By WALTER S. MOSSBERG
For most Internet users, Google is synonymous with online search. Millions of people begin every Web session at Google's famous, plain home page.
But that's not good enough for the bright young upstarts who run Google. They want Google to be your constant companion even if searching or browsing the Web is the furthest thing from your mind. They are working hard to make Google software a fixture on computer desktops.
That is the aim of two new, free products the search giant released this week. One is an instant-messaging program called Google Talk, intended to be your primary means of real-time digital communication. The other is an information-management utility called Google Desktop
2, designed to become a permanent part of your desktop, grabbing space from Microsoft's Windows desktop.
I've been testing pre-release versions of both new products, which only work on Windows PCs, and have found that both work well, with a couple of exceptions. More important, both products, especially Google Desktop, have great potential for expansion and are meant to become indispensable.