Google Desktop Extreme (GDX) provides a front-end for the Google Desktop Search application. It shows your results in a Windows-Explorer like fashion, rather than the browser window of the standard GDS. This view allows quicker sorting and filtering of your results, so you can find what you need faster.
Google Desktop Extreme uses the Microsoft .NET Framework. If you get a "failed to initialize" or "missing dll" error, your PC is missing the .NET Framework. Please see the online FAQ for more information on how to get these files. Google Desktop Extreme is compatible with both the 1.0 and 2.0 releases of Google Desktop.
GDX hides automatically, and leaves an icon in the system tray. Simply click the icon to show a search window in the lower right corner of your desktop, and begin typing your search query. If you want the search box to go away, you can either click the system tray icon again or close the results window. You can clear the search box text by clicking the "X" button to the right of the box - whenever the search box is empty it will fade away after about ten seconds if your mouse is not near it.
As soon as you begin to type, GDX starts sending search requests to the Google Desktop Search Engine, and shows you your results (GDS must be installed and running). These results are known as "real-time", and are limited to the top 100 items in order to show you the results as soon as possible. This limit will be fine for most tasks. However, if you want to be certain that you see every result, just press "Enter" when you are done typing your query, and a full search will run with a limit of 1000 items. You can also run a full search by clicking the GDX icon to the left of the search box. To open a specific result, double-click the name in the results window and it will launch with the default application. You can easily turn off real-time searching, or change the maximum real-time and full search results in the settings window.
Whenever you run a full search, the search terms are stored by GDX. As you begin to type new queries, any stored search terms that may match what you are typing will be displayed below the search box. To use one of these auto-complete items, simply press the down arrow to scroll through them. As each auto-complete item is highlighted, a real-time search runs automatically. If you find a term you want to search fully, simply press "Tab" while it is highlighted, and the text in the search box will change to the auto-complete text, then a full search will be run. You can also select the auto-complete terms by scrolling and clicking with your mouse.
Your search results are presented in a list similar to Windows Explorer. However, you can sort by any of the columns in the results window, just like in Windows. It's easy to find files by filename or date when you can sort this way. As you look at your results, you may also want to filter out unnecessary file types. You can easily narrow down your search by clicking one of the group buttons at the top of the search results window. The group buttons are as follows: All Results, Web/Email/Chat, Office Documents, Media (Music and Movies), Pictures, or Other/Unknown. GDX looks at the file type to determine what group to put the result in, such as *.pdf or *.doc for Office Documents, or *.mp3 for Media.
If grouping and sorting isn't enough, you can perform some advanced filtering on your results very easily. Some of the columns have special behavior when you double-click a result within them. For instance, if you double-click a result when your mouse is within the "Name" column, the file will open just like in Windows Explorer. However, if you double-click a result within the "Type" column, your results will be filtered to only show other results of the same type as the one you clicked on. The full set of column behavior is listed here:
Your search results have a right-click context menu. For all items, you can "Open" and "Open Cached". For files, you can also "Open Folder" to see the file(s), or "Copy", which puts the selected file(s) on the clipboard. In addition, you can adjust which columns are visible in your results window.
Two additional items in the context menu allow you to save your results to file: "Save All Results..." will write the details of your search out to a text file, either tab or comma delimited. "Save All Cached..." will loop through every result, and retrieve the cached html, then save it to a new .htm file in a specified folder.
You can use the Google Deskbar (http://deskbar.google.com) to launch searches with GD Extreme, even if it isn't running. The Deskbar plugin is included in the GDX Program Files folder, and has separate instructions for use.
The following settings can be changed by clicking the "Settings" button on the results window:
http://127.0.0.1:4664/search&s=[random characters specific to your computer]?q=
If you need to get a working URL, try running a normal Google Desktop search, then copy the URL from your browser's address bar (up to and including the "q="If this help file didn't answer your questions, please feel free to email support with questions. We also welcome your suggestions and feedback.