Daring Fireball: A Quick, Possibly Incomplete Guide to What Gets Installed by the Google Desktop Installer:
Today, Google released Google Desktop for Mac, which, in a nutshell, is more or less a competitor to Spotlight. I’ve only had time to give it a cursory examination, but it’s clearly a deep and complex set of software. I say “set” because Google Desktop is not just one piece of software, it’s a system with numerous components. A simple drag-and-drop installation wouldn’t work.
But Google doesn’t use Apple’s standard installer, either. Google Desktop is delivered using another new Google app, called Google Updater. This app is a meta installer for various Google Mac apps, including, as of today, Google Desktop, Earth, Notifier, and Picasa Uploader. It doesn’t contain the software for any of these apps, instead, it downloads the latest version when you choose to install or update them. It also provides a simple one-button interface for uninstalling these apps.
It’s a slick, easy-to-use piece of software, but alas, it lacks anything like the aforementioned Show Files feature of Apple’s installer. There’s no way to tell what files it’s going to install, or where.
This matters with Google Desktop, because there are a lot of files, and they’re installed into some interesting — if not suspicious — locations.
2:07 PM
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