We’ve just posted an article on dev.live.com that looks at a few simple hacks you can do with the Live Search Box, to change its look and feel. You can use these hacks to make the search box fit better into the design of your site. List of hacks:

• Applying the Windows Live styling to the basic search box
• Adding default text to the search box
• Auto-selecting the search box when the page loads
• Ensuring compatibility with ActiveX and other smart objects

But this is really only the beginning of what you can do. As you play around with the search box on your site, let us know what you come up with, and maybe we’ll promote it on this blog. And if there is a hack you’d like to do but just don’t know how let us know.

Small print – before you go hack-wild, please read the Terms of Use to ensure responsible hacking.

— Nathan Buggia, Live Search Marketer