Well, the title of the thread is “A dashboard (not only) for DEVONthink”. I therefore assumed the thread was supposed to be about dashboards, a concept that has interested me for a long time. (And here I take “dashboard” to mean broadly a way of getting quick access to items that interest you, usually presented in some sort of group, as icons, or perhaps a list.) It was the word “dashboard” that sparked my interest. I confess I have something of a weakness for this sort of thing, and I’ve lost count of the number of “solutions” I’ve tried over the decades – including DragThing, FinderPop, Fresh, Liquid – you name it, I’ve tried it. You can even achieve something of this sort using Gladys, or Dropzone, which is a utility that I use a lot. In recent times I was simply tagging files with “status:urgent”, “status:pending” and so forth, and using smart folders (both inside and outside DEVONthink) to keep track of those items. It worked pretty well. As to the video, well it is possible to use the method to create a dashboard for quick access to individual items inside DEVONthink. Here is a screenshot of one that I created in a couple of minutes this morning.
The last three items on the palette are items inside a DT database, accessible via item links, and clicking on them will open them in DT. Any item that can be linked can be placed on the palette. Not only that, you can even put actions or menu items on the palette, or even chain them together. The other items are there because I added the new ones to a pre-existing palette. Some of them launch two different applications and position the windows to my taste. The palette appears on my screen when I make a three-finger swipe on my trackpad. Granted, this is not a way to deal with large numbers of bookmarks, but personally I would not want more than a few items on a dashboard because in my view that would defeat its purpose. If I did want a large number of bookmarks, I would probably use the tagging and smart folder method, or I might use Tinderbox to watch a DT folder. Since I keep my DT databases indexed with SpotLight, I can use that, or HoudahSpot, to find tagged items inside a DT database very quickly. It is even possible to use Alfred to do the same thing.
I certainly intend no disrespect for the solution @pete31 has offered to the problem of creating dashboards – on the contrary. Indeed I looked at it, and even installed SuperTab temporarily, to see if it could work for me. I regret that it doesn’t suit my purposes, which is no reflection on the quality of the script. It is merely the case that I have different needs. If I mentioned the system I use, it was only in case it might be of interest to others – which it may well not be. I used to be a teacher, and it is natural to me to want to share knowledge. But we all work in different ways, and each of us has to find their own solutions. I believe that discussion of other options can help us to find one that works for us.
All the best,
Martin.