Greater Than Google: The Best Bits Of Bing

When we think of searching the Internet, we without a doubt think “Google”. And why not? It’s a fantastic search engine and has some great features. But even before the idea of writing this article, I started Bing again and I was quite surprised. Then, the more I used it, the more fascinating things I discovered on it.
This isn’t an “anti-Google” article, as in my opinion, Google still does have a place. And I use it for many things. But for searching, perhaps you should try Bing and see how you like it. You just might change your mind, especially after reading about these awesome bits.

 

 

Bing Twitter Maps

Of course you know that Bing has a maps function – that’s nothing new. But what you might not know is that you can see public tweets and the sender’s location. There’s no invasion of privacy here. This works by accessing what is already public with geo-location enabled by the user (on Twitter). Once those two things are done, the tweets will show up on the map. It may take a while at times, but hang tight and you’ll see yours too.



Bing Twitter Maps is a project of the Microsoft FuseLabs.

 

 

Bing Travel: Flights And Hotels

With the holidays approaching fast, the travel page will be your best friend. It is kind of like having an assistant. Simply enter your travel information (i.e. to and from departure dates and locations, number of adults, and desired class)






You’ll then be shown ticket prices from several different airlines.





You can compare prices with hotels. What’s great is you have a map right next to the price. Wouldn’t it be nice to not only know where your options are, along with comparing them to each other? Now you can.

 

 

Bing Events

If you’ve ever lived (or do live) in a small town, you are likely to have a local newspaper. And in it is probably an events section. Picture Bing Events like that, but something which is much more customizable, larger, you don’t have to worry about it getting ripped, lost, or your dog eating it. Just type in the city. You can scroll through all of the events, or filter them down based on day, category, distance, and other specifics. The events are quite detailed and often display a brief description, pricing and (obviously) location and time.

 

 

Friends’ Photos

If you connect your Facebook account to Bing (which I recommend and will expand on that later), you can view your friends’ and pages’ photos. You can also view your own photos quite easily. It’s like a visual news stream of just images! Below I’ve displayed only photos from pages I follow, keeping in mind my friends’ privacy.





In addition to being able to view the photos, you can like, comment and share the photos right from Bing.

 

 

Interface And Integration

Some might not consider this a secret or tip, but Bing has an awesome interface and with that interface, comes awesome integration of videos, images, maps, and more.

Images

Several specifications are available for finding the right image. The image collection itself is clean and easy to scroll through. An added bonus are the search-specific suggestions below the search and more suggestions on the side for other topics that you might be interested in. Does this beat Google Images? In my opinion, you bet it does.

 

 

Maps

We already mentioned about Twitter integration in maps, but I feel the normal maps function in Bing is impressive as well. Just look at how easy it is to find exactly what you’re looking for!

 

 

Videos

I love this about Bing – being able to watch a video directly in Bing. I don’t need to click away from my search and worry about losing it (although you can just hold down the Control/Command key when clicking the link to avoid that from happening). Along with embedded videos in the search, there are also suggestions alongside.
There is another article on MakeUseOf which expanded upon it in using Bing to listen to music.

 

 

Entertainment

Speaking of music, Bing has integrated several forms of entertainment into the website as well, each with it’s specific features. For example, the Movies tab displays popular movies and their show times and ticket prices. The Music tab seems pretty basic, until you open up an artist and then you can view their songs, albums, and lyrics.

 

 

Custom News In Facebook

There’s Bing News… and then there’s My Bing News, which is a Facebook app that ties Bing News to Facebook. The app allows you to customize what topics you get news about and also can display what you’ve recently read (Note: if you don’t want your Friends to see content that an app posts to your Timeline, make sure you select that so only you can view it).

 

 

Bing Search Tips

What’s there to know about searching for things on Bing? Well a lot actually! Below are a couple things that you might not know about Bing Search.

Social search: get expert advice recommendations

When you connect Facebook to Bing, and search for something, related posts and photos from your friends will be displayed along side your search results from Bing. In addition, Bing searches Twitter, Quora and other social networks for people who are “knowledgeable” or talk a lot about the topic you are searching for.

 

 

Search and get points that you can redeem for rewards

When you search with Bing (obviously), you earn credits towards a great selection of rewards. It’s as simple as that. Some examples you ask? How about Starbucks, Microsoft products, Amazon, Hulu Plus, Groupon and more. I wish I had started this a long time ago, and I am sure by now I would have some credits built up. But they accumulate fast, don’t worry.
Learn more about the rewards program or check out what you can redeem with the credits.
Note: You must be signed in with a Microsoft account, otherwise the points you accumulate aren’t worth anything.

 

 

Other Useful Tools

Some other great tools to take advantage of on Bing are the Calculator, Translator, Dictionary and Local search.





Sure Google has these too, but it’s important to know about them if you’re already going to be using Bing. Bing is still growing too and will likely be adding new features, so be sure to check out the Explore page frequently for all the services.

Conclusion

Still not convinced on Bing? Try the latest Google vs. Bing test, Bing It On, and see how Google stacks up. Does it win? Or does Bing? Either way, it couldn’t hurt to try Bing out – you just might like it!
Do you use Bing? If so – why and, which is your favorite feature about it?

More articles about:

• google search
• microsoft bing
• search engine
• web search

38 Comments

Aaron Couch

Aaron Couch is a Vet Assistant and an exotic animal enthusiast who also loves mountain biking, photography and playing basketball. When he's not writing or indulging in technological findings throughout the interwebs, he can be found interning at his local zoo. More about Aaron on his personal website. + 

 

Source: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/greater-than-google-the-best-bits-of-bing/ 

4 Great Ways To Sync Your Bookmarks & Favorites Across Computers & Phones

Gone are the days when we used a single browser on our only computer. Today, many of us constantly switch between desktop computers, laptops, netbooks, smartphones, and tablets, all of which are outfitted with various browsers and obviously a connection to the Internet. Keeping all of your bookmarks with you and automatically synced on that many devices can be a challenge.
Unless you have entirely bought into the world of Apple, you actually have to put a bit of thought into your setup. Fortunately, there are many great solutions to keep not only your bookmarks, but also passwords, tabs, browser history, and other information. This article introduces you to four of the best tools to safely sync your bookmarks across browsers, devices, and platforms.

Multi-Browser & Multi-Device Solutions

 

Xmarks

Xmarks, formerly known as Foxmarks, is probably the most popular sync tool for bookmarks. Xmarks stores your bookmarks and open tabs online and thus allows you to sync them across computers and browsers.




The free browser add-on is available for Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. Being a browser add-on, it can be used on all systems that run one of the mentioned browsers, including Windows, Mac, and Linux. The premium version supports iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, and offers additional advanced features.
We have previously reported about Xmarks - XMarks Syncs Bookmarks & Passwords Between All Major Browsers. Note however that Xmarks was acquired by LastPass and since then, it no longer stores and syncs bookmarks.

If you are just looking to sync bookmarks between desktop computers and various browsers, Xmarks should do the job. If you want to involve mobile devices and don’t want to invest in a premium add-on, however, you have to look into alternatives.

ChromeMarks Lite

Syncing your bookmarks between your desktop computer and your Android isn’t straight forward, not even if your default browser is Chrome. What you need to do is set up bookmarks syncing on Chrome on your desktop computer (see description under single browser solutions below) and install the ChromeMarks app on your Android.
ChromeMarks Lite will sync your bookmarks to your Android device, however, it will not sync bookmarks with Android browsers.





For more detailed instructions, read my article on how to Sync Your Google Chrome Bookmarks With Your Android Device Using ChromeMarks.
If you are looking for an app to sync your tabs, have a look at TabCloud: How To Restore Tabs In Chrome & Firefox Across Machines With TabCloud

Single Browser Solutions

Maybe you are using only a single browser on different computers and wish to sync bookmarks. If the browser is called Firefox, Chrome, or Opera, you can use a native feature, meaning you don’t have to bother with a browser add-on.

Firefox Sync

With the release of Firefox 4 in early 2011, Mozilla integrated Firefox Sync, which was previously available as an add-on only. With this now native feature you can sync a lot more than just bookmarks. Firefox Sync also backs up and syncs your add-ons, passwords, preferences, history, and tabs.
Find the feature by clicking the orange Firefox button in the top left of your browser, then go to Options and switch to the Sync tab.





We wrote about Firefox Sync when it was first introduced: How To Keep Your Bookmarks Synced Across Computers With Firefox 4

Chrome

Chrome can sync your bookmarks with your Google account. This requires that you sign into Google via Chrome. The feature can be found by clicking the wrench icon and going to Settings, then clicking the Sign in to Chrome button.

Apart from bookmarks, Chrome can also sync your apps, forms, extensions, history, passwords, settings, themes, and open tabs.


As a Chrome user, you should also look into this article: 3 Cool Tips To Get More Out of Your Bookmarks in Chrome

Opera & Safari

While I don’t personally use Opera or Safari, I want to mention them for the sake of completeness. Opera offers Opera Link, which syncs your bookmarks and Speed Dial across computers and devices. With Safari you can set up sync to iCloud on both your Mac and Windows.
What browser and devices are you using and what have you found to be the most effective way to keep your bookmarks in sync?

Source: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/4-great-ways-sync-bookmarks-favorites-computers-phones/

PCWORLD: Web browser showdown

Web browser showdown: Which Windows app is really the best?

Nick Mediati @dtnick

• Sep 19, 2012 6:00 PM

Your Web browser is probably the most-used application on your PC. You check your email in it, you write in it, you collaborate with coworkers in it, you use it to watch cat videos. With so much at stake, you need a browser that works well for you.
But which one is the best? We put the three major Windows browsers—Google Chrome 21, Microsoft Internet Explorer 9, and Mozilla Firefox 15—through their paces and crowned an overall winner.

Browser performance

 

When we looked at the browser contenders previously, we concluded that all the major browsers loaded webpages at similar speeds.

But many new Web apps and services rely heavily on HTML5 and JavaScript, so the browser makers have been spending a lot of development time making sure that their programs render such apps and services quickly and efficiently.

To gauge how well browsers handle HTML5 and JavaScript code, we subjected Chrome, IE, and Firefox to the Sunspider JavaScript benchmark and to the WebVizBench benchmark for HTML5. In addition, we tested on a PC with switchable Nvidia graphics hardware to see how each browser exploited the extra processing horsepower in the graphics card.

Our test PC was an Acer Aspire Timeline Ultra M5 laptop with a 1.7GHz Intel Core i5 processor and 6GB of memory. The switchable graphics system consisted of an integrated Intel HD Graphics 4000 chipset and a dedicated Nvidia GeForce GT 640M graphics card with 1GB of video memory.

In our WebVizBench HTML5 benchmark test, Chrome and IE 9 saw large increases in performance when we switched to the dedicated graphics card instead of the integrated graphics chip.

Chrome achieved an average score of 5502 when we used the integrated graphics system, and hit an average of 5825 when we used the Nvidia graphics card. IE 9 came in second with average scores of 4797 and 5642, respectively; Firefox finished third after posting average scores of 4492 and 5600. Notably, Chrome did almost as well on this test using the integrated graphics hardware as the other browsers did using the more powerful Nvidia graphics card. So if your PC has a weak graphics card, you'll probably get better performance from Chrome than from Firefox or IE.

Our tests for JavaScript performance were less conclusive, with all three browsers rendering the benchmark’s JavaScript code within 15 milliseconds of one another. Internet Explorer 9 eked out a narrow victory, completing the Sunspider benchmark in 200 milliseconds. Chrome 21 finished in second place at 206 milliseconds, and Firefox 15 rounded out the three at 214 milliseconds.

Winner: Google Chrome. Browser performance will vary some depending on your PC, but Chrome was a solid all-around performer in our testing.

Ease of use

Current browsers continue the less-is-more trend that began with Google Chrome's introduction in 2008, sporting thin toolbars and minimalist designs so that the page content takes center stage.

Browser toolbars compared: Firefox, Internet Explorer, Chrome.

Internet Explorer 9: In IE 9, Microsoft chose a hyperminimalist approach with an extremely narrow toolbar and few on-screen controls. By default, IE 9 shows the address bar and tabs in the same row, which can make things a little too tight, especially if you frequently have a lot of tabs open at once (you can choose to show the tab bar in a separate row, though). On the far-right edge of the toolbar lie three buttons that take you to your browser homepage, show your favorites, or toggle various settings.

One nicety in IE 9 is its unobtrusive method of providing notifications: Instead of popping up an alert box that interrupts your browsing, it displays the message in a bar at the bottom of the browser window, where you can address it when you're good and ready. In addition, IE 9 shows you a download's progress via its taskbar icon, which fills in with green as you download a file.

Chrome 21: Google has stuck with the same basic look and feel for Chrome since releasing it in 2008. It has no title bar, and by default it shows only the back, forward, and reload buttons, as well as the combined search/address bar and a button on the far right that opens a tools menu. The start screen helps you reach your most visited sites, as well as any Web apps you've added via the Chrome Web Store. When you download a file, it appears in a gray bar that lives at the bottom of the window.

Click the orange button in the upper-left corner of any Firefox browser window to access frequently used commands.

Firefox 15: While most other browsers now feature a combined search and address bar, Mozilla keeps the two separate in Firefox 15. Whether separate fields are better than combined ones is a matter of personal preference. (Note that Firefox does let you search from the address bar and remove the separate search box is you prefer.)

One convenient feature of Firefox allows you to switch between search engines readily: If you want to use Bing instead of Google, for instance, you can do that with two clicks. Chrome permits you to switch between search providers, too, but requires a quick tweak in the Settings screen. With IE you need to install an add-on for each search provider (other than Bing) you want to add.

Like other current Windows browsers, Firefox doesn't show a menu bar by default; the various menu options live in a single menu that pops up when you click the orange 'Firefox' button in the upper-left corner of the window.

Winner: Tie. In truth, you won't find much differentiation between browser interfaces these days. All the prominent ones work the same, save for a few fairly minor differences.

Security and privacy features

To say that security and privacy concerns are a big deal for browser makers would be a gross understatement. All of the major browsers have some baseline security and privacy features, such as pop-up blockers, protection against phishing attacks, and some sort of cookie blocking and filtering.

IE 9 gives you lots of advanced security settings.

Internet Explorer 9: IE 9 is easily the most flexible browser out there with regard to privacy settings. Its advanced security settings let you block or allow all sorts of things, but those granular controls are a bit much for most users. For the rest of us, IE 9 offers a choice of various preset security and privacy levels.

IE 9 also includes a reputation-based download checker: If you download a questionable or previously unknown file, the browser will warn you about it. If the file is safe, it'll download the file, no questions asked. That last bit is useful because it reduces "warning fatigue"—you'll get a warning only when necessary.

In addition, IE 9 will let you see a privacy summary of the site you've just visited to learn whether it tried to use cookies to track you, among other things. IE 9 also features Tracking Protection, which allows you to set the browser to automatically block participating websites from setting a third-party cookie to track your movements online.

Firefox 9: Firefox's privacy and security settings cover all of the basics. It can block phishing sites and other malicious sites, and it permits you to turn on Do Not Track to block third-party cookies. Beyond that, Firefox 9 will clearly show you whether a shopping or banking site is safe, questionable, or unsafe via a badge in the address bar. And it includes a link to a Firefox-specific plug-in checker site so you can see if any of your plug-ins are in need of updating.

Chrome 21: Chrome's claim to security fame is the sandboxing feature, which quarantines each webpage you open so that it can't interfere with other pages you already have open, or with anything else on your PC. For example, if a page you visit tries to download a piece of malware to your PC without your knowledge, the sandboxing feature should prevent that site from carrying out its evil deeds.

Chrome does tie into a number of Google services, though; for instance, it uses Google services to autocomplete your search queries, predict which site you meant to visit if you mistype the address, and so on. If you don't trust Google, you'll want to look through Chrome's privacy settings carefully.

Winner: Chrome...with a catch. Chrome's sandboxing feature still makes it the browser to beat, but you should be mindful of its tie-ins with Google's other services.

If you could pick only one…

Google Chrome comes out ahead of its rivals, but the competition is closer than you might think. Although Chrome's simplicity, speed, and good security give it the edge over Internet Explorer and Firefox, both IE and Firefox still have a lot to offer in those areas. But hey, they're all free! Try them all, play with them, and get a feel for them, and soon you'll be able to select the one that works best for you.

Source: http://www.pcworld.com/article/2009768/web-browser-showdown-which-windows-app-is-really-the-best.html