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Bing Maps Gets Cab Fare Calculator

by Terrence O'Brien on August 4, 2010 at 06:23 PM

Bing's Taxi Fare Calculator

Microsoft has actually managed to turn its Bing Maps from a poor imitation of Google Maps to a serious competitor for its clientele. Rather than simply copy what others are doing, Microsoft has put a decent amount of effort into differentiating its product, as evidenced in its creation of an SDK (Software Development Kit) and a contest that encourages developers to build apps on top of Bing Maps. Browsing the catalog of apps reveals a nice cross section of interesting ideas, but one of the more unique is the Taxi Fare Calculator, which, as you would expect, tries to guess how much a cab will cost.

After launching Taxi Fare Calculator, enter your city, the origin and the terminus of your route, and the app will use publicly available rate information and the "best route" to roughly estimate the cost of your trip. It won't be perfect, but it could be a helpful guide if you expect to be hailing a cab later in the day. Sadly, Microsoft has built the Bing Maps SDK on Silverlight, which is possibly the only browser plugin we loathe more than Flash. The apps won't load under the Linux Silverlight port Moonlight, so, if you're not in on the cult of Mac or enjoying Microsoft's OS, then you can't partake in the fun. [From: LifeHacker]

Tags: bing, bing maps, BingMaps, microsoft, microsoft bing, MicrosoftBing, moonlight, silverlight, taxi fare calculator, TaxiFareCalculator, top

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