While the beta only indexed Microsoft Outlook e-mail and Internet Explorer Web browsing history, the latest release also can search e-mail from the Mozilla Thunderbird and Netscape clients and browsing history from the Firefox and Netscape browsers, Google announced.

To make more desktop data searchable, the latest release adds indexing support for the full text of PDFs to existing support for Microsoft Office formats. It also indexes the metadata of video, images and audio, such as titles or artist information.

"With regard to users, we have tens of thousands of applications and file types they want to search," said Nikhil Bhatla, a Google product manager. "We've addressed the top requests and most popular applications, and the best way to address [this] is by making desktop search available for developers to write plug-ins."

Google Desktop Search went into beta in October. Since then, major search rivals Yahoo Inc., Microsoft Corp.'s MSN and Ask Jeeves Inc. have entered the desktop search race. Startups such as Blinkx Inc. and vendors like Copernic Technologies Inc., X1 Technologies Inc. and ISYS Search Software also are vying for desktop searchers.

Unlike its competitors, Google merges desktop and Web search results together, using its well-known Web-browser interface to display results. It also indexes browser history and AOL Instant Messenger chat sessions along with files and e-mails.

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News Source: eWeek