Google Labs has debuted “Google X” which adds an animated Mac OS X-style Dock above Google’s search box. Chikai Ohazama, Google Software Engineer, has blogged the following:
Today is an amazing day: A small idea – a fun late-night coding jaunt to help me learn Javascript & DHTML – has just launched on Google Labs. I never expected it to make it as far as it has when I wrote it a month ago, especially since my “real” job is working on Keyhole, where I’m having the time of my life taking our cool 3D mapping application and putting the power of Google behind it. It’s fulfilling to have the opportunity to reach the audience we always dreamed of when we started Keyhole five years ago, and that by itself is absolute coolness.
And now there’s Google X, which came about because I wanted a quick fun way to access all of Google’s services. I gave it to a few friends in the company, who gave it to their friends, some posted it on their blogs, others sent it around on mailing lists, and it eventually made its way to Marissa Mayer, who liked it enough to say, when do you want to put it up on Labs? So after some spit and polish from some enthusiastic Googlers and the keen eye of the UI team, Google X is here. I hope all of you enjoy it – especially Mac users, who I’m sure will appreciate its lineage.
See “Google X” here.
MacDailyNews Take: Too bad you can’t turn off the animation; Dock Magnification is one of the first things we disable on our Macs. Why? It’s far easier and quicker to hit a stationary target than a slippery moving one. Let’s face it, the animated Dock icons aren’t very useful. So, because Apple has included text rollovers on Dock icons, turning off the Magnification and minimizing the Dock to its smallest possible size works best for us.
Kudos to Google, though, for minimizing the Magnification animation and providing a familiar place for Mac OS X users, right down to the quote (and link to Apple’s Mac OS X page) at the bottom of the page, “Roses are red. Violets are blue. OS X rocks. Homage to you.”
[UPDATE, 10:31am ET: AcidSearch is a search enhancement for Safari. It adds unlimited “Search Channels” to the Google search field. Channels can be customized, so you can add Google X. AcidSearch is free software, and will always be free, according to developer pozytron. More info and download link here.]
[UPDATE, 7:00pm ET: Google X is no longer currently available. See related article below.]
Related MacDailyNews articles:
‘Google X’ goes missing – March 16, 2005
How to run a Mac OS X PowerBook or iBook; no shut downs, restarts, or quitting applications – March 16, 2005
I really like dock magnification, as long as it is only slightly turned on. As others have said, it provides lovely visual feedback of where you are pointing, and it doesn’t interfere at all with pointing at your target.
Yeah, just pop up a little, not too big. I don’t like the Dock being blown up like a balloon. The Google thing is cool, but it does look a lot like a web page, and not a piece of software. I guess that’s too appeal to the ‘dozers out there, but whatever. I’m still using what I want, we’ll just leave it at that. Go get ’em Tiger!
“Dock Magnification is one of the first things we disable on our Macs.”
I also highly disagree with Mac Daily News’s take on Dock magnification. I think it’s one of the coolest features about our Mac Docks. It helps a lot when you have a ton of icons in your Dock. Helps a lot to concentrate on what your clicking.
Believe it or not, the dock magnification is incredibly helpful, particularly when you have alot of icons on the dock and the size shrinks, with magnification it becomes much easier to see/recognize the icon you are over.
I’ve noticed that Reality Check is always highly/over-critical abut the aritcles posted about the mac.
I have to wonder, is there ANYTHING about OS X or macs that he likes or can be positive about?
Or is he just a simple troll looking to antagonize mac users for his jollies, and nothing more?
If Apple’s on a litigation roll, they should sue Google while they’re at it.
Something must be going on…
GoogleX isn’t working at the moment… ??!!
It no workey…
Did apple’s legal team threaten a smackdown?
Ha, they just removed the link. That was quite spiffy.
Come on gang… We’ve got a mystery to solve…
Wow, that didn’t last long… 🙁
well now that sucks, where did it go? HEY HACKERS: Find it, or look and see if the code is cached on your local machines, and get it running again! WOOO!!!
Magic Word: Morning
As is a misspelled mourning for googlex.
Yeah, already saved the code on that one just so I could see how they did it. It isn’t groundbreaking, but it is rather spiffy and cleaner than most attempts I’ve seen.
Deal link MDN
seriously, aren’t the “macdailynews takes” annoying? i leave mine on.
Use google to find the page;
Google “Google X”
Look at the first non-news link returned and click on the “Cached” link
Scroll over the broken image icons to see the OS X like Dock Magnigication at work