Tag: Directory

Zaad, A Specialized Palestinian Directory Search Engine

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ZAAD

Zaad is a local Palestinian directory search engine that serves up search results from specialized databases, currently covering the Palestinian private sector and NGO sector databases.

Zaad enables users to enter information about their company or association directly to the site’s database, and update it as frequently as they need to. Details submitted to the search engine are confirmed through phone by the Zaad team to make sure all data in their database is accurate.

The service aims to build national databases for several sectors, expanding soon to hotels, restaurants, health centres, and more; positioning itself as an easy entry point to search for and find any type of business or organization in Palestine.

An integrated text advertising solution will be launched in a few days, that will enable advertisers to buy text ads to be displayed with the search results, targeted by category and language, with geo-targeting to be added soon.

The service went live earlier this month, and is available in both Arabic and English.

Zaad is a project of Sadaf Technology Development, a Palestinian web development company based in Gaza.

# Zaad

New And Improved Version Of Araby Directory

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ArabyTowards the end of 2007, Arabic search engine “Araby” bought popular Arab website directory “Eyoon” in order to integrate it as a service of Araby; Araby Directory was officially launched in early 2008.

The goal behind Araby Directory is to add the number of useful services for Araby users, as well as grow the user base, through providing for users’ every need.

Ever since the intial launch, the Araby team have been working on a set of improvements for the Araby Directory service, to enhance usability and provide better and more organized content.

Some of the main enhancements released with this new version are the following:

  • A new design for the directory and an easier way to navigate through it.
  • A number of new main categories and subcategories to better cover and organize as many websites as possible.
  • Addition of a large numbers of websites, organized under their relative categories and subcategories.
  • Integration of the advanced Araby search functionalities to make searching for and finding websites a lot easier and efficient.
  • The possibility to suggest new websites by users.
  • The possibility to report broken links or inappropriate content by users.
  • Display of more information about the websites in the directory.
  • Integration of the “Email to a friend” functionality.

Araby Directory screenshot

Araby is one of the services and companies of Maktoob Group.

# Araby Directory

Places.ae Dubai Location Based Directory Goes Mobile

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Places.aePlaces.ae, the Dubai location based directory, previously reviewed here, have taken their service one step further, officially launching the mobile version of their service at http://m.places.ae

The mobile version has been under development and test for a while now, and now that BlackBerry support has been integrated into it, it has been launched officially.

This mobile version also supports iPhone and Windows Mobile clients, with an even more optimized interface as their browsers and UI are better than those of the BlackBerry; as well as any mobile device that can read HTML pages.

Places.ae BlackBerry Home

However, if you have a BlackBerry equipped with GPS, it’s even easier to find places you’re looking for, as place.ae will use the information from the GPS satellites to know where you are and find a list of places that are closest to your current location.

If you click on one of the entries in the list, you will see a little static map of the place, and as phone numbers of the places are often detected, it’s easy to call a place to ask for other details or make a reservation if necessary.

For more details on how to use a GPS-enabled BlackBerry with Places.ae, you can check out the details and instructions on the Places.ae Blog.

Resto Tunisie, Community Powered Directory Of Restaurants in Tunisia

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Resto TunisieResto Tunisie, is a Tunisian website that aims to become a comprehensive directory of restaurants in Tunisia, aiding people to make their decisions on which eatery to pick.

The site’s users as well as restaurant owners get to suggest restaurants for addition, by filling out a contact form, specifying the address of the restaurant and why they think it should be included.

Site visitors can navigate through the restaurants in a number of different ways; either by specialty, budget, and top voted for example; or by searching directly for a certain restaurant or using the advanced search to combine different criteria to find the best restaurant for their needs.

On each restaurant’s page, visitors will find the restaurant’s details, specialty, its address, phone numbers, website, whether it servers alcohol or not, and a little description of it. The restaurant is also located on a map (using Google maps) to make finding it easier, along with other nearby restaurants.

Users can also use this page to cast their votes on the restaurant in the three areas of Decoration, Service and Food; as well as leave their reviews and comments on it.
By logging in to their accounts on the site, users can always come back to find the list of restaurants they favorited and reviewed.

A little zone in the website also provides a list of job openings at some restaurants.

Resto Tunisie Screenshot

The service was developed by Tunisian web agency WebCarré, and currently has 327 restaurants in its database.

The design is really nice; the site is pretty easy to use and to surf around. The only thing I think they should consider is opening up addition of restaurants by the users more, letting users fill in the restaurant’s details, position it on the map and all, with them going over all submissions later on, checking there are no duplicates and that the content is good. It should make the service livelier and easier for them to maintain.

# Resto Tunisie

Places.ae Release Places Answering Machine (PAM)

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Places.aePlaces.ae, the cool Dubai location based directory, previously reviewed here, have released a new interesting feature called “Places Answering Machine (PAM)”, which acts as an interface for Places.ae with other communication channels on the internet, thereby enabling users to ask Places.ae for places directly through these channels without having to visit the website.

They’ve currently launched with Google Talk and Twitter support, and more channels should be added soon.

For Google Talk users, all you have to do is add places.ae@gmail.com in your contact list then ask PAM to find you something by sending a message in the following format:
find me <something> in <area> (e.g. find me pizza in jumeirah).
You can also use a search term without an area, using find me <something>.

If you’re using Twitter, you’ll have to start following the user places_ae, and once it starts following you back, you can send it a direct message to search for a place:
d places_ae <something> in <area> (e.g. d places_ae pizza in jumeirah).

PAM is still in the beta stage, and more work is currently being put into it’s communication skills and the layout of the sent answers. But it’s still a really nice feature, worth checking out and using for quick searches.

# Places.ae

Places.ae, Dubai’s Location Based Directory

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Places.ae is one of those simple, small, but very useful services that we really wish we had more of all around the Arab world.

In short, and using their own words which I think say it best, places.ae is a location based directory for Dubai.
Integrating Google Maps, the website helps you find, positioned on a map, anything in Dubai by simply asking you what you are looking for, and the neighborhood you’re looking for it in; from businesses to restaurants to clubs to hospitals to any other place you would want to go to in Dubai.

The interface is very simple and really easy to use; you start typing what you’re searching for and the website helps by giving suggestions, and then it delivers a list of nearby places sorted by how far they are from the location you typed in.

You get to click on each one of these places to see it located on a map, find how other people who have been there rate it and read their comments on it.

Users can also add other places that they know of to the website, thereby giving the community the possibility to further enrich the service.

Places.ae currently only covers Dubai, but should be adding other emirates soon. The service is free, both for users and for businesses for the time being.

This very cool service is a product of the collaboration of code.ae and spinbits.

# Places.ae