When you now organize a street interview and ask people “What is Google”, I assume more than 90 percent of the people answer that Google is a search engine. Indeed, Google is a search engine and it is probably its core business, but Google is much more!
A short overview of the main services of Google:
++ Category One : Google Web Search Features ++
– Besides the traditional Google search engines in different languages, there is also a local search engine available: Google Local. As Google Local is in beta, only US searches are possible.
Are you living in Detroit and hungry and you want a taco, do a search on http://local.google.com and you get a list of all taco restaurants.
– Google Mobile : search with your cell phone online information
http://mobile.google.com
– Google Print puts book content right in the Google search results
http://print.google.com
– Calculator: Type a mathematical expression (e.g. 5+2*3) in the Google search box and you get the result, even with complicated math!
– Definitions: when you search for ‘define Personal Computer’, you get the definition of that word;
– With Froogle, you can search for products (independent free service)
http://froogle.google.com and http://labs.google.com/frooglewml.html (Froogle for your cell phone)
– With ‘I’m Feeling Lucky™’ next to the Google search box you will see directly the first web page for your query. You will not see the other search results at all.
– Movies: To find reviews and showtimes for movies playing near you, type ‘movies’, ‘showtimes’ or the name of a current film into the Google search box
– With PhoneBook you can search for US business and residence phone numbers in the Google search box, e.g. ‘John, Fitzgerald, Washington’
– Q&A answers (all) your questions in the Google search box, e.g. birthplace Bill Clinton
– You can get specialized information in the Google search box of parcels, patents or other specialized numbers.
– Restrict your search to a specific site (Site Search), e.g. ‘google site: http://www.wallies.info’ for wallies.info pages with the word ‘google’
– Stock Quotes in the Google search box, e.g. GOOG for the Google stock quote
– Weather conditions and a four-day forecast for a particular U.S. location, e.g. ‘weather Miami, fl’ in the Google Seach box;
– Travel information: To see delays and weather conditions at a particular airport, type the airport’s three letter code followed by the word ‘airport’; To check the status of a U.S. flight, type the name of the airline followed by the flight number.
– Google Alerts send you an email with the latest search results of your query.
http://www.google.com/alerts
– With Google Catalogs you can search mail-order catalogs online.
http://catalogs.google.com
– Search for images with Google Image Search
http://images.google.com
– Google Scholar enables you to search specifically for scholarly literature.
http://scholar.google.com
– Google special searches: http://www.google.com/unclesam (U.S. Government), http://www.google.com/linux, http://www.google.com/bsd (BSD), http://www.google.com/mac.html (Apple Macintosh), http://www.google.com/microsoft.html
– Google University Search enables you to search to a specific school website.
http://www.google.com/options/universities.html
– The Google web directory
http://directory.google.com/
++ Category Two : Webmaster Tools ++
– Enter ‘link: http://www.wallies.info’ in the Google search box will show you all pages that point to wallies.info;
– Add your URL to Google on http://www.google.com/addurl;
– Develop your own Google applications with Google Web API’s.
http://www.google.com/apis/
– Google Adsense: place relevant ads on your pages and get paid
https://www.google.com/adsense/
– With Google AdWords you can create your own ads.
https://adwords.google.com
++ Category Three : Stand alone services ++
– With the xml Google Sitemaps, https://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/ the Google crawler should index faster your website. See also http://www.wallies.info/blog/item/132/index.html.
– Google Blog is the official weblog of the people behind Google:
http://googleblog.blogspot.com
– Blogger is the free weblog service of Google
http://www.blogger.com
– With Google Maps can you search for a specific US location on street level and see a satellite image of that location
[http://maps.google.com/!]
– Gmail is Google email with 2GB space
http://www.gmail.com
– Google Groups are discussion groups
http://groups-beta.google.com/
– Keyhole: nice satellite imagery of our world.
http://www.keyhole.com
– Google Video enables you to search a growing archive of televised content – everything from sports to dinosaur documentaries to news shows.
http://video.google.com/
++ Category Four : Google Software
– Gmail Notifier : Check your Gmail messages without opening your
browser.
http://toolbar.google.com/gmail-helper/index?promo=gdl-en
– Google Deskbar lets you search with Google right from your Windows taskbar
http://toolbar.google.com/deskbar/
– Google Toolbar is the open-source Googlebar for your browser
http://toolbar.google.com/googlebar.html
– Search your own computer with Google Desktop
http://desktop.google.com/?promo=gdl-gds-en
– Picasa is free software that helps you instantly find, edit and share all the pictures on your PC: http://www.picasa.com
– Google Video Viewer is needed for Google Video
[http://video.google.com/video_download.html]
++ Google Labs ++
Google labs showcases a few of our favorite ideas that aren’t quite ready for prime time – http://labs.google.com/
– Google Personalized Search: Get the search results most relevant to you
http://www.google.com/psearch
– Personalize your Google Homepage with information for you
http://www.google.com/ig
– Save time online by loading web pages faster with Google Web Accelarator
http://webaccelerator.google.com/
– My Search History Easily access and manage your Google search history from any computer
http://www.google.com/searchhistory/
– Find a taxi, limousine or shuttle using real time position of vehicles with Google Ride Finder
[http://labs.google.com/ridefinder]
– As you type your search, Google Suggest offers keyword suggestions in real time
http://www.google.com/webhp?complete=1&hl=en
– Google SMS: Get precise answers to specialized queries from your mobile phone or device
http://sms.google.com/ and http://www.google.co.uk/sms/
– Google Sets: Automatically create sets of items from a few examples
http://labs.google.com/sets