Microsoft announced the release of the Tafiti Search Visualization source code to CodePlex. Developers can now download, modify and resell the source code. The release of the source code is under the Microsoft Public License (Ms-PL).
Tafiti is web search site from Microsoft to demonstrate the use of Silverlight and Live Search APIs to provide better and more specialized search.
Tafiti, which means "do research" in Swahili, is an experimental search front-end from Microsoft, designed to help people use the Web for research projects that span multiple search queries and sessions by helping visualize, store, and share research results. Tafiti uses both Microsoft Silverlight and Live Search to explore the intersection of richer experiences on the Web and the increasing specialization of search.
Tafiti exercises many Microsoft technologies:
- Microsoft Silverlight 1.0
- Microsoft ASP.NET
- Microsoft SQL Server
- Windows Live™ Search API
- Windows Live™ ID Web Authentication
- HTML / JavaScript / CSS
A demonstration of Tafiti can be viewed at http://tafiti.mslivelabs.com/ and a walk-through is also available. Those developers who would like to setup and deploy Tafiti can also reference the Deployment Guide.
Tafiti is included as part of the Windows Live Quick Applications consisting of 6 demos/starter-kits. The starter kits are:
- Contoso ISV (Systems Integrator / Consultancy) demo
- A professional services web site using the Windows Live platform services for a customer acquisition / CRM scenario. Featured technologies are the Windows Live Messenger IM Control where customers can interact with sales staff, and the sales staff can schedule an appointment within the Windows Live Messenger client via an activity which integrates Microsoft Virtual Earth and Windows Live Alerts. This application also leverages Silverlight Streaming by Windows Live to provide an interactive video carousel
- Codebase is not in the release yet - download from Source Code Tab
- Run through PowerPoint presentation and configuration instructions
- Contoso ISV site http://contosoisv.mslivelabs.com
- Contains Silverlight application with multiple videos coming from Silverlight Streaming by Windows Live
- Listing of stories / content (right now this is static)
- Shows presence of sales staff using the Windows Live Messenger IM Control (see below for configuration).
- Contoso ISV Sales Activity _an ASP.NET application which gets surfaced within a Windows Live Messenger Activity Window see http://contosoisvsactivity.mslivelabs.com/
- Used by sales staff scheduling a meeting with a customer
- sales staff enter the address of customer, time, and directions are generated from Virtual Earth
- the service staff can then get notified using Windows Live Alerts by clicking Send Appointment. To test this you must sign up to the Alert.
- Adventure Works Resorts (Social Network) demo (_by SharpLogic_)
- Live ID being associated with ASP.NET Profiles
- User Generated Video Content
- Accepting file uploads (via a form post)
- dropping the uploads onto a MSMQ Queue
- automatically encoding using Expression Encoder
- programmatically uploading to Silverlight Streaming
- rendering the videos back from Silverlight Streaming
- Map Point Web Service
- Contacts Control
- Spaces Photo Control
- Windows Live Alerts
- Virtual Earth
- Contosos Bicycle Club (Membership Organization) demo
- Video.Show (User Generated Content sharing site) (links to another CodePlex project)
- Video.Show is a sample that demonstrates usage of Silverlight, Expression Encoder, Silverlight Streaming and ASP.NET AJAX to create a video portal for user-generated content.
- Silverlight Streaming | Expression Encoder | ASP.NET
- Video.Show (User Generated Content sharing site) (links to another CodePlex project)
- Contoso University (Education) demo
Examining the source code for these projects, they all appear to be written in C#, the code for Tafiti and all of the Windows Live samples can be found on the CodePlex web site.