Opening its annual TechFest event in Redmond this morning, Microsoft Research showed a pair of projects meant to help people make "collaborative" Web searches.

One, SearchTogether, is an Internet Explorer plugin that puts a sidebar into the browser. It's meant for collaborating on multiple computers, possibly in different locations. In the sidebar, each person can see and follow the Web searches that a friend or co-worker has conducted related to their project or common interest. It uses a Windows Live ID login.

The other, CoSearch, is designed for collaborative searching on a single computer. For example, a person using a mobile phone in the room can control a cursor on the computer screen to click on a link and transfer the result to the phone, even as the people using the PC follow a different link.

Like other Microsoft Research projects, these aren't products, but they could contribute to the company's future products. Inside the company, the idea behind TechFest is to give Microsoft's product groups and managers a chance to see the work going on in the company's research labs, and potentially put it to use.

Despite that opportunity for "technology transfer," as it's known, it doesn't always happen. Rick Rashid, the senior vice president in charge of Microsoft Research, pointed out that Microsoft's researchers were working on Web search for years before the rest of the company recognized its significance. Rashid didn't point this out, but in the meantime, of course, Google charged out to a lead that it maintains to this day.

"People don't always listen to us," Rashid said, as the audience laughed.

Other projects shown during the event include the WorldWide Telescope and a Microsoft Research-designed wireless sensor that can detect motion and temperature, among other things. The company also announced that it's making its "Singularity" research operating system available for free download to academics and researchers.