Categories

The Categories indexing rule automatically groups similar items. All items of the same kind are collected in a single category, allowing you to sub-search this category for a specific item.

If you are searching for an item of a particular kind, you can use categories to restrict the search-scope to items of that kind. Just select the corresponding category and press Space to search within this category only.

Note that the Categories indexing rule performs no indexing on its own. It just provides another perspective on the items that are already indexed.

Example 1

Let’s say you have created a bookmark folder in Safari named “News” and you wish to select this folder in LaunchBar in order to retrieve one of the contained bookmarks. Type e.g. BF to select the “Bookmark Folders” category, which contains all of your bookmark folders. Now press the space bar to sub-search this category for the “News” folder. Then press the space bar again to show all the bookmarks in this folder.

Example 2

Say you are looking for a particular image. Instead of searching the whole index you can restrict the search result to image files only by sub-searching the “Image Files” category.

If you know the exact type of the searched image file, you can restrict the search even further. You may e.g. type PSIM to select the “Adobe Photoshop Images” category, and search for Photoshop documents only.

Example 3

If you wish to play a particular album from your iTunes Library, select the Albums category, press Space and type an abbreviation for the album’s name.

Or even faster, select and sub-search the Albums category with a single keystroke using Instant Send.

Company, Department and Job Title categories

The “Company”, “Department” and “Job Title” categories allow you to quickly retrieve groups of similar contacts.

LaunchBar automatically groups people working for the same company, within in the same department or people with the same profession. These categories are directly accessible via abbreviation search.

You need a plumber? Just enter PLUM to select the Plumbers category, then hit the right arrow key to display a list of all plumbers available from your contacts.

You may also search for a particular company by sub-searching the Companies category, then press right arrow to retrieve all people working for that company.