Smarter Geek

Just saw an awesome video show some Microsoft lab project that integrates Photosynth with live video to create a panorama. Can’t wait.

After lots of rumours about Bing being the default search engine for the iPhone and iPad it seems to have been squashed with the images of the iPad that Apple have released. Now in theory this is something that could be changed easily as it is just a case of changing the default setting however this is looking less likely.

1. Google can be seen as the search provider in Safari.

 

2. Maps used for the Map application are from Google. (Map on right is from Google Maps, note they are the same)

There have been so many Microsoft/iPhone/iPad rumours lately that it has got me thinking that what ever this new device Apple is going to be launching on January 27th one could be mistaken that it wasn’t going to be a Microsoft powered device.

Don’t think so? here few points I think are worth considering…

Fact

1. iPhone (and now Snow Leopard) already natively supports Microsoft Active Sync for email synchronisation with corporate Exchange email servers.
2. Microsoft recently released the Bing iPhone App which allow many people to access the Bing services from the iPhone so Microsoft know how to provide Bing services to the iPhone.
3. Microsoft has released a Seadragon Mobile deep zoom image app that is the technology Bing Maps uses.
4. Microsoft has released Microsoft Tag reader application that would be really useful addition to the iPad.

Speculation

1. In a previous article I spoke about the rumour of the next iPhone and iPad having Bing as the default search engine.
2. Now on The iPhone Blog web site they mention that Bing would be used for both Search and Maps. This makes a lot of sense as the two a normally very interconnected and if Apple were going to dump Google then changing the mapping provider would also be a highly likely.
3. As Bing Maps beta is no more it would make a lot of sense that this mean its now ready for production use ahead of the iPhone 4/iPad announcement.
4. Now admittedly this is a little more of a stretch but if Bing Maps is going to be on the iPhone 4/iPad this could also mean we are going to see Silverlight on the device. This would mean that there be a lot more support than just IIS streaming for Silverlight (See Microsoft ‘worked with Apple’ for Silverlight on iPhone, says Goldfarb).
5. Then today during the recoding of Windows Weekly episode 140 Paul Thurrott mention that he has been speaking with Microsoft about how Hotmail is now the only email service that does not support push email support. He then mentioned that Microsoft said they were aware of this and they were working on it. Weather this means that Hotmail will be supported natively on the iPhone with the other mail services (Exchange, MobileMe, Gmail, Yahoo! Mail and AOL) or if this mean they will enabled Active Sync support like Gmail on hotmail has to be seen. But it would seem that push mail support for hotmail is coming to the iPhone… Yeah!

Now I will be the first to admit that I would be totally shocked if all of these predictions/speculations come true… But if they did… the iPad might finally be a device that might just build a bridge over the huge device between the Apple/Microsoft fan boys.

There has been a lot of speculation on the Internets in the past day about a BusinessWeek Article  (here here here here here and here ) saying that Apple are considering making Bing the default search provider.

While some people might think this seems like Hell freezing over this to me seems to make a lot of sense due to a number of reasons.

1. There are only two selectable search engine options on the iPhone Safari browser namely Google and Yahoo. With the Bing/Yahoo deal getting closer to being finalised this would mean the iPhone would two search options would then be Google and Bing.
2. Google recent entry into the phone market with the Android OS means that Google now are a direct competitor to the iPhone. This is in stark difference to when Apple first introduced the iPhone back in 2007 when Google did not have a phone OS.
3. Apple already licences the Microsoft Active Sync protocol for the iPhone which is used large number of users for syncing their email with their corporate email server. So having Microsoft technology on the iPhone is really not
4. Microsoft Bing is already a search option on the iPhone via the free Bing iPhone App.

What I would really like to see would be if Microsoft could make some sort of a deal with Apple to support hotmail natively in the email client in the iPhone 4.0 OS update in exchange for using Bing as the default search engine.

But what it really boils down to is Apple only having two choices (Google/Bing) as the default search engine and them deciding which is the lesser of two evils.

Microsoft have now released a Bing iPhone app that allow you to use the Microsoft services from your iPhone. The app itself is actually a few apps in one with a launching pad to numerous Bing services:

• Standard Search (Voice or Text)
• Image Search
• Movies
• Maps (and directions)
• Business
• News

Home Screen

The home screen is very much like the home pages you see on http://bing.com however the photos have been optimised for the smaller screen resolution. If you press the “6 pack” button at the bottom then it hides the search buttons and you get hover hot spots like the main web page.

Home Screen

Navigation Controls

The navigation buttons are always present when you are navigating in the app. The home button is very useful for coming back to the launch screen and the simple navigation buttons are also nice. My only complaint was that the back button is next to the home button so it is really easy to press the wrong button.

I have to also wounder if this application is also a preview of the look and feel for applications running on Windows Mobile 7.

App Navigation Controls

Search

The search feature works as expected you tap in the search bar up the top and you start to type. You also start to see search results as you type.

Search as you type results
Search Results

Search (Voice)

Next the the search bar you see a microphone that can be used to perform a voice search via BING. Press the button and just start to say what you want to search then press done when you have finished talking.

Voice Search Listening
Voice Search Thinking

Now if you are not in the USA after a few seconds of thinking the app will crash and dumps you back to the home screen for now if you change you region setting of the iPhone to the United States it will work. When you do this voice searching will then work and searching for terms like "PIZZA" work really well. Microsoft have come out and said that they will be releasing a fix for this soon.

Images

As expected the image search allows you to search for images via BING. I tried searching for my name and was happy to find that a photo of me came up first… The image search results also faded in nicely as the phone loaded the images.

Image Search

Movies

I can only assume this is an USA only feature for now as when I select this option I immediately get a “We did not find any results for Movies” popup. Hopefully localised Australian information of the movie times will be coming soon.

Movies Search

Maps

This certainly looks a lot like the Silverlight map web application that Microsoft recently released on the http://bing.com web site. The maps have integrated the  seadragon deep zoom technology which makes the whole experience very smooth. The map has full multi pinch to zoom and GPS support. The settings for the map are very similar to those seen on the included Google map app in the iPhone. I do wonder what the “Shaded” view  is as this seems to be no different to the “Road” map view.

Map

BING maps settings screen compared to the inbuilt Google maps setting screen. Very similar.

Bing iPhone App Map Settings
iPhone Map Settings

Businesses

This option for searching for different types of business near your location but again it seems that there is no localised data for Australia for it to use yet.

Business Search – Restaurants

News

This option was another a disappointment as when you launch it you are immediately presented with the “We did not find any results for (null)” message box. Not sure if this is also an issue for just Australian users but the error message is less than graceful.

News Search

Directions

Again this seems to mirror very closely the inbuilt Google map app however you launch this separately from the “Directions” option from the home screen.

Another disappointment here as the search feature will only direct you to the suburb instead of the exact address that you typed into to the search. What I really don’t like about this is that it does not warn you that it is not sending you to the exact address just to a random point in the middle of the suburb….

Directions

Bing Directions
iPhone native app Directions

Just like Microsoft releasing Photosynth for the iPhone and licensing active sync they continue to demonstrate that they are willing to compete by innovation and not by exclusion. This makes me wounder how long it will be until we see Microsoft Zune App for the iPhone.

Overall

This is a really nice looking app and it is great to have an alternative to the inbuilt iPhone/Google apps. Its buggieness can be forgiven as this is Microsoft first really shot at making a mainstream iPhone app and this only needs to have a updated version deployed to fix the voice record issues. However it is really dissapointing that a lot of the features don’t work in Australia and what Microsoft really needs to do is get the localised services for Australia up and running ASAP.

UPDATE: Looks like these issues are going to be fixed soon as Microsoft have come out and said they will be soon fixing the issues of the voice search crashing outside the USA and enable the ability perform searches outside of the USA.

If you want to try it out you can install the app right now from this iTunes Link for free.