Menu Management

Menu Management

Use the keyboard shortcuts to visually edit the menu while it is open. Changes are written immediately to LAUNCH.MNU.

Add

CTRL+A allows you to add a new folder, launcher, or separator to the currently visible (right-most) menu panel.

Each menu panel can display 20 items, and there can be at most 4 panels displayed (so maximum 4 level deep hierarchy).
Adding a 21st item automatically creates a More folder at the bottom and moves the overflow into it. Further overflow is handled the same way, up to the four-level menu limit. More is kept at the bottom when the menu is sorted.

If we want to go higher than 4 make some noise, I just don't think it's realistically needed for anyone really.

Edit

CTRL+E will show you the edit dialog to modify the selected launcher or rename a folder.

• If a launcher has Prompt? activated, when launched from the menu, the parameter entry dialog will be displayed.
  You will be able to enter parameters before running the program.
• Provide enter after launcher command if toggled off will just type the command, not supplying Enter - allowing you to then add more to the command line (such as further parameters) or review it, before execution.
• When Change directory first is selected, Launch! extracts the directory from the first command token when the launcher is run.
  E.g. for C:\TOOLS\APP.EXE it types C:, presses Enter, types CD C:\TOOLS, presses Enter, and then types the complete configured command. The Enter setting applies to that final complete command; the preliminary drive and CD commands must receive Enter.
  Commands without a path do not cause a directory change.
• If Add to PATH for execution is selected, the command's directory will be added to the environment %PATH% variable. Many programs require this, and will update AUTOEXEC.BAT/FDAUTO.BAT - all competing for environment space in a tiny environment variable (cough including this one). This allows you do away with that, and just add a program to PATH as/when launched from the menu itself.

• Floppy disk programs (on A: or B:) can be added as a launcher to the menu. When these launchers are opened from the menu, you'll be prompted to insert the floppy disk containing the program to continue. Launch! will validate the program exists on the floppy disk before trying to execute.

Remove

CTRL+D will remove the selected item from the menu (with confirmation first).

Re-order

You can move selected items up and down with CTRL+↑/↓. CTRL+S will sort the current panel alphabetically.

Manual menu configuration

LAUNCH.MNU is a plain text file that you can edit yourself with any text editor.
Within the LAUNCH.MNU file, sections represent menu paths. Separate nesting levels with a backslash:

  [Launcher\Internet]
  FOLDER=Communications
  ITEM=Telnet|C:\MTCP\TELNET.EXE|1|0|101

  [Launcher\Internet\Communications]
  ITEM=Pine|C:\COMM\PINE.EXE|1|1|0

An ITEM record has this form:

ITEM=title|command and parameters|provide Enter|change directory|prompt

The last three values are 1 for on and 0 for off. Records that do not contain them remain compatible and default to 1|0|0.

A separator is added with

SEPARATOR=