>One of the most popular programs I ever wrote was a menu app written in the Basic that used to come with MS-Dos.
>All it did was execute a bat file that called programs like Lotus 123, etc.
>Sounds primitive but it was a lot better than navigating to the .exe.
>Windows made it obsolete.

What, shortcuts on the ikonostas?*? That's near useless as soon as you reach the critical mass of about thirty of them.
Likewise, all the attempts to hide the complexity of the directory tree system (introduction of catalogs, of labyrinthine fake folders with fancy names, of putting things in app's own hidden folders so the user can't find them later etc etc) have only made things worse.

Believe me, after all these years (and under linux, whose filesystem is actually simpler) I have one folder with about a dozen batch files (ok, bash files) to launch my favorite apps. Those that aren't on the toolbar. And that folder is always at hand (second tab on the left pane of DoubleCommander).

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* in orthodox christianity, the wall behind the altar, where the ikons are hung; on a PC that'd be the desktop