Slashdot Mirror


Microsoft To Unify Search Across Windows 10, Office 365 and Bing with Microsoft Search (zdnet.com)

Microsoft has a new 'North Star' for search: One, unified, smart search box that will span Windows, Office, Bing and more. From a report: For the past several years, Microsoft been working to unify and personalize its search experience across Office 365. But now the company is going a step further and bringing Windows 10 the same search experience. At Ignite last year, Microsoft said its holy grail for search was to enable people to search from wherever they were without interrupting their workflow. Bing for Business -- a way to turn Bing into an Intranet search service -- also debuted last year. At this year's Ignite, Microsoft is refining and expanding that search mission. Microsoft's plan is to put the search box "in a consistent, prominent place across Edge, Bing, Windows and Office apps, so that search is always one click away." The company also is "supercharging" the search box so that users can more easily find people, related content, commands for apps and more before they actually start typing in the search box, as it will be contextually aware and offer proactive search results and suggestions. Today, September 24, Microsoft is starting to roll out a preview of this Microsoft Search feature to Office.com, Bing.com (where it's no longer called Bing for Business, but, instead Microsoft Search in Bing) and the SharePoint Mobile app. Microsoft Search will be coming to Edge, Windows and other versions of Office in the coming months, going into 2019.

12 of 77 comments (clear)

  1. Allow me to ask it by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Funny

    The inevitable first question that emerges whenever such a feature gets announced:

    How do you disable it?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    1. Re:Allow me to ask it by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The Windows 10 start menu is so shit that I usually just search for the thing I want to open, so if I'm not getting Bing pollution in there too that just slows me down.

      Also I really don't want everything I search for sent to Bing thanks.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  2. Outlook? by ook_boo · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Wow. And maybe after this, they can finally figure out how to make a decent search function for Outlook.

    1. Re:Outlook? by DogDude · · Score: 2

      What's your problem with it? I've been using it successfully for more than two decades.

      --
      I don't respond to AC's.
  3. Feature creep by DarkRookie · · Score: 5, Funny

    Pretty sure the feature creep has completely gotten outta hand when you need a search bar to find one.

    --
    The millennial that doesn't like most of the stuff designed for millennials.
  4. Get the basics right first by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    The company also is "supercharging" the search box so that users can more easily find people, related content, commands for apps and more

    Can't they make it find content before looking for related content? Because the Windows 10 search function is just awful. "Broken" is not an unfair description when it refuses to find installed programs or files with the name typed exactly.

    Learning to use Linux as a daily driver on my laptop has been a bit painful but it's nothing compared to my experiences with Win10.

  5. Kill it with fire! by Nidi62 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Microsoft is going full on Sauron. One Bing to rule them all and in the darkness bind them. So the question remains, which volcano do we have to throw them into?

    --
    The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
  6. Search without interrupting? by smooth+wombat · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Searching is an interruption in one's workflow. Instead of allowing people to go directly where they want to go, Microsoft keeps trying to force search down people's throats by claiming it's a better "experience".

    Question: if one went to the store for eggs, do you walk around the entire store "searching" for eggs, or do you go directly to where eggs are located?

    As I have said many times, with each iteration of Windows Microsoft has made it more difficult for an end user to accomplish something. Things which used to be readily available are buried or moved to obscure locations. When you do find what you're looking for, the steps to complete the task have soared.

    This is why, except for work, I will not use Windows 10. It's an abomination whose inept design will cause a myriad of bad habits to be the norm and cause a regression in accomplishing tasks easily.

    --
    We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
  7. SLOW by TheDarkener · · Score: 5, Informative

    I know I'm not the only one, please chime in if the same thing happens to you:

    1) Click on Win10 start menu
    2) Wait
    3) Wait some more...
    4) .....
    5) Watch little lemmings cobble together a start menu tile by tile
    6) Type something to start searching your PC
    7) Wait....
    8) Listen to your HDD churn like it's the little engine that could going up a steep incline as Win10 tries to find things on your computer, the web, etc.
    9) Curse the dead bloated seal that is Windows 10
    10) Give up with frustration and open 'This PC' and manually search for something

    --
    It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
    1. Re:SLOW by thevirtualcat · · Score: 3, Interesting

      More like:

      1. Type the name of something on your system, press enter.
      2. Mutter a few choice words under your breath and close the control panel or Microsoft Store app listing that opened instead of what you wanted.
      3. Type the name of something on your system, use the mouse to click on it because it's actually the third item in the list for some reason.

  8. not this again by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Anybody remember "web desktop"?

    "Network places"?

    Stop trying to blur the lines between my local PC and some networked location out there. I want to know where something I am interacting with is. For security if nothing else.

  9. I'm getting sick of this. by thevirtualcat · · Score: 2

    I didn't like it when Ubuntu integrated Amazon searches into their launcher.
    One of the things about the new Pixels that drives me insane is that you can't search your app drawer without also pulling up google search suggestions. (Because, you know, there weren't enough ways to get to a google search from the Android home screen.)
    One of the first things I do on a Windows box is disable Cortana and the integrated web searching.

    Why? Because if I wanted a damn internet search, I'd open my browser and search the internet. When I open the search function on my OS, I want it to search my local system. These days, the only way to do that is "find" and "grep."