Neowin member and Microsoft Windows Search developer Brandon Live, aka Brandon Paddock, has been kind enough to publically release his own unofficial tool for Windows Vista.
"Users of WDS on XP may recall the "Deskbar Shortcuts" functionality that allows you to create little aliases between words or characters with commands and searches. For example, you could set up the Deskbar so that you could type "g Stuff" to search for the work "Stuff" on Google. You could also launch programs, run scripts with parameters, and more. Windows Vista replaced the Deskbar with Instant Search built-in to the Start menu, which is totally awesome. Unfortunately, it lacks all of that fun shortcut functionality that the Deskbar had. Unless you have my tool, which for the time being I"m calling Start++."