I am an avid user of a variety of applications ranging from simple web browsers to music programs to the most sophisticated of games and applets. Apart from web browser I use and the operating system, the application is like and utilize the most is the Google Toolbar. It may sound weird, but Google Toolbar is surely one of the most helpful software for me.

Initially when I started with the web, the search engines were very inefficient. There was a fierce competition among search engines to be the best. Some focused on finding more number of pages while others looked for relevant results. Very often the same search on three different search engines would yield three different results.

Google then came into the market. Few years after this Google became the most popular and reliable search engine in the entire web world. The reason ease that it gives results that are very relevant to your search. Google took full advantage of their position and diversified. Currently, Google can be used to browse and search full-text books, images, videos, songs and even your own hard disk and desktop!

One generally has to navigate the Google's home page every time a search is performed using the Google search engine. Here is a great technical page http://www.techiehut.com. With Google Toolbar, you can bypass the Google home page and yet be able to perform the searches. Just download and install the Google Toolbar and you will see it integrated with your browser appearing just below address bar. Go and type the keyword you are searching and hit Enter. You will have the results displayed directly.

With the menu provided, you can search Google Images, Google Groups, Google News, Froogle (The shopping search engine from Google) and even the site you are currently visiting. There is even a pop-up blocker that is more effective than any of the existing ones which prevents any ads appearing and annoying you. Highlight option is another feature that can be used to highlight the search term on the page displayed. Helpful particularly if the site is a text heavy site.

Google Toolbar will do check the spellings for any text you input. You can even link to Google Maps to see any location specified on the page. An Auto Fill option will fill in advance any form with your information. And all these without any hassle or conditions, no ads popping up and ofcourse, it is 100% free.