Google Desktop vs. Spotlight

karavite

karavite

Registered
Anyone heard about Google Desktop? http://desktop.google.com/about.html
I heard a radio interview about this and they completely ignored the fact that Apple is working on Spotlight and even that Mac Finder search has been, IMO, superior for years and years to Explorer on Windows.

Any way, when I heard Microsoft was working on something like Spotlight, I expected it to be lousy and about 2 years post Spotlight, but now that Google is doing it, I wonder if this will distract from what Apple has cooking. Of course Google DT is Windows only, so that is good news and it seems the smart thing for MS to do is just give up on their own work, but I can easily imagine them doing all the old tricks (think Netscape and IE, WMP and Quicktime...) to thwart Google with their own inferior copy cat version.

Any way, it would be interesting to compare the two (Spotlight and Google Desktop). Anyone out there with a beta of Tiger and a spare PC? I'll try out Google on my PC soon.
 
Not to be (overly) paranoid, but does anyone really trust Google with their files? Sure, they scan emails sent to your GMail account and that's fine since you knew it before hand. But what about the files on your computer? Surely we all store important stuff like bank details, pay cheques, love letters (if you're lucky :)), do we want Google indexing all that stuff?

Have a look at this site that should explain why I'm feeling rather uncomfortable with Google on my desktop. http://www.google-watch.org/bigbro.html
 
Microsoft has already killed the search using meta data in Longhorn. They announced this 3 months ago I believe.
 
How is "Of course Google DT is Windows only, so that is good news" working for you? That's a rather _bad_ thing, I think. Both because people out there might think the Mac's still a second class citizen on the 'net (Google ignoring it with Desktop Search) and because we Mac users _do_ feel a bit left out by this. At least I do. Not that I'd probably actually _use_ it on my Mac, but I'd certainly like to _try_ it.

Btw.: Google is not searching your E-Mails on gmail.com. At least not actively in the way you make it seem. And Google's made it quite clear that your Desktop's search results of course are not leaked onto the 'net. Then again, it runs on Windows, which is inherently insecure, so users' actual mileage may vary...

More importantly, however: Spotlight sounds more right to me. The metadata approach and all... I still hope for a new build of Tiger soon, so I can get to really testing it. Sadly, the available (for Select & Premier ADC members) build isn't quite ready for thorough use as a main or secondary operating system.
 
fryke said:
How is "Of course Google DT is Windows only, so that is good news" working for you? That's a rather _bad_ thing, I think. Both because people out there might think the Mac's still a second class citizen on the 'net (Google ignoring it with Desktop Search) and because we Mac users _do_ feel a bit left out by this. At least I do. Not that I'd probably actually _use_ it on my Mac, but I'd certainly like to _try_ it.
Click to expand...

Good point - I suppose it is good and bad? Good - Mac's Spotlight may end up superior. Bad - the reasons you gave.
 
Some people have already found some problems with the Google desktop search thing. For one, it indexes all emails no matter what user you are running under. So you can effectively read every email sent and received by any user on the computer.

Same goes for files it opens. If you have a secure file as one user, another user will be able to read that file through the Google desktop search whatsit.
 
That's a pretty big oops you found there Captian Code! :) In the radio story I heard on this, the speaker did warn that husbands who may have downloaded certain files they don't want their wife to know about might want to think twice if they have those old files hanging around the old drive somewhere - the idea being their wife might do some kind of harmless search on the Google Desktop and find something!

Seems a safe assumption to me Spotlight and OS X will keep user accounts seperate, greatly encouraging a safe feeling in porno surfing husbands the world over!
 
the google desktop search really sucks, it takes like a week to start recording things, and even then, it dosent work with any programs real users use. i was lucky and got a free copy of the X1 search program, which seems a lot like spotlight. its nice because it lets you preview all kinds of files.
 
ill try and get a screen shot. but it looks exactly like the normal google home page, but with a desktop search option.
 
Sounds like Google was way to premature with this! I wonder if they could suffer a Newton-esque backlash. I mean, you only get on chance to make a first impression! :)
 
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