LaunchBack 1.1.0 Beta Release: App Reordering and Custom Directories!

Unfortunately, my old Reddit account was recently suspended without notice (though I believe it to be because of "spam" from reminding people who comment about missing Launchpad that they can submit feedback requests), but this has not halted my progress with developing this app. Instead, here I am now on Lemmy!

Hey everyone, I'm proud to announce the first beta release for LaunchBack, my FOSS Launchpad remake built entirely independently of Spotlight and Launchpad/Apps dependencies!

• Application Reordering: By opening LaunchBack's settings via the menu bar and switching to the "General" tab, you are now presented with two options: Alphabetical and Manual sorting!
  • With Alphabetical sort, your apps are automatically arranged from A-Z on all pages, no manual reordering required.
  • As for Manual sort, with the option enabled in the "General" tab, you can switch to the "Apps" tab and see your applications in a column, my personal take on an improved reordering system for LaunchBack over the classic grid-based method. This may eventually be changed and I plan on refining things further in time, but this is currently functional.
    • While manual sort is still being worked on since drag-and-drop is seemingly unavailable on macOS via Swift's "editmode" function, you can move apps up or down in the list with Command and the ↑ ↓ keys or the onscreen "Move Up" and "Move Down" buttons.
• Custom App Directories: While this is still very much a WIP feature in more of a placeholder-ish state, LaunchBack brings a feature unavailable in the classic Launchpad in the form of custom application directories! In theory, you should be able to click the "Apps" menu from the settings and add folders containing your apps, a feature which could be useful for applications not stored on-device or in the traditional /Applications directories.
  • There is a known issue with this where duplicate application entries may appear with recursive directories and/or other circumstances. This has usually been resolved with an application relaunch or system reboot.
• Do note: The LaunchBack grid is not (yet) updated in real-time, and you must either Relaunch LaunchBack (available via a button at the bottom of the Settings window) or close and reopen the app manually to see changes. This applies for toggling manual and alphabetical sort, showing the rearranged apps in their new order, and custom app directories. Please do not submit issue requests regarding the grid not updating in real-time.

Why LaunchBack? See, while other solutions for accessing apps exist on macOS, there have always been three fundamentals of Launchpad that make it so beloved: A fullscreen app grid with search, application reordering, and folder support for organization. With Launchpad's removal in macOS 26 Tahoe, plenty of alternatives or solutions have arisen with some of these, but as a new developer learning more about computer science, I figured this would make for a great starting project to learn Swift, hoping to eventually capture (and surpass) the functionality of Apple's original Launchpad application. Furthermore, projects like OpenShell from ClassicShell on Windows inspired me to make the app fully free and open-source, which I was successfully able to achieve. Previously with release 1.0, I was able to achieve the first of these fundamentals, and now with Beta 1.1.0, I proudly present a solution for the second fundamental, as well as another LaunchBack exclusive: Application Reordering & Custom App Directories!

So then, without further ado... here's LaunchBack 1.1.0! Watch the GitHub page to follow along and be notified for new updates such as folder support, Sparkle updates, Homebrew installation, and more! https://github.com/trey-a-12/LaunchBack/releases/tag/Beta