Google Desktop Search 2 - Desktop Sidebar
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As the installation completed and the indexing of my hard drive started, I looked to my sidebar and found some nice user enhancements they added. It has a nice collection of information, clicking on items makes a popup slide out to the left to display more information. This even resembles the idea and features of the sidebar that Microsoft has been advocating for their upcoming Windows Vista. Unless Microsoft has much broader design plans, their new sidebar could be far less notable. This also goes head-to-head with Yahoo!’s newly purchased Konfabulator widgets, providing the same kinds of services (albeit less customizable).
Some of those services include weather for your local city and a stock indicator by default set to the Dow Jones Index (DJI). There is a “What's Hot” tab, that shows you what news and searches are hot or trendy online. It is automatically generated, using multiple resources, to show what people are talking about online.
Because of privacy issues mentioned later in this article, Google could be using information gathered from Google Desktop users to provide this “What’s Hot” information. Data collected from user searches could both define what’s how and also show how well developed organic result pages are.
Some other useful features offered are what appears to be an RSS feed of Google News and Web Clips, which displays RSS updates of web pages I visit. For webmasters, this is a clear reason why you need to be able to export your site content via and RSS feed. RSS has many applications, and reaching Google Desktop is just the newest one. This is where true marketing can occur, allowing websites to convert sales using desktop information feeds; it has much lower costs and higher views than any other ad production.
There also is a Scratch Pad where you can type notes and they will be saved automatically for you. There is also a tab for your photos, which cycles through all photos on your PC. So, if you collect pornographic photos and share a home PC with your family, you may want to rethink any decision to download this nifty little Google application (unless you feel confident in beating the Google indexer to the block files). I think Google could do better with the photo feature by making each user on a computer could have the ability to customize it for themselves. An administrator feature for parents would go a long way in gainging the acceptance of the end user Google needs.
Finally, there is the Quick View. For me, this tab pushed me to uninstall the Google Desktop Search Tool 2. The very first file that Google indexed for me reads "secure.overture.com" which is where I log in to manage my clients’ Yahoo Overture Pay Per Click campaigns. I am not about to let Google see this, nor can I run the risk of this information being exposed online in any way. Another issue is I also manage Google Adwords campaigns for clients. I run more Adwords campaigns than Overture, and log into the My Client Center more often than Yahoo Overture. The trouble is that Google did not feel that this should be in my top three Quick Views. That has me wondering why not, and why Overture should be?
Next: Desktop Privacy >>
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