A letter to Listary users 💌

general
#1

Hello, Listary users! It’s been a long time!

Sorry to disappear for almost three years and then reappear in this way. I have so many feelings to share with Listary and especially with you, the users who have always been with Listary for the past few years.

Perplexed

When starting working on Listary 6, I was a full-time indie developer. In those days, I was constantly thinking about how to develop a better product. I have too many ideas, but hard to classify and drop any. As a result, I was stuck in the puzzle of product design - pile of features. What features might be useful? Provide it. What functions do related products serve? Provide it. What requirements did the users express? Provide it.

So we saw features like “extension”, “web search”, and a slew of others that you and I might never use. The features were fulfilling, yet confusing, both for Listary and myself. I can’t even describe what Listary is in one sentence – any description seems to only cover half of its functions.

By chance, I joined an AI startup in 2019 and started exploring new areas. The working environment has also shifted to macOS and Linux, moving it further away from the soil where Listary thrives. Soon after, due to time constraints, the update came to a halt.

The Awakening

Although I no longer use Windows, Listary has never left me. I don’t know how many times I unconsciously hit the Ctrl key twice on my MacBook Pro while searching with Spotlight, thinking that it shouldn’t be so slow, waiting for that magical directory prompt when saving files…

My enthusiasm for Listary never disappear and I am even more eager to update it right now.

My experience in the field of AI over the last three years has led me to a new stage in both product design and development. This long and brief withdrawal also allowed me to reconsider what kind of product Listary is, what kind of product it will be, what is its weakness, and more importantly, what is its strengths.

It’s the proper time to set off again.

Restarting

In the future, Listary will continue to focus on keeping files/applications at your fingertips and providing you with an extreme user experience.

A brand-new vision, a brand-new product, and a brand-new journey. A better Listary, hope you will like it again :heart:

Some additional topics

Upcoming new features?

Full path fuzzy matching

You may be familiar with this if you’ve used VS Code or other IDEs. Now Listary brings it to your everyday life :sunglasses:

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Changelog of recent updates?

Mainly stability improvements and bug fixes. All the bugs that can be reproduced should have been fixed now.

How much time do you have for Listary in the future?

It’s still a little limited and I’ll keep it in the development. I’ll read all posts and emails but may not be able to reply to all.

26 Likes
Not indexing network drive?
#2

thankyou :grinning:

1 Like
#3

when can a stable version be released. Is there a certain date?

1 Like
#4

thank you for your developing

1 Like
#5

Welcome back!
There are too many “coming soon:)” to be done

1 Like
#6

Welcome back friend! Listary is my favorite software and I’m happy to see you back. It’s been stable enough for daily use even on hiatus which attests to the quality. Thanks for everything!

2 Likes
#7

so glad you’re back.

1 Like
#8

Hum…
Quite happy to see u…but how you can leave users for 3 years without any single word ??
I really can’t understand that…
Of course u could be busy …but a short message…come on !!
Many switch to fluent search, it’s super powerful, different from listary, but now it can do same and much more.
Let’s see the first update…and how it going on

Welcome back

3 Likes
#9

:grinning:oh yeah :two_hearts:

1 Like
#10

Kinda True, but well, some just can’t inform their community because they don’t know how to feel 'bout that (or don’t know how to express themself) and there could be a lot more that may should not be questioned a single bit.

Everyone has their own personality.

Can agree Fluent Search is nice, used it a while, also “Everything”…

Stumbled upon Listary a Month Ago, tested it once and dropped it because there was no updates besides the suspicious new "update" even if I really liked what it does! - so I looked today if there are any news and @Channing seem to be finally back! :white_heart: (well Channing is back but you never know how long, at least I hope as long as possible)

Fluent Search looks a lot nicer and is really powerful ofc (but feels a lot more heavier for me), Listary instead feels darn fast & responsible and extremely light on resources. they’re even some more things I noticed but can’t describe at all~

(Well, the double press ctrl search-bar is offset af and if I search the results are kinda cut off) anyways…

While I had a good time with Fluent Search I still would prefer Listary if its gonna really be updated more often~ :blush:

2 Likes
#11

Bravo~~~ :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:

1 Like
#12

Hi @Channing.

After such a long time you are finally back! There is a lot of work to be done with Listary, It’s a great piece of software that has become indispensable for me for many years, and I have tried several alternatives but none is as good as Listary. You say you no longer use Windows, but you use a MacBook. A Listary alternative for Mac is Alfred, have you used it? It’s similar to Spotlight, but with many more features. I have heard that it’s very good, as good as Listary, but unfortunately there is no version of Alfred for Windows and the developers of Alfred have no interest in bringing it to Windows. If you don’t know Alfred, you can try it and get some useful ideas from that software to apply them to Listary.

Now that rounded corners are coming in Windows 11, I would also like to see Listary with rounded corners, as well as dark theme support, plus integration with a file viewer like QuickLook.

Thank you very much for making Listary, and I look forward to more updates.

Good day.

1 Like
#13

Exited to have you back. I’ve only recently gotten into Listary and I absolutely love it. Seems my timing was pretty good.

1 Like
#14

Yay @Channing is back. Best :love_letter: of the decade! :heart_eyes:

1 Like
#15

念念不忘，必有回响 :joy:

#16

Listary 6 下载路径在哪里呢

#17

As a long time user of Listary that had switched to Fluent Search, I’m glad @Channing is back. Listary is just more polished and reliable. I’d like to reiterate a few requests I made back when development was active =

  1. Ability to input search keywords AFTER the search query. Ex. “Chrome+Space+g” would search for “Chrome” with the Google search engine
  2. Make search keywords case insensitive
  3. Ability to delete file from search results by pressing Del key
  4. Default to Google search when no keyword has been inputted or no file was found.
3 Likes
#18

You need check default folder X on OSX. Its an app which is, in my eyes more capable tthan Listary in terms of folder traversing.

Very yglad you took the time and effort to do some more development. Finally i can enjoy this app without it crashing after the first usage after a restart. I was never really able to use it properly, always kept crashing. Im talking about the beta app ofcourse.

#19

YES~~~~~!!!~~~~~ C’s BACK!!
The ones I know
Xie Xie nian!!!

  • Urdu = Shukriya
  • French = merci
  • Spanish = gracias
  • German = danke
  • Arabic = shukraan
  • Japanese = arigato
  • Farsi/Persian = mam’noon
  • Hindi/Indian = dhanyavaad
  • Thai = khĂ awp-khun
    Cantonese = Do Ze
    Others
  • Italian = grazie
  • Portuguese = obrigado
  • Zulu = ngiyabonga
  • Navajo = ahĂŠhee’
  • Tongan = mālō
  • Esperanto = dankon
1 Like
#20

Thank you!
Always be there, and always be with.
Anyway, is there any chance to see is on MacOS, when you are being shifted to MacOS too^-^?