While sitting here waiting to read Engagdet’s live coverage of Larry Page’s keynote at CES, Google’s PR department sent me a press release (not up on the wires or Google’s web site yet, it seems, so no link) announcing Google Pack.
It’s pretty much what the leaked information said it was — it’s a software bundle consisting of · Adobe Reader 7 · Ad-Aware SE Personal · GalleryPlayer HD Images · Google Desktop · Google Earth · Google Pack Screensaver · Google Talk · Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer · Mozilla Firefox with Google Toolbar · Norton AntiVirus 2005 Special Edition · Picasa · RealPlayer · Trillian.
Google first downloads and runs something called the Google Updater, what Google says is “a new tool that intelligently downloads, installs and maintains all the software in the Google Pack.” It’s pretty important to notice that in order to get the software, you have to agree to allow Google to collect anonymous usage data from you first.
The whole Pack installed very quickly, under five minutes, mostly because I already had all the software on my laptop. Some items — such as Mozilla — were simply updated. It was difficult, however, to figure out to stop the install of some software; I didn’t want to download Norton AntiVirus and had to “pause” the download, creating a little bit of confusion regarding whether that pause would affecting the other software updates/downloads that had occurred. (It didn’t.)
Other than that fleeting problem, Google Pack was swift and easy and the company promises that updates of all this software will occur in an equally painless fashion. In the press release, Google’s Marissa Mayer said
We developed Google Pack to give users a way to painlessly install all the essential software they need - pre-configured in a sensible way - in a matter of minutes. Better yet, users don’t have to keep track of software updates or new programs - we maintain and update all the software for them.
Although I thought the idea of the Google Pack sounded somewhat…underwhelming, the experience is pretty cool — fast, efficient, free and a lot of software that is very useful. For the average Internet user, Google Pack could come in handy…and help Google expand its footprint while gaining a whole lot of useful data.
Cynthia Brumfield at 7:23 PM|Comments(0)
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