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Windows gives you a desktop, a Start menu, a taskbar, and a search bar. The things you actually use every day are still scattered across all of them. Alcove gives them one place to live - a visual workspace you open with a hotkey, arrange the way you work, and close again.
A grid you arrange the way you think
Drop shortcuts, apps, folders, and shell objects onto a grid. Drag them around, snap them into place, and the layout stays the way you left it. It's a workspace you arrange, not a list somebody else designed.
One hotkey away#
Hit your hotkey from anywhere in Windows and your space appears. Hit it again and it is gone. No alt-tabbing through twenty windows, no minimising everything to get to the desktop.
Everything you put in Alcove stays where you left it. Drag it around, rearrange it until it fits.
Drop a `.lnk`, `.url`, or `.exe` onto the window and Alcove copies it in, pulls out its icon, and drops it on the grid. Drag a folder in and it becomes a Windows junction, not a copy, so the original stays put. Click to launch. That is the whole idea.
Not a launcher#
A launcher is a list you type at. Alcove is a space you arrange. The Command Palette is in there too - local search, Google, Wikipedia - but the grid comes first.
The grid is the thing: the stuff you use, laid out the way you think about it, visible all at once instead of buried in a menu.
Around the edges: Peek for quick file previews, volume and audio device switching with a per-app mixer, power actions that ask before they act, and full keyboard navigation if you'd rather not touch the mouse.
Yours, privately#
Nothing leaves your machine unless you ask it to. No account, no telemetry, no analytics, no crash reporting. Your workspace lives in `%APPDATA%\Alcove\` as plain JSON and copied files.
Back it up to a single `.alcove-backup` file and restore it whenever. The only network calls are the ones you trigger yourself - a Wikipedia lookup, a Google search opened in your browser, a currency conversion pulling the ECB rate feed.
The docs
- Privacy PolicyWhat is stored on your device, what leaves it, and how to remove it.
- Terms of UseWhat you can and can't do with Alcove, and the limits of the licence.
- SupportWhere your data lives, common questions, uninstalling, and how to get help.
Getting help
Questions, bugs, feature requests - all welcome. See Support for the fastest route, or email iamincontrol.dev@gmail.com.