One of the software programs mentioned at this year's IORG conference (see our coverage here) was SmartDesktop. This program uses machine intelligence to automatically organize your information by project so you can quickly find what you need. In addition to organizing your emails and files created by desktop software, the beta version of this program also works with Google Docs and Zoho. These items appear in Smart Desktop as a "web resources," which allow you to quickly retrieve online documents without having to hunt through your browser bookmarks to find them.
The SmartDesktop application is designed to be used by individuals who to assist with organization of emails and files by project. (A framework for developers is also available). The application only works on Windows machines and supports the following applications:
While traditionally a software program like this would stick to only supporting other desktop software, the company seems to have taken note of the online office trend and has decided to branch out from being solely tied to the machine to support some cloud apps as well. With support for both Google Docs and Zoho (only Zoho Sheets, unfortunately), there's a chance for SmartDesktop to succeed among the online crowd as well. That is, assuming they continue to add support for online services, including the rest of Zoho's suite.
To really benefit from a program like SmartDesktop, you need to have a lot of data stored in files across both the web and your machine and no time or inclination to organize it on your own. But you don't need to work on "projects" to use SmartDesktop; it is meant to organize anything that you're working on, whether personal events, managing clients, doing research, planning a budget, etc. In SmartDesktop, a "project" is just the container for the files, email, and web pages that are related to each other.
This structure takes SmartDesktop beyond being just another desktop search app. Instead of just scanning your hard drive for keywords, it starts with a project-oriented view of your information and doesn't even index the information you haven't touched. This way, search results are faster and contain much less noise.
Will SmartDesktop really help people deal with information overload? Those interested in finding out can can sign up to be alerted when the beta is made available for download: just click here.
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What is 'machine intelligence'?
Posted by: Conrado at OpenGoo | July 28, 2008 6:52 AM
Four pages with a record breaking 26(! - i counted) input fields and a multi-page beta-test agreement just to be notified when their software becomes available? Guess they are trying desperately to keep the number of beta user down.
Posted by: Valentin | July 28, 2008 7:20 AM
Yes What is machine intelligence I Like This
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Posted by: Oigen | July 29, 2008 2:05 AM
Too bad there's no OpenOffice support. I wasn't aware that people were actually using Office 2007. :)
Posted by: Matt Wiseley | July 29, 2008 5:52 AM