Comparison Between Windows and Google Desktop Search

Felix — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 22:23:40 +0000

I am a fan and heavy user of Google Desktop Search but have always been curios about Windows Desktop Search and wanted to do a comparison between the two. Well, the guys at Download Squad have beaten me to it and done a good job in comparing the latest offerings from Microsoft and Google.

They looked at a number of factors that are important from a user’s point of view including:

Indexing options available
Automatic categorisation of documents
General Ease of Use

Whilst it suggest that Google is slightly faster in query response time (and I can concur that the response time for Google Desktop is certainly lightly fast !), the comparison basically resulted in more or less a draw between both offerings. This is not surprising considering the amount of effort and focus Microsoft has put in in defending its desktop strong hold that is the Windows franchise and the fact that Desktop Search is a relatively simpler technical challenge when compared with Web Search.

One of the main emission from the article is a comparison of the type of documents supported which to be is a HUGE factor. Whilst both offerings states that Lotus Notes is supported as a document source, I would have liked to see a detailed test and analysis just because it is probably the most difficult source it terms of desktop documents.

If you are a user of Lotus Notes and do need to index and search Notes emails, I can personally recommend that you go with Google Desktop Search as it rocks. I use it on a daily basis and only is the indexing process seamless, the results presentation is fantastic and it even allow you to preview the email in the results listing page. Just remember to download the Google Desktop Search Enterprise Edition and enable to the Lotus Notes Plugin after you installed it.

For those of you who have not used or tried Desktop Search technologies, check out this article for a discussion on some of the other desktop search offerings and give it a go as they are a great productivity booster !

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Are you using Desktop Searching ?

Felix — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 01:58:38 +0000

During a conversation with a friend the other day, we got onto the topic of searching for email and I was surprised to find that whilst desktop searching technology has really matured significantly over the last couple of years (with a bit of help from more powerful PC !) most people are not really aware of them are not really benefiting from the power of these fantastic desktop searching technologies.

So if you have yet to try a desktop search technology or were disappointed last time you tried it and never looked back, I encourage you to give it a go again ! Particularly in a work environment, I now can not live without my desktop search tool.

What’s available you ask ?

are recognized as the some of the leaders in the world of desktop search currently.

What do I use ? Google Desktop, although I must admit I never really looked at the other alternatives but my experience with the latest version of Google Desktop has been very positive (which I will discuss in a later post). There are, however tones of review on the web if you want to get to the bottom of this.

In the meantime, contribute to our little poll by telling us what you use and also share with us your experience with desktop search.

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Search 1.x » Desktop

Comparison Between Windows and Google Desktop Search

Are you using Desktop Searching ?