L'Ardiose in Duboce Triangle/Castro is a wonderful new French addition to the neighborhood. It's walking distance from my place in Lower Haight. It's only about six weeks old but it is already drawing pretty good crowds. I love it because it feels like going on vacation in France.

http://www.ardoisesf.com/Site/L%27Ardoise.html

StudentExplorer and rjque,

Thanks for the restaurant leads! Both look great and I make an effort to try them.

Thanks to everyone for their responses.

Other resources to check...
 

Also winovin, do make sure you check out The San Francisco Chronicle's San Francisco Neighborhood Guide for some perspectives on different zones of the city.

Another great resource is Alfredo Jacobo Perez Gomez's A Local's Guide for People Visiting or Moving to San Francisco, which I used before moving to our great city.

My most handy guide when I moved here is the Not For Tourists book, which comes in hard-copy, but is completely free on the web:

http://notfortourists.com/SanFrancisco-PDFs.aspx

And please, do not share with tourists ;)

Palo Alto and Mt. View don't even belong in the same sentence. PA is much nicer particularly if you are looking for nightlife, etc. (though they are adjacent so neither area will be far from your home if you live in the other). Sunnyvale and Cupertino are fine if you are looking for SFH and good schools.

Depending on where you live and work, the commute from SF could run 1 hour or more each way. Proxmity to 280 on either or both end would shave your time. Your best bet might be to rent something in the booming south of market area. If you don't like the commute you can always move south. If walking to nightlife is important, then you might be happier in the Marina, Russian Hill or Haight areas, but add another 15 minutes to your commute time each way.