Integrate Launchy With Wget

Reader Justin writes in with a clever idea for quickly launching downloads with the popular command-line download manager, wget. His method: Make wget available to Launchy, then pass the URL of the file you want to download to wget through Launchy. Here’s how it works:

1. Install Launchy.
2. Download wget and copy the files from the unzipped folder to C:\Windows.
3. Create a shortcut to C:\Windows/wget.exe and rename it dl.
4. Place that shortcut in your Start menu. To configure wget to start minimised, right-click the shortcut, select Properties, and tick the checkbox next to Run minimized.
5. Finally, to set the download directory, set the working directory (Start in) to your download folder of choice.
6. Now simply rebuild your Launchy index, and voila!

To download a file with wget, just invoke Launchy, type ‘dl’ (though I actually stuck with wget), hit Tab, then paste the link. It works great, and it’s a really handy shortcut if you want to start a quick download. If the command line isn’t your cup of tea but you wouldn’t mind a little more flexibility with your downloads, take a quick look at the Hive Five Best Download Managers. Thanks Justin!