The centerpiece of the planned offering is Windows Live Search, a desktop application that binds together several previously separate search tools. Expected to be released in beta-test form this summer, Windows Live Search will enable users to simultaneously search their PCs, their corporate intranets and the Web for information, according to Microsoft officials.
That would save a worker who wants to find information in his Outlook e-mail directory, corporate databases, and ERP or CRM applications from having to search them one by one, said Jon Beighle, general manager of Microsoft's online services group.
Windows Live Search will leverage intranet search capabilities built into Office SharePoint Server 2007, an upgrade of Microsoft's collaboration and workflow manager that's expected to be released in October along with the rest of Office 2007. The search tool will also use indexes of data created by SharePoint to speed up the process of returning results, Beighle said.
The indexing feature will make the tool much more nimble than Microsoft's existing Windows Desktop Search software, Beighle said, adding that Desktop Search can take minutes to search a large disk drive on a PC.
The upcoming technology is a big step forward for Micro-soft on search capabilities, said Mark Kruger, head SharePoint developer at Kaplan University in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
Running multiple searches across different data sources "wastes time and money, and Microsoft has definitely gotten that message," Kruger said. "There's a reason why Google has been successful: People just find what they're looking for [with its tools]. Now Micro-soft is making great strides to meet those high standards."
Beyond keywords
Bill Simser, a technology consultant in Calgary, Alberta, who focuses on SharePoint implementations, said he likes the way that SharePoint Server 2007 will use document metadata to create indexes for organizing information based on its relevance to other data.
With that capability, Windows Live Search users should get results that are aligned with specific concepts, not just documents that contain certain keywords, Simser said. "Google is search from an IT perspective," he said. "Microsoft is trying to do search from a business perspective."
But Bill English, co-owner of Mindsharp Inc., a SharePoint consulting firm in Maple Grove, Minn., said that even with the upcoming improvements, Microsoft will face a challenge in convincing users that its search technology is better than Google's.
"Google has all of the mind share in search," said English, who is also the author of several books about SharePoint. "Nobody thinks of Microsoft. Its biggest challenge is getting all of that mind share back."
Windows Live Search will compete against Google Desktop, which lets users search the content on their PCs as well as the Internet. Mountain View, Calif.-based Google also sells an enterprise search appliance that enables users to search corporate intranets. Other companies with an even more established presence in enterprise search include IBM, Autonomy Inc. and Fast Search & Transfer Inc.