An Exercise in Search - You Are Here

My wife asked if I could remember the name of the little French elementary school where we had cast our ballots in last year's federal election. I couldn't, but I knew with the right search I could find it.

First stop was Google to find the web page for both the public and separate school boards. Tabbed browsing in Firefox sped meant I could easily pop between the two during my search. Now the school boards list their schools in alphabetical order. Fine if you know the name of the school - which I'm sure most parents would - but not so good, if you're an outsider to the school system looking for the name of a particular school. Clicking each and every school until I found the right one was not my idea of a fun night, so I had to find a better way.

I could do a site specific search, but that would require me to remember the name of the street the school was on... which I couldn't either. But I could get that easily with a quick look at Google maps. Start centered on my home and then shift the map so that it's centered on the school - easy to find with the satellite image. On a lark, I thought I'd give the local search a try. I type in 'school' in 'the map area below'. Voila. There's the school's name, phone number and direct link to their site.

Not bad at all for a beta. I've been using Google Maps for general directions and to check on the location of decent gas prices, but this is the first time I've used it for an actual search. I can see this becoming a very powerful tool - especially when combined with a mobile device.