The new book search from Microsoft is out and this is what it looks like (click pic for a full view):
It's even bookmarkable, which is nice. Here's a link to the page above.
I've heard some minor complaints about there not being a ton of content there, but MS has signed a lot of partners to help out and it's only a matter of time before they build up the library.
I was actually wondering if I could get a script for “Gone with the Wind“ with the search above, but I couldn't be bothered to scroll much further in that search and “The Dark Star“ just sounded like a cool title for a book.
If you've got a few minutes to kill, check it out. The interface is quite nice.
Once you've clicked on a book you'll get an interface like the screen shot above with more search results from that book. The right side highlighting in the photograph of the book is a very nice touch as well. While I'm not an anti-MS zealot like you'll find at SlashDot, I do have my “MS pet peeves“, but this one certainly isn't one of them. It looks like MS has a winner with this.
It will be nice to see the library expand more, but for now we're just in the beginning stages of indexing information. It's only been slightly over a decade since the search engine was invented, and already there's more content indexed than anyone could ever hope to possible read in a thousand lifetimes. More indexed content like this will only add to that frustration... errr... I mean that awesome index. :)
Cheers,
Ryan