The Command Line Strikes Back

For the better part of the past decade (or two decades if you are a Mac fan), people having been extoling the virtues of the Graphical User Interface (GUI) over the command line. So naturally, when the internet became big, and Yahoo! et al started putting their portals together, they were graphical in nature.

Users of such portals have access to their email, weather updates, stock quotes, maps, yellow pages, news, and more. All in all, it has been a great ride, except for the need for more screen space. People now have so many buttons, links, icons, and other information crowding their portal that they need several pages for it (mine has three pages). And even this is not enough. In fact many of you can probably sympathize with Buck Murdoch from Airplane II, as played by William Shatner: "We've all got our switches, lights, and knobs to deal with, Striker. I mean, down here there are literally hundreds and thousands of blinking, beeping, and flashing lights, blinking and beeping and flashing - they're *flashing* and they're *beeping*. I can't stand it anymore! They're *blinking* and *beeping* and *flashing*! Why doesn't somebody pull the plug!" Yes, there is a lot of clutter in the portal world!

However, there may be a way out of this morass, and I believe that Google is providing it - not through a GUI portal, but through a command line. "What!?!?" you may stammer, "the command line is dead!" Well, maybe it was dead, but it has come back to life through Google's search bar. Proof of this is given by the following examples.

• Weather - By entering "weather new york, ny" you can get a quick four day forecast of the weather for the city of New York. ( see the example at http://www.google.com/search?&q=weather%20new%20york%2C%20ny ). This also works if you type in "weather zip-code"
• Locations - By entering "outback dallas" you can find the results for Outback Steakhouse in Dallas, Texas. The first link then takes you to a nice listing with a map ( see the example at http://www.google.com/local?hl=en&lr=&q=outback&near=Dallas,+TX&sa=X&oi=localr )
• Movie Reviews - By entering "movie:titanic" you can view all the movie reviews on the web, with a nice summary page. This is especially helpful for titles that have several different versions over the years. This also works for "movie: keywords", such that you could enter "movie: boat atlantic sink" and still get the information for the movie titanic.
  
• Movie Times - By entering just "movie:" Google will prompt you for a zip code. If you type in 78660, you can get the movie times for the theaters around Dell's Round Rock headquarters. (see the example at http://www.google.com/search?q=movie%3A&sc=1&near=78660&rl=1 )

There are many other examples, most of which can be found at Google's Help page at http://www.google.com/help/features.html . The point is pretty clear, though. Google has been able to replace many of the buttons on my portal pages with a command line. There is no clutter, just a text entry bar for me to enter whatever I want to find. And if I'm not interested in stock quotes when I'm looking for movie times, then I don't have to see them. Now that's genius.