PCWorld.com - Microsoft Rolls Out MSN Search Beta

PCWorld.com - Microsoft Rolls Out MSN Search Beta Microsoft Rolls Out MSN Search Beta Software giant says the final version will be available next year. Juan Carlos Perez, IDG News Service Thursday, November 11, 2004 A beta version of the search engine Microsoft is developing went live Thursday, offering users an interface and a set of features that make the product begin to resemble established search engines from competitors Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves, and America Online. Advertisement Microsoft had released a less-developed version of the MSN Service for public tryouts in July. That was simply a search box without special features or functionality, and it returned results grabbed from an index of about 1 billion documents, a Microsoft official says. But the beta version released Thursday has an index of over 5 billion documents and lets users narrow and customize their queries in a variety of ways, says Justin Osmer, an MSN Search product manager. The beta of MSN Search is available at beta.search.msn.com. The MSN Search service is expected to be ready in final release in 2005 and will eventually replace the search engine technology that Microsoft currently licenses from Yahoo to power the MSN portal's search feature, he says. "Our overall goal with this beta and eventually with the final product is to help users find whatever information they want faster," Osmer says. Vending Machine Business Project Management and Leadership Skills Training