Microsoft Bing: Five Areas in Search of Improvement

Bing's new additions are the latest in a series of updates that have included Visual Search, Facebook and Twitter integration, improvements to Bing Maps and the rebranding of MSN Video to Bing Video.

Here is an overview of what's new on Bing starting Wednesday.

Wolfram Alpha Integration

Bing has partnered with Wolfram Alpha, the computational knowledge engine, to help you make better choices for your health and your waistline. When you search for a specific food item on Bing, your results will return nutritional content information about that food including fat content, calories per serving, vitamin and mineral content, and other important facts.

Do a search for "banana" and you'll discover the fruit has 3 fat calories, 14 grams of sugar, and 10 milligrams of Vitamin C, and its average serving size is 118 grams. You can also find out the nutritional content for your favorite brand name foods like the Big Mac, Whopper, and various candy bars.

After figuring out where you went wrong in your diet, you can use Bing's Wolfram Alpha integration to determine your body mass index. BMI is a widely used, and somewhat controversial, measurement that estimates your ideal weight range based on your height. To figure out your BMI on Bing, just enter "BMI" into the search bar followed by your height and weight, like this: BMI 5'10", 175lbs.

Hover Preview

When Bing debuted earlier this year, it included a feature called Quick Preview that lets you see a text-based synopsis of the pages displayed in your search results. The concept was nothing new, but Bing believed it was an effective way to reduce what it calls "bad clicks" -- selecting a search result only to find the site didn't have what you were you looking for.

Today, Bing is expanding its preview feature to include a small snapshot of the Website you're about to visit, a list of the most popular links found on the site, contact information (when applicable), and a "search-within-this-site" box to get more information about the site without leaving Bing. (click on image to the left to enlarge)

Last month, we heard about new social search features coming to Bing and Google. On Wednesday, Microsoft revealed another part of Bing's social twist with Facebook previews. Enter a person's name, and if their Facebook profile is publicly available, you will see their profile picture and Facebook network, and you can send them a message or friend request right from Bing's results page.