Yahoo! Gets Into Desktop Search

January 11, 2005

This news came across our site today:

Yahoo! Introduces Yahoo! Desktop Search Beta

It's about time Yahoo! moved on this -- Google has had desktop search available in beta for some months now. I've been using it, and it's become a productivity tool for me. As a writer and editor corresponding with many people, it's easy for me to forget where I filed an email or document. Google Desktop Search helps me find stuff quickly -- even deeply-buried Outlook messages. (I can't guarantee whether that link will work -- it seems to be dynamically generated. But you can easily get at that area of the Google site by going to http://www.google.com and clicking on the link for "Desktop.")

The new Yahoo! product is based on X1's technology -- I have used the client version in the past. It's actually pretty good, but I make more use of the Google Desktop Search just because it's already integrated with the Google search interface I use for other things.

From the Yahoo! Desktop Search beta site, it looks as if Yahoo! has done a good job integrating the X1 technology with their search interface.

To be truthful, it is not a priority for me to download the new Yahoo! plug-in and try it out. Too busy, and Google got to me first!

AB -- 1/11/05