We’ve covered Firefox plugin Search Cloudlet before, when they bolted their tag-based search solution on top of Google and Yahoo Search. At the time, I thought it was pretty cool and still use it daily.
But as you may have heard, Twitter is rapidly becoming a complementary search engine on its own, providing real-time results on a variety of topics based on keyword search. It was only a matter of time for Search Cloudlet to add support for the micro-sharing service, and the updated version of the plugin that does just that is launching today.
The functionality is the same as what you get when you search Google or Yahoo. Installing the extension in Firefox (works from version 2.0 up to 3.1 beta 3) enhances Twitter Search, which is increasingly being integrated into the main Twitter interface, in the sense that it inserts a tag cloud based on queries on top of the regular results. Clicking tags filters the results down, and you can do the same for authors (based on Twitter handles) and @To messages, meaning replies to other users. It’s quite easy to turn off and never gets in your way, so it’s definitely a great addition if you search Twitter conversations on a regular basis.
Also very useful is the fact that if you go to a user’s profile page, you get tags for what that individual user has been tweeting about, which you can also filter down. Tags for individual users only go back 20 messages, while the regular Twitter search enhancement goes back 100. It would be nice if this number could be tweaked somehow.
Screenshots:
Search Cloudlet is extremely similar to what startups like Tweetag (review), TwitScoop and Tweetwire are doing (also check out Cloud.li), but the big difference is that the tag cloud is integrated right into Twitter Search, which is evidently very valuable since you no longer need to remember or head to a separate website to enjoy tag-based search. Of course, it’s only really helpful when you use Twitter via the web, which is still the most popular way to use the service but is also being challenged with the rise of excellent desktop clients like TweetDeck, Twhirl or AlertThingy to name but a few. And of course, it only works with Firefox.
Search Cloudlet was developed by the International Software & Productivity Engineering Institute (INTSPEI), a research organization with offices in New York and Kiev (Ukraine). It was cooked up by @vlpavlov, @sashakravets and @kzhereb but the original idea to use the technology to enhance Twitter search came from Marjolein “@cleverclogs” Hoekstra.
Looks a good extension. Gotta try it out
http://www.smartbloggerz.com
Hi Robin,
Thanks for mentionning twitscoop, but we are pretty different from the services you discuss in this post (despite our use of a tag cloud).
With twitscoop, you don’t need to be looking for something. Our application is a real-time navigation tool which gives the pulse of the twittersphere.
We are releasing a new version in the coming days, please don’t hesitate to get in touch if you want some informations about the upcoming lauch.
Best regards.
its quintura.com clone
Huh? Quintura is a site search solution / alternative search engine, while Search Cloudlet is a plugin that enhances existing search tools. How is this a clone? Neither invented tag clouds for search, you know.
You fell for a troll/spam bait
Well, probably
but I actually thought of Quintura and decided it had nothing to do with this.
Still think it’s a clone, I launched cloud based Twitter search http://cloud.li last week. It was featured on Mashable:
http://mashable.../03/09/cloudli/
You should read the posts before you comment. I linked to Cloud.li
Sorry Robin, I somehow missed the bottom part of your post (I do read all of them). I started working on a Firefox extension myself, but Cloudlet beat me to it.
Nicely done!
Installed it, love it, thanks to the developers. Doesn’t work for “Advanced Search” though, any advice?
Marko, thanks for installing our extension and for your comment. I’m sorry to hear about your issues with Search Cloudlet in Advanced Search. I’ve tried to reproduce these issues, but for me Cloudlet works fine with advanced search on search.twitter.com. Could you please provide more details to cloudlet@intspei.com ? It would be very helpful if you could describe what behavior you are seeing, and/or provide a screenshot and URL of the page where Cloudlet isn’t working for you. I hope this information will help us resolve your issues with Search Cloudlet.
Dear Search Cloudlet:
Live up to your name and give us a bookmarklet!
Thanks,
joe
Try mine (for http://cloud.li/): http://cloud.li/bookmarklet/
Nice post! Check out my site too at http://macmaniapodcast.com.
I love the headline of this story…was just talking to a friend, imaging reading this headline when we were in high school in 1989…
How long would it take to explain?
haha, I know what you mean. I graduated highschool significantly later than 89′ (and even a little after 99′ for that matter) and we still would have been clueless for the most part.
It is amazing what you can obtain from an efficient data mining process if you have enough “real time” messages to consider. Another site with a valuable search function is justaskgemalto the digital security site.