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Mel Sampat on Windows Mobile
Windows Live Mobile Search v2 Released

Mobile Search v2 has just been released with improved navigation, caching, movie listings, restaurants, GPS, traffic reporting and more! This is one of my all time favorite apps, and not just because I work in the Windows Mobile team. It is extremely well designed, the search results are accurate, and it comes with enough bells and whistles to be useful in many scenarios. Read the announcement and download the latest version from the team blog (while you're at it, check out this review on CNET news.com).

Also try out the updated Live Search in IEMobile by visiting http://m.live.com.

If you want one more cool mobile search option, try Microsoft's recently acquired TellMe's service. Simply SMS a search query like "Starbucks 90210" to TELLM (83556) and wait for the results. This works on all phones - not just Windows Mobile.

Note: If you're a Windows Mobile developer, I especially recommend downloading the Mobile Search client above. This app follows all the design guidelines and compatibility best practices that ensure it works on the widest range of devices. And it is written in managed code (C#)! Seeing it work may help you improve the usability of your own applications, or inspire you to create something equally cool with the Windows Mobile 6 SDK.

-Mel

Posted: Thursday, July 12, 2007 9:26 PM by MelSam
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Comments

Kevin Daly said:

Before I get my hopes up, is this another of those US/UK only things?

'Cos that's getting really old.

# July 13, 2007 5:40 AM

Kevin Daly said:

Unfortunately I answered my own question this morning...it *is* US/UK only.

Why then is Windows Live Mobile Search v2 being announced as if it were something that is generally available?

Has Microsoft forgotten that the rest of the world exists? (and no, it's not a language issue: we speak English here).

The internet, despite its origins, is an inherently global medium. So why are we subjected to this regional chauvinism?

Does this affect my opinion of Microsoft? You bet.

# July 14, 2007 11:12 PM

MelSam said:

Hey Kevin,

I agree, it's disappointing that this doesn't work outside the UK and US. This is a data collection issue, not a US/UK bias on Microsoft's part. My guess is that at this time data such as Yellow pages, road maps, directions etc is more readily available for the US and UK than other countries. Ultimately of course we'd like to support every country in the world, and we're working on that. However, collecting that amount of data and scaling our infrastructure takes time. This is only my guess, I don't work on the Live team so I don't know what the exact reason might be but I've asked my coworkers there to clarify.

# July 15, 2007 3:26 PM

Antoine Cloutier said:

Kevin,

> Unfortunately I answered my own

> question this morning...it *is*

> US/UK only.

The movie listings may well be for the US/UK only, but the maps do work elsewhere. At least LiveSearch does work partially here in Montreal. I tried it tonight to find a store nearby and it worked perfectly. I am now using it to bookmark the hotels where I will be staying in Spain. (Leaving tomorrow, I can't wait!)

Just in case you missed this... Did you first select "add a new location" before using the search function? If you scroll from the US/UK to your country/city and then create a new location from there, you will then be able to do local searches from that location.

Hope this helps,

Antoine

# July 20, 2007 10:07 PM
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