I don't think this has been covered yet. Google released the first iteration of their desktop search. Looks very good so far.
http://desktop.google.com |
That's big news, thanks Jamie. |
The underlying search tool is awesome. It's fast and does the job!
However, I don't like the way the results are presented. Web pages are fine for an internet search, but I would like a bit more flexibilty when I'm searching on my own computer. I am not really waiting to click through several pages of results to find the desired file.
Ideally Google should harness the impressive search technology and put some sort of client on top of it that easily let's you tweak your query, browse through results, change your preferences, remove items from the cache etc.
They should combine the best of what their web based search experience has with the advantages of being on the desktop. |
I like the way Google Desktop searches my emails (I use Outlook Express). However, there are still some drawbacks:
- attachments are not indexed
- you can't see in which mail folder a mail has been found, so that if you want to look up the original mail, you still have to use your Outlook Express search.
- I have a lot of backuped and/or recovered mails in .eml format. These haven't been indexed. I would have thought that Google Desktop would have indexed them as seperate files, but apparently it didn't.
|
Here are some more findings:
- indexing chat sessions from AOL IM is a separate option, but my stored chat sessions from MSN Messenger (these are automatically stored in XML format through the logging option of Messenger) are not indexed
- web pages from my local chached are indexed, I want to be able to switch this of easily, to separate local search from web search. These cached web pages point to the web location, this is good, but I still want to switch this off. I can switch it off by excluding the cache directory, but this should become easier. |
Loving it so far.
Specially since I don't have beagle/Ximian desktop, and was waiting for this for so long that I almost started out with writing something (or with egging people to write something of this kind).
Liked the idea that they are sticking with the web interface, though am dreaming of much more. The lightweight server and everything.
Now guess we just have to wait for a firefox extension to slickerize this, if that is possible. :D
|
When Google integrates Desktop with Deskbar, then they will really blow away the competition. I did it manually, but it would be nice to see it built in. |
We just built the Google Desktop Search into our Firefox toolbar.
Now you can search all of the Google engines, your Desktop, GMail, and even add your own engines, right from your toolbar.
http://www.firefoxtoolbar.com/google
Any feedback on the GDS addition to our toolbar would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
-Pat |
