Google has released an updated version of Mac OS X, includes Google Earth browser plug-in. Now users will be able to use Google Earth software as a browser plug-in. Around six month back it was released and made available for Windows but now the Google Earth plug-in has been made available for the Mac & they are still working on the Linux version. Digital Earth Blog was the first to blog about it & points to a few sites such as EarthSwoop and Mini Flight Sim where people can try the plug-in.
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Yahoo has announced the top 10 search terms on its search engine for the year 2008. Celebrities, U.S. politics and TV shows were among the 10 most-searched terms on Yahoo for 2008. Pop star Britney Spears is No. 1 on Yahoo’s list of top 10 overall searches,just like she did last year, WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) at No. 2, and Barack Obama, president-elect of the United States secured No. 3. Singer Miley Cyrus and videogame RuneScape came in at 4th & 5th position.
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Just a day back, CUIL was launched. And from the day one, every one started raising questions, whether it can be a Google Killer or not. So, I decided to use CUIL for one full day, instead of Google.com, just to figure out whether CUIL is worth the hype or not, and figured out that somehow its not a good idea to switch to CUIL. Well, there are a lot of reasons for that. But before that, lets just list out why it is getting so much of hype.
- The very good thing about this search engine I found is its massive index of nearly 120 billion pages, compared to 40 billion pages on Google.
- It is developed by former Google employees, making sure that the indexing methods used by google are further improvised and used here.
- It not only search for the results, but shows them in a nice format along with a thumbnail too. Also, it displays further options to find relevant searches.
- It indexes the pages based on the contents and not on the page ranking system, which ensures that you find related information, much easily.
- It displays possible search options in a dropdown box, as you type in the search box.
- It loads faster than google. It may be because of low traffic as compared to google, but still its a good thing. Also, animations are crisp, smooth, and even with those animations, page doesn’t seems too flashy. Really nice graphics.
Enough of praise of CUIL, as a potential google killer. Lets just face it now. The search engine is not worth the hype, as I found. Atleast I am not switching to CUIL permanently, for next few months. May be it will be just another search engine, like Powerset or Wisenut, which also tried to make a dent in Google’s market share, but miserably failed. Obviously, I have got a proof for the same, as I have used it for one day. Listing out my findings below.
- It is not google. Sorry, for being so mean. But, I never really use term “search” in context of internet. It is by default Google. For so many years, everyone is using Google as their favorite search engine. It is not easy to get such a big fan base easily.
- Google provides other services, based on their own search index, like page ranking, adsense etc. Adsense won’t work on basis of CUIL or other search index.
- You can search just web pages in CUIL. To search for images, news, blogs, or using advanced search, I had to switch back to google. CUIL does not support using “filetype:” keyword while searching for a PDF file.
- “Did you mean: jitendra garg“. I missed this auto spell check in CUIL. You have to start playing scrabbles to improve your spellings before using CUIL.
- Where is the option to “Search pages from India”. I am not interested in all results but just from Indian sites, but still CUIL displays me all the results for my search query. Option to search regional pages is missing. One more negative point for CUIL.
- How many times, do you have used Google to check the current dollar prices in INR, or to calculate a mathematical equation, or to know the current time or temperature of the city? I use these features a lot. It helps saving you a lot of time, looking for icon of Calculator, or Weather gadget, in your Vista sidebar. But sadly, this feature is also missing from so-hyped CUIL.
- Most of the sites, uses google page rank and Alexa rating to determine your page’s importance on internet. So sad, they have to write their algorithm once again. Clearly, not a feasible option.
- Advertisers prefer google. They have a reason for it after all.
- Google is one stop solution to most of your needs. Calculator, maps, weather information, foreign exchange, image search, and lot of such features, integrated with search, provides a richer experience. While, CUIL just boasts of a massive index for web pages, and nothing else.
Finally after one day of using CUIL, and missing google, I feel a bit too relaxed, as I am back to Google. Any search engine trying to call itself a Google killer, should atleast think again. After powerset, wisenut, a9.com, and now CUIL, it seems that for the next few years, Google have to wait for the true contender. May be MS-Yahoo merger can result in a better alternative of our most beloved search engine. Till then, happy googling.
All most all webmasters has one query, I.e. how Google crawl our web pages? After searching on Google it self I found some good facts and figures how Google bot crawl Websites and web pages.
Google bot start crawling web pages from top left corner to bottom right corner of web pages. Most Websites that I found over the internet are designed in such way that they have links on the left side and content on right hand side. The problem with this design is that your website links are come first in contact with Google crawler, so website links are get optimized for Google instead of website content.
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Some days back I have written one post for search engines for specific search queries. Google, Yahoo and Microsoft Live search is not always the right place to search information over the internet. Now I found 10 search engines that can be used to fins a new business product, services or information, places where to advertise. If you are looking for a general product then Google, Yahoo or Microsoft Live search is best suited for your search query otherwise if you are looking for a product that is targeted a particular business the choose any of the following search engines.
Looking for a wholesale provider for your retail business then you may find that TopTenWholeSale.com is best suited for you. Site is aimed to put all wholesalers together on to the single place, so when you search for a particular product you will find the wholesalers of that product not the product information. The site also offers news, a blog, directory listings, forums and classifieds, fulfilling Prescott’s goal to create not just a wholesale search site, but a wholesale portal.
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Google developed a Safe Browsing diagnostic page that will provide detailed information about our automatic investigations and findings. Google show and analyze historical data over the last ninety days but does not go further into the past.The Safe Browsing diagnostic page of a site is structured into four different categories:
- What is the current listing status for [the site in question]?
We display the current listing status of a site and also information on how often a site or parts of it were listed in the past.
- What happened when Google visited this site?
This section includes information on when we analyzed the page, when it was last malicious, what kind of malware we encountered and so fourth. To help web masters clean up their site, we also provide information about the sites that were serving malicious software to users and which sites might have served as intermediaries.
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Has this site acted as an intermediary resulting in further distribution of malware?
Here we provide information if this site has facilitated the distribution of malicious software in the past. This could be an advertising network or statistics site that accidentally participated in the distribution of malicious software.
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Has this site hosted malware?
Here we provide information if the the site has hosted malicious software in the past. We also provide information on the victim sites that initiated the distribution of malicious software.
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Are you trying to find Icons on web search engines like Google, Yahoo and Live, then have a look at this search engine that will search only icons for you. ICONLook searches icons for you. Its very to easy to use also just type the keyword or search term for the icon that you are looking for and ICONLook will do the rest of the work for you.If you’re not sure what you’re looking for, you can click below to view the link exchange, tag cloud or even random icons.
ICONLook be very handy for web as well as desktop designers, because they used to have icons in their designs.
Source : ICONLook
Microsoft keeps improving Live search and this time they come with some more new features introduced in Live Search for Windows Mobile. Live Search for Windows Mobile includes Weather, Web search, Increased Traffic coverage, Bluetooth headset support, Map a contact, Delete a recent location.
Weather: Now Windows Mobiles users can view the weather conditions on their Windows Mobile using the Windows Live Search. Windows Live search for mobile also gives you the 4 days forecast.
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Yahoo India has launched it’s Local search service in India. Yahoo Local search initially launched for Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, and Chennai. Yahoo has integrated Yahoo India maps, weather information in Indian Local search service. Yahoo India Local search offers users to search restaurants, pubs, health clubs, and shopping malls, they are led to the business detail page where they get details along with driving directions on how to get there.
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Microsoft recently added Product search feature in their Live search. Live Product search is e-commerce oriented product search. Live product search is result of one year hard work and dedication from Microsoft Live Product Search Team [Congratulation].At the beginning of 2007, Google rebranded Froogle as Google Product Search and, in this context, Live Search Products, because of both the label and the area of focus, is yet another front where Microsoft goes against the Mountain View search giant.
According to Microsoft, the new version of Live Search Products delivers an improvement in the quantity of images of no less than 9.4%. This means that while the old variant of top results offered 79.2% images, the new iteration goes up all the way to 88.6% top results complete with images
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