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Where can I fly for how much?

kayak.com

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Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#81

Post by dagw »

smaher wrote: post #46
martythemaniak wrote: post #4

OMG, I've been waiting for someone to build something like this forever. I've always hated the fact that all major travel sites work based on the assumption that you already know exactly when and where you're going, rather than at least giving you the option to explore your options.

Another good site that does something similar is skyscanner.com For example, here are all of the flights from SFO: http://www.skyscanner.com/flights-from/sfo/cheapest-flights-...

Thank you. I didn't know about that site, and it's exactly the sort of thing I've been looking for. Perfect for planning my next holiday.

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#82

Post by dagw »

jarek wrote: post #67
aohtsab wrote: post #44

whoa - it'll be cheaper for me to fly to Moscow (from DC) and travel to Eastern Europe by rail than actually flying directly in -- by about $420. This is dead useful; thanks for the link!

Depending on how, if at all, you are getting around the region otherwise, eastern European railroad might not be something you want to add to your itinerary.

The inter-country express trains tend to be pretty good. The slower local trains on the other hand can be a bit hit or miss. I mean they'll basically always get you to where you want to be, but perhaps not always exactly on time. But really when all is said and done trains in Europe generally work just fine.

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#83

Post by jka »

kiwidrew wrote: post #73
bkrausz wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem you have is that flight data is incredibly fast-changing and computationally expensive to get. So in order to get enough data for this you need to do a lot of long queries very often. Companies that provide pricing information (like ITA, who Kayak uses) charge a lot for these resources, so it's not like the usual internet where your incremental cost per user or search is minimal: there's a real cost here.…

Yep, that's exactly right. Every metasearch site out there uses essentially the same interface: given an origin, destination, departure date, and arrival date, return a list of itineraries in order of increasing price. Needless to say, the number of combinations of these variables precludes doing any kind of exhaustive search (especially since you're being charged per query). And availability is constantly changing,…

Broadly agree with this and the parent - but there's an interesting alternative way to look at travel metasearch.

If you think of obtaining prices as being akin to 'indexing', then what metasearch engines are doing is building up a search index for flights. And not all price sources necessarily charge for data (do Google pay to index Hacker News?)

Flight prices become stale as do indexed web pages - and as long as the user doesn't pay a transaction price for any search activity, then you can re-check pages based on user activity - in the case of travel, re-check the price once the user nears the booking phase of the funnel.

As noted though, sparseness of travel queries is certainly tricky! The 80/20 rule applies to some extent, and popular routes will be the ones which have the best price cache.

Another disclosure: I work for Skyscanner (our core is a flexible travel search engine)

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#84

Post by tinblink »

Hi,

Something similar, from big guys in the online travel business: Amadeus Affinity - http://www.amadeus.com/amadeus/x163551.html - accurate prices - choice per price range, comparison of prices on date range - destination per type of activity (beach, golf, whatever) - etc.

The URL for a major air travel company using it is - wait for it - ...

http://www.lufthansa.com/online/portal/lh/de/booking/affinit...

(Lufthansa Germany home page > Trip Finder)

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#85

Post by sambe »

Is there a contact link? This is neat but some obvious non-US improvements:

Colour-coding the prices would make it a lot more intuitive to read/scan for deals.

Detects me as being in New York (I'm in Switzerland) if I go to the base URL.

Only offers Fahrenheit... and dollars I think.

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#86

Post by asdflkj »

dagw wrote: post #80
bkrausz wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem you have is that flight data is incredibly fast-changing and computationally expensive to get. So in order to get enough data for this you need to do a lot of long queries very often. Companies that provide pricing information (like ITA, who Kayak uses) charge a lot for these resources, so it's not like the usual internet where your incremental cost per user or search is minimal: there's a real cost here.…

Yea, I was actually seriously looking into the idea of starting a travel site like that a couple of years ago. But it all basically fell apart once I realized how much it would cost to get the necessary data I'd need.

How much?

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#87

Post by sjones »

borism wrote: post #32
martythemaniak wrote: post #4

OMG, I've been waiting for someone to build something like this forever. I've always hated the fact that all major travel sites work based on the assumption that you already know exactly when and where you're going, rather than at least giving you the option to explore your options.

my problem is, I know my travel dates (mid-August) and I know my budget, but still not sure where to go. Unfortunately Kayak searches (including this very cool hack) are useless at solving that. P.S. ITA Software Matrix is good at this if you have a list of places, but not for random destinations.

Well, here's the countries you can fly to from the US in august:

http://www.skyscanner.net/flights-from/us/august-2010/august...

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#88

Post by gaius »

trin_ wrote: post #79

do they list the airlines somewhere? they dont seem to be listing ryanair for example.

That's a good thing :-)

More seriously, I would expect RyanAir charges a hefty fee to third parties who want access to their API, just like they change much higher fees to passengers who use a credit card than other airlines.

EDIT: Atually RyanAir is there (London -> Knock)

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#89

Post by nileshtrivedi »

kiwidrew wrote: post #73
bkrausz wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem you have is that flight data is incredibly fast-changing and computationally expensive to get. So in order to get enough data for this you need to do a lot of long queries very often. Companies that provide pricing information (like ITA, who Kayak uses) charge a lot for these resources, so it's not like the usual internet where your incremental cost per user or search is minimal: there's a real cost here.…

Yep, that's exactly right. Every metasearch site out there uses essentially the same interface: given an origin, destination, departure date, and arrival date, return a list of itineraries in order of increasing price. Needless to say, the number of combinations of these variables precludes doing any kind of exhaustive search (especially since you're being charged per query). And availability is constantly changing,…

We actually started building such a product for India where the problem complexity is much smaller (only about 20 prominent airports, majority travel by train where prices are static, only availability varies with time).

Availability of data APIs turned out to be a big hurdle for a bootstrapped startup. The market is still up for grabs. Here is another attempt by an Indian startup:

http://www.90di.com/travel/#form_based_search_home_page

Re: Where can I fly for how much?

#90

Post by david_p »

I have unknowingly been waiting for this for my whole life ... thank you so much ! It would be event better if there where some details added, like the possibility to choose one-way/two-ways flights.
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