Help, what is it?

JQL GTK (Joe's Quick Launch GTK) is a simple quick launch menu for Windows that you can use to run your applications, folders and files quickly than with the Start Menu. You can customize it by editing a simple XML file. It uses GTK+ libraries.

JQL GTK puts an icon in the Windows notify area, near the clock. If you click it with the left mouse button, a simple menu is opened; here you can puts the applications that you use frequently. If you click the icon with the right mouse button you will see a menu divided in categories; here you can puts all your applications, files and folder, in categories like "Graphic", "Video", "Web", "Utilities" and so on.

Requirements

JQL GTK runs on Windows systems, but it was tested only on Windows XP so far (you can test it on other versions and write me an email). It uses GTK+ libraries , so you need to install the GTK+ Runtime Environment for Windows on your computer. You can download the recommended version (2.10.11) directly from this link.

How to customize menus in JQL GTK

Left menu and right menu of JQL GTK are easily editable, by modifing a single XML file that is placed in the same directory of the executable (JqlGtk.exe).

The XML Links file

The XML file that you have to modify is "Links.xml": it is placed in the same directory of the executable (JqlGtk.exe). You can open it by clicking the JQL GTK icon, opening the first submenu ("Joe's Quick Launch GTK") and clicking "Open XML Links file". This file is a text file formatted like a XML document (but technically it is not). In it, you can see the first tag "<jqlgtk>" that contains the two tags for left and right menu. In this two tags there are the items.

<jqlgtk>
    <leftmenu>
        [here there are left menu items...]
    </leftmenu>
    <rightmenu>
        [here there are right menu categories and items...]
    </rightmenu>
</jqlgtk>

How to create menu items

To add an item, you have to create an item tag in the XML Links file. To place items in the left click menu you have to puts these tags in the "<leftmenu>" tag. Every item has 3 attributes: "label" is the text displayed in the menu, "path" is a Windows path (file or folder) or a Windows command that the item has to run; "icon" is a Windows path to use as icon for the item. For example, to create a menu item that runs the Windows Notepad and have the Notepad icon, the item tag is:

<item label="Notepad" path="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe"
      icon="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe" />

So, an example of left click menu that has only some Windows utilities is:

<leftmenu>
    <item label="Notepad" path="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe"
      icon="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe" />
    <item label="Calculator" path="C:\Windows\System32\calc.exe"
      icon="C:\Windows\System32\calc.exe" />
    <item label="Paint" path="C:\Windows\System32\mspaint.exe"
      icon="C:\Windows\System32\mspaint.exe" />
</leftmenu>

You can add separator in the menu writing a special item tag, with the label "-" and without path and icon:

<item label="-" />

There are some examples of items in the default XML Links file.

Right click menu and categories

The menu shown by clicking the JQL GTK icon with the right mouse button is a menu divided in categories. Every category has a group of normal menu items (like the left menu ones) inside.

To create a category, you have to create a category tag in the XML Links file. You have to puts these tags in the "<rightmenu>" tag. Every category has 2 attributes: "label" is the text displayed in the menu, "image" is the path of an image file (PNG images are recommended). Inside a category you have to place the items. For example, a category can be:

<category label="Text editing" image="C:\Images\Text.png">
    <item label="Notepad" path="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe"
      icon="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe" />
    <item label="Word Pad" path="C:\Programs\WordPad\wordpad.exe"
      icon="C:\Programs\WordPad\wordpad.exe" />
</category>

So, an example of right click menu that has only two categories is:

<rightmenu>
    <category label="Text editing" image="C:\Images\Text.png">
        <item label="Notepad" path="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe"
          icon="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe" />
        <item label="Word Pad" path="C:\Programs\WordPad\wordpad.exe"
          icon="C:\Programs\WordPad\wordpad.exe" />
    </category>
    <category label="Win utilities" image="C:\Images\Utilities.png">
        <item label="Notepad" path="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe"
          icon="C:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe" />
        <item label="Calculator" path="C:\Windows\System32\calc.exe"
          icon="C:\Windows\System32\calc.exe" />
        <item label="Paint" path="C:\Windows\System32\mspaint.exe"
          icon="C:\Windows\System32\mspaint.exe" />
    </category>
</rightmenu>

Some useful PNG images are places in the "Category images" folder. They are free icons from some icons themes.

How to run JQL GTK at Windows startup

It's convenient to run JQL GTK on Windows Startup. You can do this just checking the "Run at Windows Startup" menu item in the submenu with the application commands.

If it doesn't work...

You can do this manually, modifing the Windows Registry. Open the Windows Registry Editor (Start button, choose Run and type "regedit") and go to "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run" (use the tree to the left to browse folders). From the menu at the top choose Edit, New, String (REG_SZ) to create a new string in this folder. Name the created item "JQL GTK". Now double-click it and type the path to the JQL GTK executable file as data value (with quotation marks); for example:

"C:\Programs Files\JQL GTK\JqlGtk.exe"