I spent the last two days in Ocean City, MD and Windows Mobile Live Search was very helpful. In an unfamiliar city, finding a decent eatery is always at the top of everyone's list. We had gotten some recommendations but no addresses or phone numbers. This is where Windows Live Search 2 shines.
Bull on the Beach is a popular eatery in Ocean City, however they have multiple locations. Finding the closest one was a breeze, and important since driving conditions in Ocean City are less than ideal...
The review feature is very nice, however there is no way to read the review text or submit new ones. You have to use http:\\maps.live.com which does not work with Pocket IE (you are redirected to m.live.com). Another missing feature is the ability to perform an live.com search from Windows Live Search to find the restaurant's web site. An easy fix would be to include the web site link in the Windows Live Search results.
Using http://m.live.com and manually entering "Bull on the beach", found the restaurant's web site and did a nice job reformatting it for Pocket IE. Pretty cool.
The mobile rendering feature provide some excellent navigation options at the bottom of the page.
When looking at dining options for a group, everyone is always interested in the menu. Most restaurant web sites have menus and Bull on the Beach's web is no exception. Unfortunately, they placed their menu options in a Flash menu bar which does not display in Pocket IE. Adobe does have a Flash 7 player for Windows Mobile 2003, however I have not tried it on Windows Mobile 6. Since Flash is pretty much ubiquitous, Microsoft and Adobe should work together to provide support on Windows Mobile devices. The other side of the coin; I think it is poor web design not to place simple links at the bottom of the page replicating any menu item displayed using Flash.
All in all the Windows Live Search and Windows Live work very well, however Microsoft needs to provide more integration between the two. But, as usual the Microsoft naming nomenclature of these two products is very confusing.
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