* Products from Google, Copernic and Wizetech Software find files in a snap
To a small business, lost files can mean lost revenue. Three new programs, Google Desktop Search (beta), Copernic Desktop Search and Archivarius 3000 promise to keep your files found and money in your pocket.
Google leads the pack in brand name awareness, and millions are using the free “beta” Desktop Search. If you like the look and feel of Google, you’ll love this, and the results pop up even faster than on the Web search engine. Each listing shows the file name, location and the first two lines of text in the search results.
Copernic, which offers Web search applications, has added its new Desktop Search utility. Patterned after the Microsoft Windows Explorer look and feel, Copernic Desktop Search lists files’ name and location in the display pane up top, and a dozen formatted lines of the file in the Quick Preview pane below. Files are searchable by document type (e-mail, documents, music, etc.), and Copernic includes Web search, as you’d expect. And like Google, it’s free.
For $30, Archivarius 3000 from Wizetech Software lets you search beyond the desktop to shared directories on other computers, network-attached storage boxes and network devices. It also handles eight languages. In the search results box, you can click an icon to open the highlighted file, which loads the appropriate application, or one that lets you view a semi-formatted version of the file. Results appear in an Explorer-like window showing file name, location, relevance, date and size.
All three search Microsoft Outlook and Outlook Express, but Archivarius also handles e-mail applications Netscape (and related applications Firefox Thunderbird and Mozilla) and The Bat. Google handles AOL Instant Messaging and says it will add more e-mail support in time.
Indexing can become a resource hog if the program doesn’t handle index creation and updating cleanly, but each of these does a good, unobtrusive job. Google indexes in the background when your system isn’t busy; with Archivarius, you need to schedule index updates manually. Copernic uses its patent-pending “Instant Indexing” technology to grab files as they change or are created, a method that sounds identical to that of back-up programs used by Mirra, RocketVault, and Iomega.
Google Desktop Search, probably because of its Internet heritage, includes cached Web page indexing and retrieval. Although this type of aggressive caching and hoarding makes the IM transcription and indexing possible, it raises security concerns on systems connecting to the corporate network via SSL VPN connections. The cached pages will remain unencrypted within the Google cache.
Copernic separates e-mail from regular files, and requires you to click on the appropriate icon to see different listings results from one search. The others group files together, so you might want to narrow the results list by automatically filtering by file type.
Not sure which to use? All three grab information quickly and present it cleanly. If you love Google, go with Google; if not, consider Copernic. If you need to search non-Microsoft application e-mail and want to search shared drives on the network, Wizetech Archivarius 3000 is more than worth the money.
