Some poking around in the settings for Google’s Search app shows it is largely incompatible with many of the apps on a typical smartphone or tablet. This means that users hoping to take advantage of “universal search” are unlikely to get the results they were hoping for. Universal search has been the subject of patent skirmishes, especially for Samsung devices. Nonetheless, the function is now present and has been for a while on Android powered devices. With universal search, users can get results not only from the web, but from applications that are running on their device. As the latest analysis shows, the applications capable of delivering results to Google Search are made up of a small list.
To check out how universal search works, if you are not already familiar, open Google Now and start typing something in the search bar without hitting enter. As the app starts to try to populate the results based on what has been typed so far, you’ll see a results page building. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and you will find a link for Search Phone or Search Tablet. Click on that link to see your local results.
If you want to see what is included in what Google searches on the devices, in the Google Search app go to the menu and drill down through Settings to Phone search. As some have now discovered, the list is quite sparse, especially when comparing Android 4.4 with any older version. This may give the appearance that Google made some change with KitKat to limit the function’s capabilities. However, apps like the Chrome browser and Play Music only recently showed up after receiving updates. This could suggest the issue lies in how apps are compiled for KitKat requiring developers to make some adjustments to their code.
For now, there do not appear to be any workarounds or fixes for the issue. If the issue is on Google’s end, hopefully they will take steps to correct this problem. If the problem lies with app developers and the need to include some new code in their apps, we can only hope they are working on updates.
source: Android Police
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