It is a huge paradigm shift but one of the key changes that is happening all over the web right now. Search technology has improved rapidly over the past few years. In 2000 we could search the whole internet faster than our own computer, with Google. Lately though speedy desktop search is a reality and it’s time to make the most of it. Take bookmarks and shortcuts for example – my logic is that if I can’t remember enough about a page or file to find it again using a search function, it’s not worth saving!
Have you ever thought about how a computer uses Folders and Files? Those concepts _obviously_ come from the filing cabinets that we all know and maybe it’s time to leave behind some of the old metaphor. Google’s Gmail was one of the first email programs to do away with folders, instead replacing them with ‘labels’. The difference is subtle but huge. A message can only go in one folder, but any number of labels can be applied to a single message, if it needs a label at all.
How can search replace filing?
- You wrote an email to me about that party and I need to know the time it starts? I’ll search my inbox.
- I need to know about some topic and I know I have information about it in a pdf of a slideshow, but which one? I’ll search for it.
- I need to open Microsoft Word so I can write a document? I’ll search for Word and open it.
- I’m uploading a new display picture to website. I’ll search for ‘avatar’ using the folder search box to instantly find the image that I use everywhere.
- There are a million examples here!
Try it sometime, search don’t sort.
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