Those of us watching the 2013 Google I/O keynote either in person or streaming on the web have been introduced to some wicked cool new features. Even with the presentation still ongoing we have been treated to numerous new technologies and services as well as a lot of improvements on things that we have already come to know and love.
Obviously the focus for a lot of people who read this site will be on Android with a side helping of the Chrome OS, but it is important to remember what Google’s bread and butter is and that’s search. Everything the company does will almost always go back to Google search in one way shape or form so it would make sense that they would want to keep improving on it.
One of the updates that we got to see demonstrated this afternoon was to Google’s “knowledge graph”. This work in progress was debuted just a year ago has already grown by leaps and bounds in that short span of time to where now it can actually predict your followup question should you need to get further in depth with your query.
Additionally it looks like we will be seeing more of a Google Now type look brought over to the desktop search. Viewers were just treated to a demonstration of what Google has dubbed “conversational search” using the the Google search web page.
Similar to how those of us on the Android side of things interact with Google Now, the new desktop search is activated when the hot word “Google” is spoken. After a question is asked the reply from Google is not only shown on your screen in a Google Now type card format but it is also spoken back to us just like we are used to on our smartphones and tablets.
Search answers will also be more personalized than ever before. If given access to your Gmail, Google Search will now be able to answer questions such as “What time is my flight?” with your flight times as well as a map and travel time to the airport.