11. A method of operating a search system, the method comprising: provisioning a device to execute a copy of a selected mobile application selected from among a plurality of mobile applications; extracting content and metadata from a plurality of states of the copy of the selected mobile application executing on the device; identifying search input states within the plurality of states of the selected mobile application, wherein identifying the search input states is performed based on a first set of heuristics, wherein the first set of heuristics includes recognition of user-visible search indicia from the extracted content and metadata of the selected mobile application and recognition of items of the extracted metadata of the selected mobile application that correlate with search functionality; identifying, for each of the search input states of the selected mobile application, necessary input parameters for a search function corresponding to the search input state; storing a record for each identified search function in the selected mobile application, wherein each record includes: a navigation path within the selected mobile application to reach a search input state of the corresponding search function, an indication of input parameters required to be supplied to the corresponding search function, and a mapping of the input parameters to user interface widgets of the search input state; and in response to a query, (i) identifying a first search function record from based on the query, (ii) within a first mobile application corresponding to the first search function record, navigating to the search input state of the first search function record according to the navigation path of the first search function record, (iii) based on parameters specified by the query, selectively performing the search function of the first search function record in the first mobile application, (iv) scraping content from a resulting search results state, and (v) presenting the scraped content to a user.
11. A method of operating a search system, the method comprising: provisioning a device to execute a copy of a selected mobile application selected from among a plurality of mobile applications; extracting content and metadata from a plurality of states of the copy of the selected mobile application executing on the device; identifying search input states within the plurality of states of the selected mobile application, wherein identifying the search input states is performed based on a first set of heuristics, wherein the first set of heuristics includes recognition of user-visible search indicia from the extracted content and metadata of the selected mobile application and recognition of items of the extracted metadata of the selected mobile application that correlate with search functionality; identifying, for each of the search input states of the selected mobile application, necessary input parameters for a search function corresponding to the search input state; storing a record for each identified search function in the selected mobile application, wherein each record includes: a navigation path within the selected mobile application to reach a search input state of the corresponding search function, an indication of input parameters required to be supplied to the corresponding search function, and a mapping of the input parameters to user interface widgets of the search input state; and in response to a query, (i) identifying a first search function record from based on the query, (ii) within a first mobile application corresponding to the first search function record, navigating to the search input state of the first search function record according to the navigation path of the first search function record, (iii) based on parameters specified by the query, selectively performing the search function of the first search function record in the first mobile application, (iv) scraping content from a resulting search results state, and (v) presenting the scraped content to a user. 20. The method of claim 11 further comprising: receiving a query from a user device; identifying a set of entity types to describe segments of the query; identifying at least one search function record from the stored records, wherein: the at least one search function record includes the first search function record, and each of the at least one search function record has a set of required input entity types that is a subset of the identified set of entity types; executing the first mobile application within a device; within the first mobile application on the device, navigating to the search input state of the first search function record according to the navigation path of the first search function record; supplying parameters to the search input state based on the parameters specified by the query; performing the search function within the first mobile application on the device; scraping content from a resulting search results state within the first mobile application on the device; assembling the scraped content for each of the at least one search function; and transmitting the assembled content to the user device.