All Articles Tagged search

Search Google.com from your iPhone (or Android or webOS device) and notice the brand-spanking new Options drop-down on the top right. Tap it a list Google’s Mobile Blog says:

Finding the exact information you need sometimes requires filtering and refining your search results. Earlier in the year, we launched a collection of tools called Search Options which enable you to easily and quickly do this from a computer. Today in the US, we are making Search Options available on Android/iPhone/Palm WebOS devices so that you can slice and dice your mobile search results as well. For example, suppose you are shopping at a store for a camera, and you would like to see what users have been saying about a specific model within the past week. You can do this simply by searching for the name of the product. Then, on the search results page, use “Options” to filter by “Forums” and refine further by choosing “Past week”.

Let us know how it works for you…

[via PreCentral.net]

Yahoo! and Microsoft have just announced a 10-year search deal where Microsoft’s newly re-branded Bing service will take over web searches for the venerable Yahoo! For its part, Yahoo! will get 88% of ad-based search revenue for 5 years and the ability to sell ads to some Microsoft search sites as well and limited access to user data.

Um, okay. Is that a good deal? Even if it doesn’t face any regulatory or approval problems, the deal won’t close until next year and then will take up to a couple of years to get up and running.

So, impact on the iPhone and iPhone users in the short term is likely nothing. Although, like Jacob’s nemesis on Lost, it could mean Microsoft has finally found a loophole to get their Bing search service onto the iPhone…

Currently the iPhone offers too search options via Settings > Safari: Google and Yahoo. Will Apple be switching that to Google and Bing?

Apple’s lone outstretched hand to the social web, the MobileMe News “blog” is back with another helpful hint for users, this time about using iPhone 3.0 to search older email on the server:

select your Inbox or another folder from your MobileMe Mail account and access the search field by scrolling to the top of the message list. (Tap the status bar at the top to quickly reveal the search field.) Type what you want to search for and tap To, From, or Subject, or All to search all three. You’ll see the messages that match the search on your device, and you can then tap “Continue Search on Server” to see the remaining messages that are stored in the MobileMe cloud.

I’ve used this to find old order info, network machine names, and scads of other stuff buried in server-side email. Since it doesn’t (yet?) search the body of the email, it’s not as useful as Gmail’s WebApp, for example, but it’s lightyears ahead of where it was under 2.2.1.

One of Dieter’s longest longings for the iPhone was the ability just to start typing to search. Just turn the phone on and start typing to launch a device-wide query for all your contacts, emails, events, etc.

Well, it looks like iPhone OS 3.0 finally delivers for him, and all of us. The new iPhone 3.0 Settings > General > Home Button preference page expands on the iPhone 2.0 options of Home, Phone Favorites, and iPod with the two new, much appreciated additions:

• Search
• Camera

Primarily an on-the-go photographer? Just set this option and the Camera is always just a double-click of Home away. Mobile accomplisher like Dieter, choose Search and with a double-click you can immediately start typing in Spotlight to launch Apps or find your data.

Boom.

The intertubes are a flood with rumors that Apple may be building their own search engine. Does this mean they’re going into competition with Microsoft Live! Search? With Yahoo!? With Google?! (After all, Google went into competition with Apple in the smartphone market!)

Probably not, according to TechCrunch:

The answer is they’re not. But the rumors persist, and we believe they have a nugget of truth. Here’s what we think is really going on: Apple doesn’t like the search experience on its mobile devices, and may be building a radically different user experience which is much more visual than exists today. It will likely still be powered by Google results, but Apple may present it in a very different way that suits mobile users much better.

Apple’s already proven with the iPhone Map application that they can produce absolutely killer front-ends for Google’s data pipes, could they do the same for search? And what would it be like?

The New York Times (via Giz) is reporting that Google’s love for the iPhone is about to hit epic, Shakespearian proportions with the release of their ground-breaking “advanced voice search” App:

Users of the free application, which Apple is expected to make available as soon as Friday through its iTunes store, can place the phone to their ear and ask virtually any question, like “Where’s the nearest Starbucks?” or “How tall is Mount Everest?” The sound is converted to a digital file and sent to Google’s servers, which try to determine the words spoken and pass them along to the Google search engine.

Will it be perfect? Nope. It will sometimes return nonsense, and indeed the researchers behind it claim it will never reach 100% — but they’re aiming to make it as good as it can possibly be.

This caps off several weeks of Google announcements for the iPhone, of course, including OS 2.2 updates for Street-View, Transit and Walking Directions, and Location Sharing for the Maps App, the release of Google Earth, and an optimized version of the Google Search page for the iPhone.

So, when’s this hitting the App Store, and aside from candy, flowers, and a lobster dinner, what could possibly be next?!

Safari on the iPhone is the best mobile internet experience in today’s market bar none. It is as much intuitive as it is pretty which makes for a superb user interface and browsing experience. But one complaint I had with Safari was the lack of quick search tools. If you ever used Sogudi or Saft on the desktop Safari, you know that it makes Safari an even more powerful web browser.

WebSearch on the iPhone comes from a similar mold. Because in Safari the default search engine is Google (you can also switch to Yahoo! in the settings) it kind of limits the specific searches you might need. Especially considering the slow pace of EDGE, quick searches in the wild can often be cumbersome. Well with WebSearch you are allowed quick easy access to the searches you want. How does it perform?

Read on for the rest of the review! (and remember you’ll need a jailbroken iPhone!)

Read the rest of this entry »

Image from Engadget Mobile

A lot of people have been poring over screenshots from the iPhone Software Roadmap event — our own Chad Garrett saw evidence that there might be Task/ToDo functionality built into iCal. The other shot that’s been making the rounds is the one above, where you can clearly see a magnifying glass at the top of the “scrolling strip” in the contacts app. The current speculation is that it will finally allow us to “Type to find” a contact rather than have to scroll through the list. That’s what I want, but Pocketnow has just posted up an editorial with this little tidbit:

However, none of the internet communities made mention of how this may be a function of the integration of Microsoft function; rather, these sites just mention it as an Apple update. [...] However, thinking back to the contacts search, perhaps this is a Microsoft innovation related to server searching ability for contacts and emails.

AHA! We know that Apple already told us we’d be able to search through an Exchange server’s Global Address list, and I wondered how exactly it would work. On Windows Mobile a search just automatically scans through both your local and the Exchange list — with luck it will do the same on the iPhone. It’s possible, though, that all we’ll get is a separate search of Exchange with that icon. Windows Mobile uses very similar databases as Exchange so a common search is likely much easier to implement than it would be on the iPhone.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but that search icon might not give us the contact search functionality we’ve been jonesing for.

Apple’s Thursday press release (via Ars Technica), while big on Enterprise and chock-full of SDK goodness, also snuck in some new, long sought-after features for one of the built-in apps: MobileMail (Mail Touch?).

In addition to these new iPhone network and security features, the beta iPhone 2.0 software provides several new Mail features such as the ability to view PowerPoint attachments, in addition to Word and Excel, as well as the ability to mass delete and move email messages.

But what about the other built-in apps like Calendar and Contacts?

Our own eagle-eyed Chad Garrett has already spotted a mysterious new icon on Calendar, and predicted we may indeed see Task integration (GTD’ers, put it on your to do’s!).

Now BlargKABOOM (via TUAW) has hauled out the iMicroscope and discovered yet another tantalizing new icon, this time in Contacts:

It is a little spotlight icon right above the A on the alphabet.

Does this mean we may just be getting search as well? If so, how will it be implemented, and will it be limited to contacts or (dare we hope?) system wide, SDK-level CoreSearch?

iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store, YouTube, the Weather, Stock and other widgets, and MobileSafari Touch have all had search for a while now. C’mon Apple, share the love!

We’re all familiar with the 4th Amendment to the US Constitution, right? The one that states that you’re secure from “unreasonable searches and seizures?” Right, well, we all know from our TV-watching that the key word there is “unreasonable.” Turns out that the most-common of police encounters, the traffic stop, could potentially open you up to having your smartphone searched.

Basically, if the police officer arrests you for real, he or she can then search your person — including your iPhone — without a warrant:

Adam Gershowitz, an assistant professor at the South Texas College of Law, raises an interesting point about the iPhone and similarly tricked-out mobile devices: If the police stop you and find some legal cause to arrest you, they are probably free, under judicial interpretations of the Fourth Amendment, to search the device. – Machinist

That’s a scary thought, actually, because it’s one thing to search a car, but to search an iPhone is tantamount to searching your entire life. Think about it: email, browsing history, received phone calls, all of it.

Of course, there’s always the chance that when this gets tested for real in court, that court will set a precedent that will overturn this. As of right now, though, the ability to do that search is the best interpretation of current law.

What do to? Apparently if you just set a screen-lock password, a warrant is required. I’m not just saying this as a PSA to criminals, either — setting the screen lock is a good idea all around. If your iPhone gets stolen, welcome to the special circle of hell reserved for those whose identity has been stolen. Not. Fun. (and no, I’m not just talking about iPhones, either.)

So that screen lock is a hassle, but it might just be worth it, no?