oSkope - Highly Intuitive Visual Search
April 8th, 2008 | by Nathan |Sure, other search engines provide the ability to search for images and more, but it’s really how you interact with that information that’s important.
oSkope is a search assistant with a highly intuitive visual interface. oSkope lets you browse quickly through a large number of images and preview information with minimal paging.
For starters, I love the drag and drop feature on my search results. The feature mimics many of the coolest gadgets on the market today like the iPhone and the Microsoft Surface.
How it works:
- Select favorite online service: Amazon, Ebay, Flickr, YouTube etc.
- Drill down into subcategories via pull down menu or search function
- Results appear as thumbnails in display area. (Thumbnails can be dragged and dropped to rearrange favorite items)
- Hovering over image will display preview with link to original page
- Registered users have the ability to drag favorite item into “My Folder” for future viewing.
You can switch between display modes, or “views”. Currently the following views are offered: grid, stack, pile, list, and graph.
While the various views add value by loading instantly and providing new ways of approaching your search results, the Graph View is the real winner among the group.
The graph view is special because it changes depending on the service you select. Your results are plotted against relevant axes. For example…
- Amazon.com (X = Sales Rank, Y = Price)
- Ebay.com (X = Time Left in Auction, Y = Price)
- Youtube.com (X = Date, Y = Ranking)
Of all the various visualized search engines I’ve come across, oSkope is definitely a favorite because of it’s unique and interesting way of letting me sift through my results.
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