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Today Google releases a beta of Google Desktop 2, a thoroughly revamped
version of the computer-searching program. This iteration further erases the difference between local content and
network content, a dividing line already smeared by the original Google Desktop Search.
The most significant interface change is in the appearance of a vertical sidebar that slams onto the side of the
desktop, top to bottom, and presents various information nuggets from news, weather, photos, email, and stocks, to …
[gasp!] ... RSS feeds. They are not called RSS feeds, but Web Clips (further justifying Microsoft’s
too-controversial
testing of “Web feeds” as an alternate name for RSS).
The sidebar contains bookmarks and a scratch pad. Tell me if I’m wrong, and pinch me if I’m asleep, but this thing is
starting to look a little like … a browser. It can be minimizxed manually, but it actually remains open on the desktop
even after clicking Show the Desktop in the taskbar. Let it be known from this moment: Google is serious. It wants to
take your desktop away from Microsoft.
Google seems to have quietly shortened the name of the desktop product. When I was completing the manuscript to my
latest Google book (just out by the way), the extremely helpful Tom Stocky at Google repeatedly requested that I
refer to Google Desktop with its full name, Google Desktop Search. For the sake of fluent text I sometimes declined,
and now Google seems to have realized that Google Desktop is a friendlier name.
Google Desktop 2 is currently indexing my machine. Fortunately, this machine was completely wiped with a fresh
Windows install about two weeks ago, and I haven’t reloaded all the files to the main internal drive. I’ll post a
better review when the indexing is complete.
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