Visual display of Information in Google

If you're the type that appreciates visual displays of information, you're bound to like the TouchGraph Google Browser. This Java applet allows you to start with pages that are similar to one URL, and then expand outward to pages that are similar to the first set of pages, on and on, until you have a giant map of nodes (a.k.a. URLs) on your screen.



Start your journey by entering a URL on the TouchGraph home page and clicking the Graph It link. Your browser will launch the TouchGraph Java applet, covering your window with a large mass of linked nodes, as shown in fig above.
Hold your mouse over one of the items in the group of pages. A little box labeled info pops up. Click on that, and a box of information about that particular node appears, as shown in fig below.



The box of information contains title, snippet, and URLpretty much everything you'd get from a regular search result. Click on the URL in the box to open that URL's web page itself in another browser window.
TouchGraph does two rather useful things. First, it allows you to see at a glance the similarity relationship between large groups of URLs. You can't do this with several flat results to similar URL queries. Second, if you do some exploring, you can sometimes get a list of companies in the same industry or area. This comes in handy when you're researching a particular industry or topic.
For a look at all the ways you can customize the TouchGraph Google browser, be sure to check out the Full Instructions page at http://www.touchgraph.com/TGGB_FullInstructions.html.