I originally posted this at http://www.318.com/TechJournal
Google is a key tool for just about every Web user these days, and it remains the most popular web search engine in use today. But many of Google’s coolest features often get overlooked. Here are some of Three18’s favorite Google tools:
Google Toolbar (toolbar.google.com): Windows users can save themselves the step of navigating to Google’s homepage by adding the Google Toolbar to their Internet Explorer browser. In addition to fast access to web searches, you also get a history of your most recent searches, bars indicating relevance of your searches, and links to other Google resources. But its most welcome bonus is its built-in, intelligent Pop-up blocker.
Google Desktop (desktop.google.com): Ever wish you could just Google your entire computer to find that long lost document or e-mail message? Well, now you can with Google Desktop. It installs Google’s powerful search engine capabilities into your PC, so you can instantly search your entire hard drive for e-mails, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents, IM chats, and even cached web pages you’ve visited. It’s currently only available for PC, but Google has announced plans to build a version for Mac OS X.
Google Local (local.google.com): Confine your search to your neighborhood (or any other location in North America for that matter). It’s a simple matter of entering your search terms and a location, be it an address, a ZIP code, or a City/State combination. You’ll get not only your list of search results in the standard Google format, but you’ll get a map of the results as well.
Froogle (froogle.google.com): Shopping for the best price is easy with Froogle. Just tell it what you’re looking for, and it searches a seemingly infinite number of online retailers. Sort your results by price, or within a price range, or by category (this comes in handy if you’re doing a brand search such as Sony, Apple, or Craftsman). A great tool for bargain hunter’s shopping during the holidays!
Google News (news.google.com): The ultimate fix for news junkies. Browse and search over 4,500 online news publications from all over the world. Then combine it with Google Alerts (www.google.com/alerts) to give yourself customized news alerts in your e-mail inbox as often as you want: either as they happen, once a day, or once a week.
Google Directory (directory.google.com): Billed as “the largest human-edited directory on the webâ€, the Google Directory leverages the deep database of the Open Directory Project (dmoz.org) and the powerful Google search engine. You can browse categories or just run a search. Either way, your results are going to be based on categories and information that is organized by human beings, not crawlers, spiders, or bots (which can be easily fooled into incorrectly boosting the relevance of web pages).
GMail (gmail.google.com): Google’s long-anticipated (and hotly sought-after) free e-mail service is still in limited Beta test mode, but those users lucky enough to score a GMail account have been wowed by the results: over a gigabyte of mail storage, all instantly searchable with Google’s familiar search engine technology. Keep an eye on Three18’s newsletter for updates on when Gmail goes “live†for use by the general public.
These are just some of the tools Google has available right now. They’re all free, powerful, and unlike anything else on the web. Google is currently in a dramatic growth phase, with numerous projects and technologies in the works. And the great thing is, you can test them out as they’re developed. Go to Google Labs (labs.google.com) to see what they’re working on now.