Google Kills Desktop Search and Gadgets

CWmike writes with an article in Computerworld about Google axing yet another product. From the article:"Google has decided to retire Desktop, an application it first launched in 2004 that is designed to let people search for files and data stored in their computers' hard drives. It was one of the first products Google aimed against Microsoft and was intended to improve upon the native search functionality found in Windows. Desktop search became an area of competition, as Microsoft responded to the challenge and others such as Yahoo launched their own products. However, Google has decided that, with the popularity of cloud computing and users' increasing comfort with Web apps, the time has come to decommission Desktop, it said in a recent blog post. As of September 14, Google will also end support for Desktop APIs, services, plug-ins and gadgets." From the looks of it the announcement implies that Google Gadgets are getting the axe too, which a few more people might be using.

Comments

Time to decommission desktop?

[ge7]

Google has decided that, with the popularity of cloud computing and users' increasing comfort with Web apps, the time has come to decommission Desktop

I really don't like this development. Web apps tend to be really buggy and never really work as required. Either the feel is slow, you accidentally click somewhere or do something that loses all your work and most of the just doesn't feel as good as desktop app. I can't see anyone serious moving from Microsoft Office to Google's web-based offerings. Imagine if you had to do all your real development and coding within some web application. The same goes for games. I rather play real good games than some Farmville shit. I know I don't need to use them, but things like this affect everyone on larger scale. Google is destroying computers.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[The MAZZTer]

I really don't like this development. Desktop apps tend to be really buggy and never really work as required. Either the feel is slow, you accidentally click somewhere or do something that loses all your work and most of the just doesn't feel as good as desktop app. I can't see anyone serious moving from Google's web-based offerings to Microsoft Office.

This is more accurate IMO. Have had tons of problems with Office at work, especially trying to collaborate on documents (can only use Excel, not Word, can only see others' changes when you save, periodically sharing will be turned off somehow by accident, etc). When I try to change the foreground color of text in Excel, the whole app locks up for 15 seconds or longer. If a virus scan happens to be running everything goes even slower. I really wish we could use Google Docs (can't, proprietary information and all that, we could probably get some sort of local copy with an enterprise license surely though?), the collaboration features are awesome. And the great thing about web apps, at least Google's, is that they do autosaves so your data is safe. Plus managing data backups etc is on their end, and you know they gotta do a better job than we do on our own personal data!

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Riceballsan]

Indeed I would have to say much of the way googles apps tend to work, are more reliable then desktop apps. Both tend to autosave and allow recovery in the event of a power outage or something mid-work (or a misclick as you mentioned). But lets say that power outage was catestrophic, say it burnt out the power supply, or god forbid the hard drive. With the google apps you can log back in, recover from the autosave, print out or keep working whatever you were working on, while the local copy you need to either get the new power supply, put the HD in another system, and if a catestrophic HD crash, well you are looking at major time+money on data recovery then. I will be the first to admit, google has a ways to go on things like complicated excel spreadsheets etc... but honestly I still have to say in disaster recovery and likelyness of losing your stuff, google has an edge.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[PNutts]

... apps tend to be really buggy and never really work as required. Either the feel is slow, you accidentally click somewhere or do something that loses all your work ...

just like windows apps...

That that doesn't make sense, but you really believe that only apps on the Windows platform are buggy and never really work as required or slow or you can accidently lose your work then it's just sad that you posted it in a pseudo-tech forum.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Dan667]

I could not do any meaningful work with google web apps.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[couchslug]

"Google is destroying computers."

Not mine.

"Imagine if you had to do all your real development and coding within some web application."

Why? I don't nor will I ever.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[ocdscouter]

... apps tend to be really buggy and never really work as required. Either the feel is slow, you accidentally click somewhere or do something that loses all your work ...

just like windows apps...

That that doesn't make sense, but you really believe that only apps on the Windows platform are buggy and never really work as required or slow or you can accidently lose your work then it's just sad that you posted it in a pseudo-tech forum.

But where else are people supposed to share their pseudo-informed opinions?

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[MozeeToby]

I can't be the only person to think that the real reason is that the built in search features on Windows 7 (and Vista for that matter) are actually pretty good. I personally haven't felt the need to go grab a desktop search tool for windows since indexed searching was baked into the OS.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[vlm]

That that doesn't make sense, but you really believe that only apps on the Windows platform are buggy and never really work as required or slow or you can accidently lose your work then it's just sad that you posted it in a pseudo-tech forum.

"only", no. "about the same as", sure, although I'd place google apps in the lead.

If google really wants to compete with MS for office software supremacy, they are gonna have to change their user interface completely every couple years, while claiming no one can change to openoffice because its too different. From memory, google apps pretty much look and work the same as they did when they rolled out, so they're falling way behind in the critical "creates user frustration" metric/checkbox.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Eponymous Coward]

I've been using them exclusively as my office apps for almost a year now and I've grown rather fond of them. The subset of features they offer fits my needs quite well.

I've recently started automating some of the more repetitive things I do with their scripting interfaces and am pretty happy with the results.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[unencode200x]

Just as an informational item, there are lots of options with Windows. A few that come to mind:

1) www.dropbox.com - Replicate a folder to the DropBox cloud.

2) www.Office365.com - Office 2010 in the cloud (yes, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint in a browser) with lots of awesome features. For example, get a live.com account with Mesh and you can use it interchangeably with the documents on your PC. Mesh works a lot like DropBox. It also has SharePoint like features where you can open documents that are hosted on live.com or Office365.com right from Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, etc. and save them to the cloud. Not to mention Exchange and SharePoint can be had with it and there are mobile apps, etc. Lots of SMBs I run across are using this. Anyone can get a Live account with Mesh and 25 GB of storage/5GB of Mesh if I recall.

3) SharePoint - Save any type of document to a company's private cloud with tight integration for Office 2003+ with versioning and a ton of other workflow/business features baked in. I've worked on docs in SharePoint on one computer, switched to another and kept on going.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[TrueSatan]

There are a few open source alternatives (search on Sourceforge) to Google's web apps that you could host yourself and that might get past your proprietary/enterprise/security concerns. The other benefits you cite for Google systems could be seen in such an arrangement without having to do too much setting up. I prefer this sort of arrangement to handing it to a third party and it avoids giving yet more information to Google (or another provider).

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Aighearach]

I could not do any meaningful work with google web apps.

Doubtful.

More likely "would not" or "will not."

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[bonch]

... apps tend to be really buggy and never really work as required. Either the feel is slow, you accidentally click somewhere or do something that loses all your work ...

just like windows apps...

How do awful posts like this make it to +3? You didn't even bother with capitalization.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Missing.Matter]

Because it's a dig at Windows. I'll be surprised if it doesn't make it to +5 Insightful.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Riceballsan]

Haven't spent alot of time in 2 and 3. but I can say with absolute certainty 1 has a huge flaw to it. if 2 people open the same document at the same time. Person A changes a part at the top, person b changes a part at the bottom. Whoever saves 2nd will overwrite the work of the first and undo their changes, or depending on how you set it up, 2 different versions of the file will be created and you will have to merge them later adding unnecessary confusion or mess, while if it were done in google docs, the 2 people would see eachother working in real time know what changes are being made by who while they have the spreadsheet or document open, There is a difference between saving to the cloud and editing in the cloud, editing in the cloud means all parties can watch the changes in real time, and thus work can be done simultaniously, saving to the cloud means all parties can see the changes when they are submitted, which leads to problems if multiple people submit at the same time. Office 365 has the advantage of exchange integration, I will give it that as it's greatest advantage for an established company that already has it's network set up, for a new startup though I would give an edge to google apps. Secondly though wasn't this discussion intended to be about cloud vs local, When did this turn into cloud vs cloud? The main complaint that started this discussion was the idea of working on something in the cloud vs working it on a locally installed program.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

I am especially enthusiastic about the discipline imposed by my GoogleDocs size limit of 1 Mb.

So novel and revolutionary!

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[mollymoo]

At least for me, being out of 3G coverage or my broadband going down are a damn sight more frequent than hard drive failures.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[atomicbutterfly]

Yup. I think the Windows 7 one is superior to Vista in terms of recall speed as well, though I've never compared it to third-party desktop indexing software.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Goody]

Please describe the most complex spreadsheet you've ever done in Google Apps. Please include the number of graphs and pivotables and how many tens or hundreds of meg of data that's in it. Bonus points if you used the solve function. Google apps is like the Fisher Price of office suites.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Meski]

Nice to see your reasoning, too.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[steeviant]

"Google is destroying computers.".

No it's true, they are destroying computers. Their servers have a shipping container for a case, and no power supplies, no displays. They're barely computators at all.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[FhnuZoag]

Super complex spreadsheets... really just shouldn't exist.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[makinsky]

Ye, Desktop search didn't catch on even despite the lack of it in XP, but Windows 7 search is good enough - especially the Start menu search field. IMHO Gadgets wouldn't be canned - those are or will be used in ChromeOS on their laptops, unless CromeOS gets the can itself...

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[LordSnooty]

It's Apple who are destroying computers. Having no alternative to a restricted tablet with propitiatory locked-down OS is a very real possibility in the next decade.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[LordSnooty]

Proprietary obv

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[tehcyder]

Super complex spreadsheets... really just shouldn't exist.

Yes, it makes you wonder why people bother with them at all doesn't it? Nothing you can't do with a pencil, paper and calculator, after all.

Twat.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Eponymous Coward]

The limit is 1 MB, not 1 Mb. That makes a big difference.

512,000 characters is enough for a couple hundred pages of text. I've never had to write something that long but if I did, I would probably use a text editor rather than a word processor.

Office documents are typically very short and simple and it's this usage that Google is targeting. It isn't for you.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Aighearach]

It's what I call the "Professor Complex," where somebody thinks that instead of providing knowledge or insight, they try to challenge the other person to a pop quiz.

I can guarantee this, when I'm collaborating on a google apps spreadsheet I can just use the API and do things from a Ruby IRB console that are in fact very simple. My understanding is that many of those things would be complicated interacting with a spreadsheet through a modern GUI interface. I can't say for sure, because I only do very simple things through that sort of interface; things that otherwise might be written on a whiteboard.

Hundreds of megs of data? Duuuuuuuude, get a database. I can get you a good deal on some postgresql server software if you need it.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

It won't import Word .doc or .docx, larger that 1MB in the source file.

How many .doc files do you have, greater than 1MB?

Google Office in the real world? Useless turd.

Get yourself over to zoho.com, and see how it SHOULD be done!

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Eponymous Coward]

I've never had to import a Word document into Google, so I haven't experienced the problem. I suppose if I ever do run into a serious limitation with Google Docs, I would give something like zoho a try.

I have no interest in going back to running Office applications locally.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[tehcyder]

From memory, google apps pretty much look and work the same as they did when they rolled out

Indeed, just like the WordPad and Notepad programs you get with Windows have hardly changed at all in the last fifteen years.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[tehcyder]

And the great thing about web apps, at least Google's, is that they do autosaves so your data is safe.

Yes, because autosave hasn't been available since at least Office 97. Oh, wait...

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Goody]

It's not a quiz, I'm trying to get someone who promotes Google Apps to tell me they've actually done something beyond a grocery or todo list in Google Apps spreadsheets. That's great that you can do stuff with the API and Ruby, but 99% of office suite users don't do that kind of stuff. Can you do multiple models for a business plan or a complicated financial spreadsheet? I've tried. It's downright painful and makes Excel look like a walk in the park. If you want to gauge an office suite, talk with people who actually use office suites in business, not guys who use Emacs and vi as word processors.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[FhnuZoag]

Data storage should be in databases. Data manipulation should be done in software. Attempting analyses using giant spreadsheets of interrelating cells that cannot be easily debugged or even understood, using opaque 'functions' that frequently do things wrong, with massive file duplication over and over that prevent searching... That's an idiotic way to do things.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[Aighearach]

If you can't figure out what it's for from the online documents, why should somebody "tell [you]?" It isn't going to be different information.

Your theory is that Google Apps is useless and nobody really uses it? Really? Please, allow to me to roflmfao!

You really think that a "business plan" is too complex? Or a "complicated financial spreadsheet?" Raaaaaaaally? You raaaaaaaaly think that? Or, you didn't check?

As far as API stuff goes, the really funny part is that the only thing that would make a spreadsheet actually complicated is if it has a bunch of embedded programming. So then when you get to the area where Google Apps can't do that 1%, that is exactly the part that is justly being compared to other methods of API access. So you can just compare the APIs.

And no, talking to some cube monkey with a name plate is probably not going to help you "gauge an office suite," much less be the main thing to do there.

And some schmuck who has to say "office suite" over and over in place of "spreadsheet" probably formed their opinions years ago while watching a commercial telling them how business-y MS is.

Re:Time to decommission desktop?

[konohitowa]

I hate Word. Excel I'm okay with, but when it comes down to doing something moderately complicated, I'm more likely to throw Mathematica/Maple or MATLAB at the problem. That said, there are what should be simple things that I've struggled to do in GoogleDocs that I actually was able to manage in Word. And Word is really a pretty crappy program (particularly if you do any technical docs). Try doing something as simple as an outline in either of them when the outline format doesn't fit any of their pre-canned formats. It's a royal pain in the ass. But Word still ended up being better than Google Docs.

dup

[Warwick Allison]

http://tech.slashdot.org/story/11/09/03/1611214/Google-To-Shut-Down-10-Products

Re:dup

[g051051]

Didn't take long for the dupmasters to take over again, eh?

Re:dup

[Nimey]

Taco would never have allowed these dupes to happen.

CMDRTACO NEVER FORGET.

Re:dup

[Aighearach]

It's not really a dup because the original had accurate information, and this one has wild and inaccurate speculation about Gadgets.

Of course in the actual announcement it is clear that it is the gadgets for google desktop that are going away. The more normal use of gadgets, which is for web sites, is not endangered.

So it's half dup, half FUD.

Re:dup

[Mathness]

CmdrTaco's tears can cure memory loss, unfortunately he never cries.

Too bad

[boret1]

Too bad, it was one of the first google apps I ever used and really liked it. It turned me into google apps.

Re:Too bad

[Ishkibble]

It turned you INTO google apps?! You should see a doctor!

Re:Too bad

[nigelo]

(pause) He got better?

Re:Too bad

[The Grim Reefer2]

It turned you INTO google apps?! You should see a doctor!

See? This is proof that Google was justified in "killing" this app.

I'd say he was lucky the Gov't didn't decide to cover this one up. This kind of thing never turns out well for zombies. I can't image that apps would fair any better.

Re:Too bad

[boret1]

LOL. Recovering ... ;)

Something Microsoft does well

[Mean Variance]

During that heyday of competing desktop search products, I tried all that I could find.

I ended up settling on MS Desktop Search. It didn't seem to get in the way, searches were decent. To this day, it just runs on my work machines and comes in handy from time to time.

It's a very useful product when needed but not very sexy. I didn't RTA, but I presume Google got bored and couldn't monetize their version.

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[mr1911]

Yeah, Google couldn't monetize desktop search. But it did keep their name as the verb for search, and help keep folks thinking Google.

Is Google getting jealous of HP?

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[drinkypoo]

I thought google desktop search was narrowly better at finding things than what comes with windows now, but it was also more intrusive. Which is surprising. Since Windows 7 has indexed search and gadgets, there's no reason for either of these things to exist on Windows. The death of google gadgets on personalized google is a little more surprising.

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[Anonymous Coward]

I've tried most of the indexing utilities for Windows, and Everything is the one I ended up choosing.

It builds its index in seconds, and searches in realtime. It does not search inside files, though, but usually I know the filename.

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[Cinder6]

Google doesn't actually want "Google" to be a verb.

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[Aighearach]

For those that didn't read the link, google's lawyers claim that the marketing folks find it "thrilling."

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[bonch]

That's just how the trademark lawyers feel.

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[haruchai]

Let people start saying "Let me Bing that for you" on a regular basis and they'll stop complaining about it

Re:Something Microsoft does well

[tehcyder]

Yeah, Google couldn't monetize desktop search.

You do realise that every time you use(d) Google desktop search, it phoned home the results and updated your user profile at Google Central, which was then sold on to advertisers, as well as being copied to the relevant intelligence agecies if it contained any suspect words?

It never worked quite right...

[dmacleod808]

I used Desktop every couple of years as an alternative to windows search, and it never seemed to work quite right with multiple physical drives (and i have... many) and the results tended to not be any better than explorer. Additionally, being in a web page style results page, made file manipulation annoying.

AAARGH!

[jothar hillpeople]

The cloud can't replace local storage. A 10mbps cable line is no match for an internal sata drive. And google desktop search is much faster than windows search, and is much better at finding emails than outlook's own search. I have come to rely on this at work, and am loathe to install windows search instead. I would love to see this become open-source.

Re:AAARGH!

[blair1q]

I'd like to have Google's desktop search at work, but as it's Not Invented Here, it's considered a Security Risk.

Pretty sure the CIO owns an assload of MSFT, as well.

Re:AAARGH!

[schlesinm]

I use Google Desktop Search at work. The IT people keep threatening to shut it down (but I guess Google beat them to it). It's immensely useful to help me sift through my email and files to find the one document that I need to forward to a colleague. But, due to security and privacy concerns, I can't have any of this data available online. If it's not running locally and stored locally, I can't use it.

Re:AAARGH!

[Anonymous Coward]

I also found google desktop search to be way faster than windows search and it was superior to searching emails than Outlook (what a slow, bloated application that is - everyone who hates on Lotus Notes must not be using Exchange/Outlook). Maybe the search in Windows 7 is finally up to par, but not in XP or Vista by a long shot.

Re:AAARGH!

[Taty'sEyes]

The search in the cloud would happen within the servers of the cloud, not across a 10mbps connection. The query and result would however traverse the 10mbps connection. Is that not fast enough?

Re:AAARGH!

[vux984]

How about a more realistic comparison between an internal SATA drive at around 50 MBps to a fast cable download of around 50 Mbps.

I have a 50Mbps broadband service, and to suggest that it is even in the same league as a local hard drive is complete nonsense.

Your hard drive actually delivers 50MB/s uninterrupted. For your internet service to deliver you 50Mbps they actually need the source to be able to send it to you at that rate reliably.

Even with 50Mbps, you tube still stutters and buffers on a bad day.... despite the content usually being less than 1Mbps.

Unless your remote hard drive is in your ISPs data center, the comparison is absurd. The internet will be slower, often much slower, and routinely inconsistent.

Then, the cable is only 8 times slower, and is fast enough for most tasks.

Even assuming it was simply 1/8th the speed. A file copy that takes 7.5 seconds locally... takes full minute to the cloud. If it takes 7.5 minutes locally... there goes an hour.

50Mbps... A 3.2GB Quantum fireball hard drive from 1996 does nearly 80Mbps. To get down to 50 we have to go back to when hard drives were measured in megabytes, Windows 3.11 was shiny, and most of us ran DOS and had a 386 or 486 CPU.

Re:AAARGH!

[crdotson]

Yeah, try that and see if it works.

Re:AAARGH!

[Anonymous Coward]

The cloud can't replace local storage. A 10mbps cable line is no match for an internal sata drive. And google desktop search is much faster than windows search, and is much better at finding emails than outlook's own search. I have come to rely on this at work, and am loathe to install windows search instead. I would love to see this become open-source.

Never mind the fact that cloud storage is also insecure and I for one don't have a connection that offers me the reliability that a hard drive does. Google's unshakable faith in the coming dominance of cloud apps and diskless computers is deja vu to anybody who is old enough to remember the 90s. It's almost as if we've never seen this idea come and go before. I'm sure cloud apps and browser only OSes will carve out a place for them selves now that we have way more bandwidth than we had back then, but Google Docs isn't going to replace MS Office any time soon and I'm not trading in Photoshop for an online photo editor either. Amazing as it may sound, there are things you can't do in a browser. Maybe when internet connections reach internal storage speeds.

Re:AAARGH!

[AmiMoJo]

It isn't the raw speed that is the problem, it is latency. Try using Google Docs on a slow line. It tries hard to make it seem like a local app through heavy use of Javascript, but even so it isn't as responsive as Excel running on your local PC.

On the other hand OneNote by default creates web based notebooks stored on your Live account. You get the responsiveness of a local app with the slower network updates completely hidden in the background. Google is trying to get similar performance by improving Javascript and using HTML5, but there are not quite there yet.

Re:AAARGH!

[ssayler]

Agreed, I use Google Desktop Emterprise daily to access email archives in lotus notes. Havent found another tool that does this.

Re:AAARGH!

[blair1q]

Actually, it can. The problem is that Google's default model ships the data up to its server farm to be indexed. Having our whole server shipped up to their server, encrypted or not, gave our IT security guys a hernia.

No ad £££

[mr_lizard13]

Makes sense. No ad money in desktop search, so why would an ad broker support such a product?

Re:No ad £££

[obarel]

They could bundle it with a webcam, so that they can, you know, just see what's missing in your life and send you a few suggestions.

Re:No ad £££

[DarwinSurvivor]

Sorry, I just had a mental image of clipping. "I noticed your child is playing wii without the strap, might I suggest a few television retailers?"

Cloud != No More Desktop

[l0ungeb0y]

You'd think Google would combine Desktop + Cloud search in their Desktop Search offering to provide seamless Cloud integration and use of Cloud as an online file backup.

It appears Google would disagree.
Cloud or nothing then!

Re:Cloud != No More Desktop

[blair1q]

But then you wouldn't be driven to the cloud. They've got an ROI to maintain.

Bait & switch...

[Anonymous Coward]

... definitely a Google favourite these days.

Re:Bait & switch...

[DarwinSurvivor]

Bait & Switch is when you advertise one product, then when the person shows up, you tell them it's not available and try to sell them something else. Discontinuing a no-longer-advertised product (and a FREE one at that!) is not even close to a bait & switch.

Back to Konfabulator

[M3wThr33]

That's still working, right?

Re:Back to Konfabulator

[aztracker1]

I always preferred Konfabulator over the others, even Windows Sidebar/Widgets, and way better than osx spotlight or whatever. It was turned into Yahoo Widgets a few years back...

Just like will happen with your cloud

[countertrolling]

Here today, gone tomorrow..

Did you ever use Google Desktop?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, Google Desktop sucks. It slows your whole machine down to provide a service that the Windows XP search has provided for some time. And since it used to be bundled with all of Google's other offerings, it was unnecessarily ubiquitous. It is one of those things that I always clean off of a machine first when users complain that it is slowing down...

Re:Hope Microsoft follows suit

[flimflammer]

Forced? You're aware you can disable indexing completely, right?

Re:Bloody lemmings

[couchslug]

"Gawd help us all in a couple of years when we're all just good little consumers."

Nah. Just another market cycle. I'm not opting in to this one and therefore don't give a fuck.

Windows Search still sucks

[Nyder]

ya, but windows search still sucks badly.

thank god for everything (http://www.voidtools.com/)

Re:Windows Search still sucks

[WidgetGuy]

Unfortunately, Everything works on local NTFS volumes only. Half a terabyte in my Vista setup is on USB drives that are FAT volumes. Worse, it only searches file names. No wonder it's fast and low-overhead. I usually need in-file searching. Vista's built-in search is actually pretty good. Very fine-grained control over indexing and it's easy to search in files with or without indexing. Everything, well, isn't really everything.

Re:Windows Search still sucks

[Shoe Puppet]

These bastards.

Re:Hope Microsoft follows suit

[Zappy]

try everything http://www.voidtools.com/

alternates?

[tkprit]

recoll, lucene, copernic, locate32... google desktop and it's included "features" wasn't that great, anyway. I see this as a positive development so more projects can get well-deserved support. Let Google focus on the sky while the rest of us work.

Desktop search...

[blahplusplus]

.. didn't go far enough. Why don't these companies actually try to develop full featured file management tool. I think there is a lot of cool apps that individual users could use if only a big company would throw its money behind it.

1) Automatically sorting and tagging files
2) Automatically finding valid duplicate files (i.e. by valid, not system files or important files)
3) Keeping track of software and software like it /w suggestions of other software you might try/like, etc.

There's tonnes of stuff they could have done.

Re:Desktop search...

[konstantinkoll]

A shame Google discontinues their desktop search. If you're looking for something to pick up where Google leaves, you might want to give liquidFOLDERS a try!
-Konstantin

too much porn on my computer to use Google Desktop

[BLToday]

I don't want every search to list my porn files as the first item.

Re:Google Desktop Gadgets vs Google Gadgets

[uigrad_2000]

Even though the article said "Google Gadgets", it actually links to Google Desktop Gadgets, not actually Google Gadgets.

One is web-like type apps running on your desktop. The other is desktop-like apps running on your webpage. A bit of confusion here is to be expected.

Gadgets on Linux...

[martin_b1sh0p]

Dang, I actually use Google Gadgets on Linux. Luckily I only use it for the Weather.com gadget/widget/whatever. So I'm not heavily invested. I'm sure I can find a replacement. Still a bummer though, it looked like it had potential for a great x-platform widget-ma-dohicky.

Re:Hope Microsoft follows suit

[unencode200x]

Windows search on 7 works great. It indexes documents, emails, programs, etc. I've been really impressed by it. However, for Outlook I still prefer Xobni (www.xobni.com), although I'm not happy that they're making you get an account these days.

Re:The one app I use

[PoopCat]

A replacement? Do you plan on removing your copy? If so, why, when it works so well for you? Or do you think TEH EVIL GOOGLEBOT will somehow reach out to your hard-drive and erase the desktop software?

GoogleLabs

[unencode200x]

They're shutting down all sorts of things. See http://www.googlelabs.com/ this includes: - Google Breadcrumb
Fast Flip
Aardvark
Google Sets
City Tours
Places Directory
Image Swirl
Google News Timeline
App Inventor for Android (possibly open sourcing?)
Google Squared
Google Talk Guru
Script Converter (replaced)
Realtime Mytracks
Sputnik


This sucks, I've always liked the little projects they have going on there. It sounds like they have some other things cooking though, and I'm happy to see them open sourcing some of it.

Sad to See it Go, Very Useful

[syntap]

Google Desktop has really helped hunt through a decade of docs when I need to do it. I know Microsoft released a desktop search but I use Google Desktop for the same reasons I don't use Bing for Internet search... I like Google's search better.

Sad to see it go, but thanks Google for releasing it. I hope it will still be available and just closed to new development.

Copernic for desktop search

[jedwidz]

I'm pretty happy using Copernic on Windows XP. Not sure how it compares with the built-in searches on Windows 7, but I gave up on both MS and Google desktop searches due to glitches.

With some improvements to the file preview in the search results, to display larger files faster and allow paging through matches in the document, I'd be a very happy Copernic user.

The Real Reason

[TheSpoom]

Why would Google put effort into a search product that doesn't allow them access to your data for targeted advertising?

Sorry to see Google killing Desktop Search

[drgroove]

Shutting down Desktop search really sucks. GDS was an amazing productivity tool and will be sorely missed; it was and still is so much better than the native search faculties available on Windows and OS X. The review I wrote about GDS in '05 still stands.

Re:Sorry to see Google killing Desktop Search

[KevinColyer]

(replying to myself as posted logged out)

Also closed: Goog411

[DogDude]

Just a few months ago, Google closed their free 411 service, which had really awesome voice recognition, too. I relied on that. I know I can still text searches, but that's not nearly as convenient as the Goog411 was. I had my cheap phone set to voice dial Google, and I used their voice recognition to find stuff, and it would dial for me. That was awesome. I could find and call a number without pushing a single button on my phone. Now, you have to have a stupid $300 pants computer to look up something as simple as a phone number. Bummer.

Re:Hope Microsoft follows suit

[UnknownSoldier]

Mod parent up.

Everything is a great windows app. Been using it for almost a year.

Closed source, but it is FAST!

...now what?

[trk6640]

I never cared about the desktop search, but it gave me Google widgets that I depend on. I don't want to leave my browser open 24/7 to get my much-needed nags about calendar events and new e-mail. Just because I'm online it doesn't mean I'm surfing the web. So what are my alternatives? MS desktop widgets never really took off, either.

NOO!!! Please say no!!!!

[ckaminski]

Google desktop is the only thing that makes my desktop usable - that can search my gigabytes of Outlook email, that makes my computer USEFUL!

You can pry my Google Desktop out of my cold dead hands!

I don't think Outlook search compares, nor do I think Microsoft's indexing compares. It's just not as comparable, in my opinion.

Re:NOO!!! Please say no!!!!

[arehm]

Might I suggest X1 (www.x1.com). Worth every penny. Kick's Google Desktop, Windows Search, and anything else I threw at it. Not free, but managed nicely with 800k+ items in it's DB.

copernicus

[koona]

well, I'm glad I kept up with Copernicus. eh?

History

[Tony Isaac]

Windows does NOT have anything that comes close to Google Desktop's "Browse Timeline" feature. I don't know how many times I've used this to look for something I saw a week or two ago, but couldn't remember details. THAT is a Google Desktop feature I will really miss.

Re:Hope Microsoft follows suit

[0111 1110]

Have you tried turning indexing off and seeing how much you like it then? As far as I'm concerned Windows 7 doesn't have a search feature.

FTFY

[ThatsNotPudding]

A 10mbps cable line is no match for a drunken yokel with a rented backhoe...

Re:Hope Microsoft follows suit

[VGPowerlord]

Have you tried turning indexing off and seeing how much you like it then? As far as I'm concerned Windows 7 doesn't have a search feature.

You mean to tell me that when I tell it to stop doing its job, it doesn't produce correct results?

I never would have guessed!

Fail

[crymeph0]

I use Google desktop search every day, and I hope they reconsider.

Re:Bing Bong

[haruchai]

Good one! I'm sure one of the young geeks there suggested it but was shut down by the stuffed shirts.