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How to search your PC with Google Desktop
By Nowshade Kabir
In this era of Internet, most people are frequent users of computers.
Many of us use computers through out the day, accumulating morasses
of information in various formats, which include email, digital
photo, word document, spreadsheet, presentation file, ebook, article,
other downloaded files, music, visited web pages, and many others.
We stuff them in multiple folders in our PC. Before we know it,
our hard drives become a storeroom of misplaced items. As a result,
finding a needed file of information some times become a daunting
task!
The search function integrated to Microsoft Windows is not a big
help either. It requires you to know, albeit vaguely, where the
file could possibly be located. If your data storage is significant
and you made a search on your whole hard disk, it might take ages
to get search results and, then again, there is no guarantee that
you will find the right file. Frustrating? Thanks to new Google
Desktop Search this is about to change!
What is Google Desktop Search?
Google Desktop Search is a free downloadable small program, which
will quickly and easily find your files no matter where in your
hard disk they are stored. The great thing about this program is
by making your computer searchable, this program frees you from
having to manually organize and sort your files, emails, and downloads.
You no more have to mull over where in your PC the information you
are looking for is residing – in your email, files or web pages
that you browsed recently.
At present Google Desktop Search works only with the full text
in Outlook and Outlook Express email, text, HTML, Word, Excel and
PowerPoint files, AOL chat, and Web pages viewed through Internet
Explorer. Other files like PDF will be probably added in future
version.
How it works?
Google Desktop Search is fairly easy to download and set up. The
address for downloading the program is http://desktop.google.com.
Once you installed the program, it begins initial indexing process
of your hard disks. This may take several hours for an average size
disk. The one-time indexing process only works when the computer
has been idle for more than thirty seconds. Indexing for Google
Desktop Search is an ongoing process, new files and emails get updated
automatically.
The search index created by the program resides on your own computer.
On your system tray you will see a swirled icon in Google colors,
by clicking on it you will open the regular Google search page with
the addition of Desktop along side with other search areas. Once
the indexing is done, files are searched in under a second and the
results are impressively precise. The top bar shows quantities of
files found under the four categories, which include emails, files,
chat and Web history.
The results are shown in much the same way as regular Google interface.
You can choose to see relevant results from all or any of the categories.
You can also sort results by relevance or by date. By clicking on
any result you open the file in respective application software.
The email query results are the best! No longer have you had to
remember in which folder you stored the email written to John in
reference to Peter. By searching for Peter or John, you will find
all relevant emails and related correspondence. You can read and
answer to any of the discovered email from the thread. This really
saves time when you need to follow up to a large numbers of emails
each day.
There are two more text buttons next to the search field. One is
Desktop Preferences and other is Remove Items. Desktop preferences
allow you to choose the types of files you would like the program
to include in its index out of available ones. You can also point
out not to index specific folders from your hard disk. If you share
your PC with others, it’s a good idea to eliminate your private
folders from the Desktop index. You can also specify not to index
certain websites from your cached web history as well. The Remove
items button allow you to eliminate selected results from the index.
The advance search option allows you to search by phrase by putting
the phrase within quotation marks, to eliminate a word from search
by putting a minus sign in front of the word, to search by file
type, and to search within a web URL. A neat feature is to integrate
your desktop search with your web search. This is very handy if
you have already done an extensive search for some information and
after a few days doing search for similar information once again.
Privacy question By default, Google Desktop Search collects a limited
amount of non-personal information from your computer and sends
it to Google. This includes summary information, such as the number
of searches you do and the time it takes for you to see your results,
etc. You can opt out of sending this information during the installation
process or from the Desktop preferences later. According to Google
Privacy Policy no personally identifying information, such as your
name or address, will be sent to Google without your explicit prior
permission.
What is missing?
I bemoan not having PDF files in the search process as yet. I have
dozens of e-books and PDF whitepapers residing in my PC, and I really
would prefer to have them indexed. That way, I’d have been
able to read materials, when I needed them most. The other thing
I want to see is clustered result of my query, which shows organized
search results into meaningful hierarchical folders similar to the
way Vivisimo search engine works. This clustering is particularly
helpful for desktop search, as this allows us to see other relevant
documents connected to the searched word.
Conclusion : Due to Google’s immense popularity as
a search engine, it’s logical that most users will prefer Google’s
desktop search program as oppose to other similar programs, such
as Copernic and Hotbot. Finally you can search your very own computer
with similar ease and preciseness as you have been searching the
Internet for quite some time.
About the author Nowshade Kabir is the founder, primary developer
and present CEO of Rusbiz.com. A Ph. D. in Information Technology,
he has wide experience in Business Consulting, International Trade
and Web Marketing. Rusbiz is a Global B2B Emarketplace with solutions
to start and run online business.
You can contact him at mailto:nowshade@rusbiz.com,
http://ezine.rusbiz.com/archivenews.html?nl_oid=46
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