I was playing around with Streets and Trips 2010 and the s/w seems very inconsistent when it decides to search Bing Maps for businesses. I looked up Wal-Mart in Richmond BC several times and it didn't show up at all. After about the third or fourth attempt, Bing should it. This was after I went and searched for another business that did show up in the "Find" pull down menu.

Has anyone else noticed this quirkiness with Bing and S&T 2010? Is there a way to force a Bing search?

I have found this type of inconsistency in several Bing searches. It just won't find results that you know have to be there, so, I've pretty much quit using it.

Here are a couple tips to use when performing a Bing Searches:

1) use comma's rather that words like "..in..." or "...near..".
2) make sure the default Country is correct set. Simply adding "...BC, Canada" to your first search will change it to Canada from the United States.

I just did a search using "wal-mart, Richmond, BC" and got the expected results. See thumbnail below. Give it another try.

Attached Images

walmart-RichmondBC.JPG (65.7 KB)

That's interesting Larry.
I just did this search: walmart. richmond, bc and nothing showed up.
I did this search as well: walmart, richmond, bc
And Nothing. I then tried your search wal-mart, Richmond, BC
And ditto, same result: nothing. This is within S&T 2010. I have had pretty good luck with Bing itself. Just not with S&T 2010 searches when it's connected to the internet.

How bizarre! I just selected one of the invalid and incorrect suggestions when I entered any of the above. In otherwords, I hit enter. After a few seconds, the red bar with search results from the web made some recommendations. Now, if this is NOT a bug, I don't know what is.

Streets & Trips can handle a variety of misspellings, and you may type either wal-mart or walmart. However, when I use the Live Search in Streets & Trips, I only search for the name or type of business, with out including the city in the query. I zoom to the city, or to the approximate area I'm interested in, and then I type "walmart", or "pizza", or "ice cream", etc.

Marvin, that's a good tip. Thanks for sharing.

Edit. I just tried your method and it didn't work. I zoomed into North Vancouver. I know there is a Wal-mart there. Clearly, it seems the search feature in S&T 2010 decides when it wants to search or not.

Is it possible the store locations are not in the database yet because the locations are new? I'm not familiar with that area, so I have no way of knowing.

It is not in the S&T 2010 database. I actually don't see any in Canada! I checked in MapSource which is also NavTeq and the Capilano Mall one was added in version 2009.1. The closest in the 2009 version is Lougheed Town Centre.

Terry

When did Walmart come to Canada?

It takes 2 to 3 years for new streets to make it into Navteq-based mapping products, but it may take much much longer for new POIs to finally appear.

S&T 2010 does show some Wal-Marts in Canada and in particular in my area, as does Bing Maps. Just not all of them. This Wal-mart in North Vancouver has been around for at least 3 years. In fact, some of the locations shown are newer than the one in North Vancouver. Go figure: http://www.bing.com/maps/#JndoZXJlMT12YW5jb3V2ZXImc3M9eXAud2FsLW1hcnQlN2Vzc3QuMSU3ZXBnLjEm...N2UtMTYzLjQ3NDI5NjU3

Now compare Google maps (and zoom out) and type in Wal-mart, Vancouver.

BTW, my Garmin maps do show the Wal-mart locations. It uses Navteq maps and their POIs.

Funny, I only saw 2 in Ontario, both listed as ATMs in S&T 2010. I must be searching incorrectly. I haven't tried Bing Maps.

As I said, Garmin maps of 2009.1 or newer show the one in North Van. The latest from Garmin is 2010.3

Terry