Windows 7 / Getting Started

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Bing

Bing is Microsoft's new search engine. It's enabled as the search facility within Windows Live and lets you perform searches on words, images, video, shopping, news, maps, and travel. Announced in May 2009, it replaced both Microsoft's Live Search and Yahoo's search engine and now includes a listing of search suggestions in real time as queries are entered, along with a list of related searches.

Some of its features include:

• A background image that changes daily. Standard images are of notable places in the world; you can see background information about the image by moving your mouse over the image.
• Separate sections for wallpaper, maps, weather, fan sites, and so on.
• A navigation pan on the left side; results pages display related and prior searches.
• An extended preview on the right side that gives a bigger view of the page and provides links inside of the page.
• Video thumbnail previews that automatically start playing when you hover your mouse over a video thumbnail.
• Image searches with a continuous scrolling image results page that can be adjusted for size, layout, color, style, and people.
• Video searches with adjustable settings for length, screen size, resolution, and source.
• Instant answers for:
  • Sports scores (by specific day, by league, by team, by player).
  • Finance (by entering the stock symbol and either "stock" or "quote" in the search box; Bing provides a subscribable Web Slice that has information such as a stock charts, prices, volumes, and p/e ratios).
  • Math calculations.
  • Package tracking and tracing (by entering the shipping company and tracking number in the search box).
  • Plane ticket price information (by entering the departing flight number with a city name or airport code in the search box).
  • Flight status (by entering "flight status" and a flight number in the search box).
  • Car information.
  • Celebrity rankings and news.
  • Answers to encyclopedia questions (using the Encarta encyclopedia).
  • Dictionary definitions.
  • Spell checking.
  • Best match (plus similar sites).
  • Product shopping and Bing Cashback offers.
  • Health information.
• Access to local information, such as:
  • Current traffic.
  • Business listings.
  • People listings.
  • Collections.
  • Local restaurants and services.
  • Restaurant reviews.
  • Movies being showing in a local area. You can also specify a city and the search will provide listings from that area.
  • Hotel listings by city, with maps and a detail search page that lets you see reviews and directions, make reservations, and see a bird's-eye view of the hotel. You can refine your hotel search by rating, price, amenities, payment methods, and parking.