Google Inc. has announced the formal launch of Google Desktop Search, a free downloadable application that is designed to enable users to search for information on their own computers. Previously in beta, the 1.0 release adds search over the full text of PDFs and the meta-information stored with music, image, and video files. Additional enhancements include support for the Firefox and Netscape browsers, Thunderbird and Netscape email clients, and new Chinese and Korean language interfaces.

In addition to searching a range of computer files and email, Google's desktop search tool accesses the full text of Web page history and searches AOL instant messages. Google Desktop Search can also be used to recover accidentally deleted or misplaced information. All results are accompanied by cached snapshots of each Web page and document so users can access information even if they're not connected to the Web or if a document has been deleted.