TextLaunch

This plasmoid for KDE 4.3 or later is something like a quicklaunch, but instead of icons you get text buttons. You can assign any command or string of commands to the button as well as a tool tip.

Why text?

Someone may well ask, "Why text buttons when we have pretty icons?". Text has a few of advantages:
- Text is simple, descriptive, and to the point. I use a lot of custom-built or in-house apps at work, so I hate having to remember which tiny blob of pixels on my panel launches which program. So much easier just to have the words right there.
- Text buttons are short and wide; icons are always square in KDE (even if they're not supposed to be!). Shrink your panel down on a small, wide screen (like a netbook) and you will have a hard time clicking a little square icon. But a nice wide text button is easy to click.
- If you're arsty about your desktop, some icons don't go well with some backgrounds/themes/styles. Text is like blue jeans or ketchup: it isn't spectacular but it goes with everything!

KNOWN ISSUES:

- None presently; older issues have been fixed or disappeared with recent versions of KDE.

TODO:
- I'd like to make the font/colors/size customizable, but after conferring with plasma-devel there seem to be some limitations of libplasma in the way. Maybe there's a way around this.
- Maybe drag&drop support for .desktop files, we'll see.
- Maybe add Dock-like functionality (where a launcher only launches one instance of the program, switching to the open instance if there is one) would be a nice option for launchers.
- Other appearance tweaks?

If you want to contribute, get the code on github:

https://github.com/alandmoore/textlaunch-plasmoid

* Version 0.3.3 by vkos (Sep 5, 2010)
- Layout fix in configuration form
* Version 0.3.2 (Feb 19, 2010)
- Fixed a small bug that broke fixed widths after KDE 4.4 upgrade. Let me know if it breaks 4.3 or other.
* Version 0.3.1 (Oct 17, 2009)
- Removed margin around the buttons so they take up less vertical space.
* Version 0.3 (Sep 28, 2009)
- Now uses Plasma Tooltips
- Can set background style to default or translucent (only seems to have an effect when used off-panel)

* Version 0.2.1 (Sep 16, 2009)
- Fixed a small bug that caused icons to display instead of text under certain conditions.

* Version 0.2 (Sep 13, 2009)
- Selection follows your item when moving buttons in the launcher config.
- Launchers can be added without comment (tooltip) text.
- You'll get a warning (and no button will be added) if you don't enter a command or button text for an item.
- NEW FEATURE: You can make the layout horizontal (default) or vertical (ideal for sidebar use)
- NEW FEATURE: You can set the buttons to a fixed width (good for vertical use)

* Version 0.1 (Sep 10, 2009)
- Initial release