For a few months now I have been a huge fan of Alfred, the super smart application launcher (and more) for Mac OS X. After having used Quicksilver, Butler and LaunchBar before, I now feel at home with Alfred.

With the latest release (0.9.9) came a long-awaited feature: extensions! Before you were already able to create custom queries – something like jq foo being translated into a URL like http://docs.jquery.com/Special:Search?search=foo that is then opened in your browser. And that was already cool. But now you can create custom extensions that trigger Shell Scripts, AppleScripts, Automator Workflows, etc. And it could not be easier. What’s even cooler is that you can easily import others’ extensions or export yours and share them with others.

I have recently created a few extensions for myself which I want to share with you here. Maybe there’s something useful in it for you.

Generate Password

Generate a random password (12 characters long) and copy it to the clipboard.

Keyword: password
Download: stuff.pb.io/9C2V

Free Space

Calculate the free space on your hard disk and display it in a Growl notification.

Keyword: space
Download: stuff.pb.io/9BWL

URL Encode

Replace special characters in the given string using the %xx escape suitable for using in a URL and copy the resulting string to the clipboard.

Keyword: urlencode
Example: urlencode some text with sp€ciäl çhåráctêrs
Output: some+text+with+sp%E2%82%ACcia%CC%88l+c%CC%A7ha%CC%8Ara%CC%81cte%CC%82rs
Download: stuff.pb.io/9BvD

Say

Read the given string out loud.

Keyword: say
Example: say Hello world
Download: stuff.pb.io/9BaK

Work On

This one is probably a bit specific to my workflow but may give you some ideas on how to create a similar extension for your needs.

Open a new terminal, activate virtual environment (Python), start development server, start compass watch, open the corresponding folder in TextMate and open the local website in the browser. This extensions makes some assumptions that probably do not hold true for you:

• I’m using iTerm2 instead of the OSX Terminal.app
• I’m developing in Python and using virtualenv and virtualenvwrapper
• I’m making use of virtualenvwrapper’s postactivate hook to initiate a screen/byobu session that in turn opens virtual terminals with the development server, compass watch, etc.
• I have my project sources in ~/Sites/projectname
• I have my development server running at http://projectname:8000/ (doing this using ghost).

Keyword: workon
Example: workon myproject
Download: stuff.pb.io/9D88
Source: gist.github.com/1139327

I will try to update this post when I create new extensions. Many more helpful extensions can be found on the Alfred blog.

Update 1 (2011-08-11):
«Work On» extension added.