In today’s Searchology Press Conference, Google made a couple important announcements regarding to the future of Google.

google searchology new interface navigation

PageRank, the algorithm behind Google’s searching technology, has entered its “first stage of an upgraded ranking mechanism that automatically and objectively compares different types of information” to deliver the best results to the end users.

The way you navigate through different search results has changed greatly. On Web searches, when you enter a query, it will include navigation links next the Web on the left side of the section where it displays the number of results. Also, Google has added a new navigation bar on top of the result pages and home page of its products to help you easily navigate to one another, this includes Gmail, Video, Blog Search, Blogger, Calendar, Document, Groups, Reader, Maps, Scholar, and many others. (see screen shot above)

google experimental

Beside the ones you can see now, Google launched a new service in the Google Labs, called the Google Experimental, where Google will “provides users an opportunity to try out some of the latest search experiments and innovations.” Some of the experiments available now are Timeline and Map views, where the results are sorted in a timeline and results are showed on a map alongside the results, keyboard short-cuts, and left/right hand navigation.

More coverage (Techmeme):

Behind the scenes with universal search - Official Google Blog

Universal search: The best answer is still the best answer - Official Google Blog

Google Begins Move to Universal Search - Google Press Center

Google Searchology: The Future of Search - Google Blogoscoped

Google Searchology Day: Recap Of Announcements - Search Engine Land

Google Launches New Design, Universal Search and a Site for Search Experiments - Google Operating System