Office 2007 Five take aways on Microsoft's new Liv

Microsoft took the covers off the drop release of its Reside Search engine on September 26 at its invitation-only Searchification event for press and analysts.I wasn;t there, but like a large number of, I was briefed and embargoed about what;s new inside the drop update. (The embargoes ended at midnight EST.) I;ve posted some display shots of a few of the new Reside Search enhancements users can anticipate to be rolled out as component of the drop release among now and mid-October.There weren;t a whole great deal of surprises, as a result of an early post and display shots from a Microsoft Reside Search item supervisor (subsequently eliminated) that had been grabbed by the LiveSide.Net internet site. But listed here are my 5 take-aways about what;s new and what;s coming subsequent from Microsoft inside the Live Search arena.one. Microsoft;s search index is often a whole lot bigger now. Microsoft officials stated the Reside Search index has grown four-fold because the first release. (Sadly, that number is fairly meaningless, given that Microsoft won;t say how major the initial index was.) I have heard from 1 of my contacts that Live Search is now indexing twenty billion documents. (Update: It seems like Microsoft made the decision to start spreading the 20 billion figure around.) ButI heard from a different source that it;s thirty billion. In either case,Office 2007, it;s a good deal a lot more equivalent to Google;s index, with regards to coverage and ranking of paperwork in the index.
2. Live Lookup;s relevancy is noticeably enhanced. “The important component of this is what shows on page 1 (of search results),Office Pro Plus, and here Microsoft have built the advances in relevance they have been talking about for the past few years,” said Chris Overd, one of the principals with LiveSide.Net. “This makes today;s beta release of Reside Search a a lot stronger competitor to Yahoo and Google.”
3. Microsoft is focusing on improving lookup in 4 verticals with this release. These are: shopping, entertainment, health and local/maps. Microsoft estimates 10 percent of consumer lookup queries are entertainment-related and between three and five percent are health-related. There was a reason (truly a number of of them) that Microsoft bought the Medstory health-search engine. Microsoft officials say they will add additional verticals to their focus with each subsequent Live Search release.4. Speaking of subsequent releases, Microsoft is sticking to its plans to do a major spring and a fall release every year of Reside Lookup,Microsoft Office 2007 Professional Plus, with incremental updates coming in between. The spring release, according to Reside Search General Manager Derrick Connell,Windows 7 Ultimate Key, will bring enhancements around “community.” (He wouldn;t elaborate.) This doesn;t sound like tagging/social bookmarking kinds of stuff,Office Home And Student 2010, as Connell told me that Microsoft decided those features appealed to too small a percentage with the potential user base. Maybe we;ll see far more peer reviews/recommendations across areas beyond shopping…? Just a guess…. And what about rumors I had heard regarding Live Lookup allowing end users to search their Outlook e-mail? “There;s a tie-in there,” Connell stated, and Microsoft will have far more to say about it later.
5. Microsoft is still kicking about the idea of probably rebranding Reside Lookup. “Reside it!” just doesn;t have the ring of “Google It!” Connell told me Microsoft “will continue to look at branding.” No hints on what Microsoft ultimately might use as the new name, however.What do you think of what Microsoft;s done with search this go-around? Do you think its enhancements will give it any kind of traction against Google and Yahoo?