Web History Suggestions in Google Instant

There are many missing features in Google Instant. The classic interface suggested searches from the Web History, so you could select previously typed queries.

It seems that this feature will be available again. Google tests a version of Google Instant with Web History suggestions. For some queries, 3 of the 4 suggestions are from the Web History and there's only one general suggestion.

Maybe it would be a better idea to only show one or two personalized suggestions, since they aren't always useful.

Google Features No Longer Available in Instant Search

Google Instant Search is a very interesting experiment that could change the way you find the information on the Web, but the new interface comes with a lot of unpleasant side effects.

1. Google Suggest can no longer be disabled. Even if you disable Google Instant, suggestions will still be displayed.

2. You can no longer change the number of results. The interface would be less fluid if Google had to fetch 50 or 100 results every time you change your query.

3. Google Suggest no longer shows previously typed searches from the Google Web History. This was a great feature for the repeated queries. Marissa Mayer said last year that "40% of searches on any given day are repeat searches for a user".

4. Google Suggest no longer shows 10 suggestions. Because of the space constraints, Google only displays 4 suggestions, followed by your original query.

5. The fade-in animation has been removed. This feature used to hide the navigation bar and all the links from the homepage until you moved your mouse.

6. "Search within results" is no longer available. This feature has never been useful because it didn't actually search within results. It only allowed you to add new keywords to an existing query.

7. Google's search box is not displayed at the bottom of the page. As Amit Agarwal points out, you have to scroll to the top of the page to change the query.

Google Suggest as a Context-Sensitive Spell Checker

This is one of the most useful features that are released by Google this year. Google Suggest, which usually auto-completes your query as you type, is now also a spell-checker. Even if the Google can't find popular queries that start with the words you've typed, it will still show a "did you mean" entry that corrects your spelling mistakes.

The most impressive thing about this feature is that the spell checker is in context-sensitive, so the suggestions are actually relevant. It's likely that Google uses the smart spell checker from the Google Wave.

If you type [this is a rlly], Google suggests that [this is a rally] and is more appropriate. Most browsers offer the same suggestion. If you type the another word and your query is [this is a rlly beautiful], Google shows with a different suggestion: [this is a really beautiful].

Type [Why its so important too eat hole grains] in a text field from a web page and that your browser won't find any spelling mistakes. Not even Gmail's will spell checker can find the mistakes. That's because most of the applications use dictionaries to find the words that are spelled incorrectly. Google Suggest is now smarter because it tries to find if the words make sense in the context of your query.

Spelling Corrections in Google Suggest

Google Suggest has already been detecting misspellings and showing suggestions that include the properly spelled keywords, but now the mistakes are easier to spot. If you type a misspelled query, Google Suggest includes the "did you mean" label.

"These spelling suggestions already exist on the results page, but by moving them to an earlier point in the search process, we hope we've made it faster and easier to get to the results you're looking for. Right now, this feature is offered only for google.com in English, but we're working to roll this out internationally in the near future," explains Google.

A Wall Street Journal article listed some of the most commonly misspelled words in Google and other search engines: "Criagslist" instead of "Craigslist", "Facebok" instead of "Facebook", "definately", "definetly" or "definatly" instead of "definitely", "stilletos" or "stillettos" instead of "stilettos", "mischevious" and "mischievious" instead of "mischievous". Yahoo's most misspelled word of 2010 so far was Eyjafjallajokull, the famous volcano in Iceland that erupted this year.