Google beat out rivals Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL in launching an application that lets users retrieve Outlook e-mail, text files, Microsoft Office documents, AOL IM logs and a history of Web pages previously viewed via the Web browser. Google calls it a "photographic memory for your computer."
According to search industry pundit Danny Sullivan, Google is making the desktop part of Google, rather than making search part of the operating system. And your desktop data never is never sent on to Google.com--your machine does the heavy lifting on local data.
AOL is close behind with a desktop search tool in the works that will likely be offered as a feature within a Web browser that AOL is developing. Meanwhile, Apple has already demonstrated a desktop search tool (Spotlight) that will make its appearance in the next version of Mac OS X. Google on Thursday (14 Oct) unveiled its first-generation desktop application for searching through personal files and Web history stored locally on a PC, a move that could shake up the landscape of Internet search and raise privacy hackles. The Mountain View, Calif.-based company, which will report earnings for the first time as a public company next week, has created Google Desktop Search, a thin-client application that lets people retrieve e-mail, Microsoft Office documents, AOL chat logs and a history of Web pages previously viewed, all via a Web browser. "It's like photographic memory for your computer--if you've seen it before, you should be able to find it," said Marissa Mayer, director of consumer Web products at Google. Rumored for months, Google's unveiling of desktop search trumps rivals Yahoo, Microsoft and America Online in the race to integrate Web navigation with PC search and stay on the cutting edge of search technology in people's minds. Desktop search has been earmarked a priority by all the major search engines, but among investors and analysts Microsoft has posed the biggest threat to Google's reign because of its dominance with the Windows operating system. The software giant has said its long-delayed version of Windows, code-named Longhorn, will eventually bring better PC file search to the operating system, although that plan has been delayed. In addition, Microsoft researchers are developing more advanced search tools that could find their way into future products.
What's surprising is that it has taken these companies--not to mention Microsoft--so long to create something that every user needs. Perhaps more interesting is how the sudden rush for the crown of desktop search will impact Microsoft's plans for WinFS - the search-oriented filesystem for future versions of Windows that Bill Gates once called the "Holy Grail" of Longhorn, but that has been subject to numerous delays.
Loring Windblad has studied nutrition and exercise (as an informed amateur interested in the field) for more than 40 years, is a published author, graphic designer, freelance writer and photographer. He is married to the beautiful June Dawn, owner of Windy Dawn Marketing. Loring has written grants, business plans and resumes that got the job done right They can be reached through http://www.organicgreens.us
