According to a source familiar with the situation, Microsoft's Bing search engine and the mathematical answer engine Wolfram Alpha have struck a deal. The agreement will permit Bing to show some of Wolfram Alpha's specialized scientific and computational data. Little else is known about the deal, as both companies declined to comment when approached.

Linux users aside, Bing has seen steady growth in popularity and is slowly nibbling away at Google's market share. Bing ads are all over the Web, Microsoft is pushing for a presence on Apple's iPhone and the company signed a ten-year search deal with Yahoo not long back. While Bing has a long way to go before it trumps Google's dominance, Microsoft and Yahoo are enjoying a combined 20.36% of the search market.

With Bing spreading like wildfire, who - or what - will the service mingle with next?