HotBot Pushes Toolbar with Local-File Search
Email
Print
The search site launches a search toolbar that lets users find files and e-mails on their hard drives and aggregate RSS feeds from the Web.
Terra Lycos HotBot search site on Monday launched a search toolbar that includes the ability to search local hard-drive content and to read RSS feeds. The HotBot Desktop, a free download available now, includes the typical search toolbar features such as a search query box and pop-up ad blocker. But unlike most others, it also can index and search across files on users hard drives, said Lincoln Jackson, senior director of search products for Terra Lycos in Waltham, Mass. The local-content search feature supports e-mail files from Microsoft Outlook or Outlook Express, Microsoft Office files, PDFs and most text-based file formats. The toolbar also lets users index their Web-page browsing history so they can search content from those sites.
Read more here about how search provider InfoSpace plans to add XML syndication support to its toolbar.
The HotBot Desktop does not include the ability to search for RSS feeds on the Web, rather it includes a list of hundreds of popular ones from which to choose and lets users type in the URL of an RSS feed. In later versions of the toolbar, Terra Lycos plans to support the rival Atom format and offer the ability to find XML syndication feeds, Jackson said.
HotBot Desktop is available for Microsoft Windows 98, 2000 and XP with Internet Explorer 5.5 or higher, Jackson said.
In other search news, GuruNet Corp. on Monday also added a toolbar version of its search tool that culls reference materials on the Web. GuruNet, which has been offered as a desktop application for Windows, is now available through an Internet Explorer toolbar as well as on the companys Web site.
GuruNet of Wesley Hills, N.Y., said it plans to release in the second quarter of this year a version of its reference software for the Mac OS X. GuruNet is available for a 14-day trial, then for an annual subscription of $29.99.
Check out eWEEK.coms Enterprise Applications Center at http://enterpriseapps.eweek.com
for the latest news, reviews, analysis and opinion about productivity and business solutions. Be sure to add our eWEEK.com enterprise applications news feed to your RSS newsreader or My Yahoo page:
As an online reporter for eWEEK.com, Matt Hicks covers the fast-changing developments in Internet technologies. His coverage includes the growing field of Web conferencing software and services. With eight years as a business and technology journalist, Matt has gained insight into the market strategies of IT vendors as well as the needs of enterprise IT managers. He joined Ziff Davis in 1999 as a staff writer for the former Strategies section of eWEEK, where he wrote in-depth features about corporate strategies for e-business and enterprise software. In 2002, he moved to the News department at the magazine as a senior writer specializing in coverage of database software and enterprise networking. Later that year Matt started a yearlong fellowship in Washington, DC, after being awarded an American Political Science Association Congressional Fellowship for Journalist. As a fellow, he spent nine months working on policy issues, including technology policy, in for a Member of the U.S. House of Representatives. He rejoined Ziff Davis in August 2003 as a reporter dedicated to online coverage for eWEEK.com. Along with Web conferencing, he follows search engines, Web browsers, speech technology and the Internet domain-naming system.
