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Job Listings Spark Speculation of Unlikely Full-Fledged Apple Search Engine

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Apple on Monday posted a listing to its Jobs at Apple page describing an Engineering Project Manager position for "Apple Search," sparking speculation the company could be working on a full-fledged search engine for use on OS X and iOS platforms.

As first highlighted by Cult of Mac, the most recent position would be based in San Francisco and asks for applicants who are "technical, driven and creative," with the ability to "manage back end operations projects for a search platform supporting hundreds of millions of users." Though Apple's website lists the job as posted February 2, 2015, entries on other job sites indicate it was originally posted on November 19, 2014.

ios8spotlight.jpg
Though the wording appears to hint at a new service, in all likelihood the job's parameters are covering Apple's already-existing search platform, largely embodied in Spotlight. Another job, posted in mid-January, supports the Spotlight probability thanks to frequent mentions of the updated Spotlight Suggestions service.

While gaining attention thanks to the use of the term "Apple Search," the new listings are less likely to be aimed at an entirely new Apple-based search engine and more likely cover ongoing efforts to improve Spotlight. Job listings have in the past hinted at the company's work on upcoming projects, but most of the time - as with patents - they are more of an intriguing tease into what may or may not be going on behind the scenes.

Apple is facing some search engine decisions this year, however, with Google's search engine contract with Apple reportedly set to expire in 2015. That is most likely to be resolved, however, by an extension of the contract for an additional term or perhaps a shift to another provider such as Yahoo or Microsoft, both of which are reportedly lobbying for the lucrative deal.

Article Link: Job Listings Spark Speculation of Unlikely Full-Fledged Apple Search Engine
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/02/04/job-listings-apple-search/
Goftrey

Goftrey

macrumors 68000
May 20, 2011
1,853
75
Wales, UK
I've been waiting for something like this to pop up for a while now.

Ever since Google fell out with Apple a few years ago it's just been a matter of time before they either sign a contract with another company (eg. Yahoo!) or set up an in-house search platform.
 
W

Waxhead138

macrumors 6502
May 18, 2012
473
546
Jamiet361 said:
If this is anything like the launch of Apple Maps, I think I'll wait on it.
Click to expand...

I think if you were to use the Apple Search to lookup Apple Maps, the universe would un-do itself.

Yeah yeah I know the search thing is highly unlikely.
 
maflynn

maflynn

macrumors Haswell
May 3, 2009
73,160
42,886
Microsoft is managing its search engine (barely), Yahoo is a sinking ship, and there's Google. I think any attempt to jump into the search engine market is a huge mistake by apple. Perhaps they should focus on improving what they already have, i.e., Maps.
 
Populism

Populism

macrumors regular
Jun 11, 2014
193
3,080
Newbie, non-rhetorical question:

Would a successful company that likes to keep its competitors guessing periodically post fake job listings?
 
T

thekeyring

macrumors 68040
Jan 5, 2012
3,485
2,147
London
Whether Apple are working on a search engine or not, they're promoting Spotlight usage. The more people who search directly from their desktop or home screen, and use Cortana in Windows 10, the more Google's market share will be cut down.

Then again, Google's market share is incredibly high, and Search is front and centre on Android.

Plus, I still have the most faith in their Search and Maps (for public transit), and moving away from Gmail 'just because' would be a pain.
 
KdParker

KdParker

macrumors 601
Oct 1, 2010
4,793
999
Everywhere
Does this really matter anyway?

Aren't we really just talking about the defaults search engine from Safari. On the Mac's/iPhone and iPads it can be changed to whatever.

The browser I use for iPhone/iPad I get a view of all the search engines and choose which one to whenever I do a search.

Also, If they drop Google, Google will have an app that can be used for searches or api's that devs can use.
 
69Mustang

69Mustang

macrumors 604
Jan 7, 2014
7,895
15,042
In between a rock and a hard place
thekeyring said:
Whether Apple are working on a search engine or not, they're promoting Spotlight usage. The more people who search directly from their desktop or home screen, and use Cortana in Windows 10, the more Google's market share will be cut down.

Then again, Google's market share is incredibly high, and Search is front and centre on Android.

Plus, I still have the most faith in their Search and Maps (for public transit), and moving away from Gmail 'just because' would be a pain.
Click to expand...

Yeah Google is a beast with their services. I use them extensively. I almost hope Apple would delve into search (though I seriously doubt it), if only to bring something new to field. Apple doesn't lack for creativity and could bring a novel way of implementing search. Worst case, they push others to continue refining the field. On the other hand, I would like them to continually improve their core services before jumping into a new field.

Just keep pushin' right?
 
lincolntran

lincolntran

macrumors 6502a
Jan 18, 2010
843
471
So the common idea here is: Apple map is not good and past services are not up to par, Apple should just stop trying in the future? Is that how you guys think?
 
teslo

teslo

macrumors 6502a
Jun 9, 2014
929
599
lincolntran said:
So the common idea here is: Apple map is not good and past services are not up to par, Apple should just stop trying in the future? Is that how you guys think?
Click to expand...

on boards like these, the ratio of people with apple problems/bugs/hatred to those that don't is ludicrously skewed in the opposite direction of the rest of reality.

regardless of why that is, most of these people assume it's because apple directs too much focus towards features they don't personally use. so it irritates them. like seemingly everything else in the world.
 
H

happywaiman

macrumors member
Oct 7, 2013
58
8
1. It's for online search
When you say crawl ("data crawled from the Internet", from Apple, which does not make sense at iOS 8/OS X Yosemite since they forward the search to Bing), it means Internet search. That's the definition of crawler (the software that crawl): indexer that continuously follow every links to recursively index all the linked sites.

2. Why are you surprised? Apple has already collect thousands of Open Search API (check your Safari Preference). Just by building a cache system in between can provide a sufficient amount of quality of search.

e.g. When you search Raymond Reddington, the server will crawl all topic/site-based search engine. Let's say the wikia for blacklist return a result, it will have a higher quality that what you got in Google because it's an entry of specific topic, not just a website mention the name.
And when spotlight to display the page, Apple can caching the result, record whether you click on it, and build a webpage index that people actually read. Google is building their own by PageRank. But the problem is: it can only how much the page is trustworthy, but not "whether the user will click on it", which is the only goal in search engine.
In fact, by recording the search query, Apple can actually build a list of words that you will actually say, which in term could potentially allowing them to build their own voice recognition system, or at least an accurate dictionary of words you will actually say.

And even if you don't believe all those stuff above (you really need to learn how it works to appreciate the value of those data), you seriously believe Apple adopt an Amazon 2005 protocol in 2014 just for the "goodness in their hearts"?

3. In fact, even if Apple doesn't want to do it to harm Google, they have should a workable prototype as the next generation of Spotlight.
I mean, the only way to get context based search result (e.g. based on location, time, calendar, files, topic you just search) is by building your own search engine, since the amount of data set is so big there's worth tenth of dollars per customers. Who have access to all these beside Google, MS and Apple?
The goal is so sweet, Apple should have worked on it to demo at next event.
 
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