One of the first desktop search engines for the Apple Macintosh operating
system, the latest version 3.0 is for both Windows and Mac OS X. One original
feature of Blinkx is its ability to use the content of documents you are
currently working on to narrow down search results. Blinkx also includes a
so-called Smartfolder, created every time you search your drive. Blinkx then
automatically fills and updates the smart folder with similar documents from
your PC and crawls the web for news articles, TV, radio or video clips etc.
Blinkx Visualizer links search results and relates each to one another. Blinkx for
the Mac can search and index documents in PC format. The latest version looks
similar to the Mac user interface. One drawback is the slow pace of indexing
that uses up a lot of memory, so results take time to display. Future versions
should address this problem. Blinkx can be downloaded free from www.blinkx.com.
Spotlight for Mac OS X Tiger
This desktop search engine comes with the new Mac’s OS X Tiger operating
system. It is like other search engines and includes some features of Blinkx
like the Smartfolder. Fast (you can see results as soon as you start typing),
it can look at file titles, contents, author, edit history, format, size, and
other details across all applications: messages, address book, calendar, and
system preferences. Security is enhanced by allowing you to add folders and
files to a privacy list, avoiding one of the problems in other early versions
of desktop search engines. As in all things Mac, Spotlight is user friendly and
intuitive. Works well for Mac users with OS X Tiger system installed.
Other Desktop Search Engines
You can also check out two less popular desktop search engines: Aduna
Autofocus and Viapoint. Aduna (http://aduna.biz ) is free for private use but
charges a fee for commercial use. You can download Viapoint (www.viapoint.com)
free but to search e-mails, you need to buy an adapter after paying a perpetual
license fee.