Google, on Monday August 22, released a beta of a new desktop toolbar, known as Desktop Search 2. Google claims it to be an upgrade to its previous Desktop Search tool, and this new search application goes far beyond typical search.
Keeping in mind that I do like Google, it seems many things that the company has done in the past year are encroaching boundaries of privacy issues and intellectual property rights. Eventually, this most likely will have their legal counsel spending months defending lawsuits.
Sometimes I wonder why other search engines feel a need to blindly follow Google's maneuverings and adopt some form of competitive technology without looking at the intelligence of the programs. Most of the top search engines are now offering some type of desktop search tool, and as far as I’m aware Google’s is the most popular of these tools.
To see what the newest Google toy now does with my data, I downloaded and installed the Desktop Search 2 Beta Toolbar. First, Google demanded that it shut down basically every open program: Windows Messenger, Instant Messenger, FireFox, Word, and Outlook. Perhaps this is so that it can integrate itself with them. Afterwards, you can configure they tool for personal settings using the screen below.
Of the three options of how to display the tool, the sidebar has the most functionality. And although it offered to index my Gmail, I declined; search engines can give me information overload as it is, and throwing my 100,000s of e-mails into a search interface just doesn't make me comfortable.
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