Does this feature exist in Firefox 2?

October 26, 2006 8:41 AM

Does this feature exist in Firefox 2?

Did the Mozilla folks remove the feature in Firefox 2 that was in 1.5 where you could input a word or phrase, such as "beans baxter," and it would search google for an appropriate page? I really miss that feature and want it back.

posted by missed to computers & internet (14 comments total)

Why do you think it has been removed? Did you try it and find that it didn't work?

I input that phrase in my address field and pressed "return" and I got to this page.

Of course there's always the dedicated search field as well, where you can choose from a number of search engines.
posted by mikel at 8:51 AM on October 26, 2006

There are two ways to search Google in Firefox. You can type your search into the address box (where the URL normally appears), or you can use the search box in the toolbar.

The search box hasn't changed much in Firefox 2, but it looks slightly different. You can see a picture of it here. If your search box is missing for some reason, right-click on an empty area of the Firefox toolbar and choose "Customize..." You can drag and drop to add the search box to the toolbar.

Keywords in the address bar have changed slightly. Firefox 2.0 uses Google's browse by name feature, which jumps straight to the top result for certain searches. You can change it back to do a normal Google search instead.
posted by mbrubeck at 8:57 AM on October 26, 2006

Surely there are three ways - the two you mention and the one where you right-click the word or phrase you want to seach for and click "search web for..." Don't tell me thats not in Firefox 2.0
posted by criticalbill at 9:04 AM on October 26, 2006

The select and right-click behaviour has changed. It now uses the currrent search tool in the search box, and the context menu offers 'Search XXX for "your selection", where XXX is that tool. I find that a retrogtrade step, as I used to like having IMDB as the selected search tool, yet the right-click method defaulted to google.
posted by punilux at 9:12 AM on October 26, 2006

i meant in the URI bar. trying the suggestion mbrubeck made regarding changing it back.
posted by missed at 9:16 AM on October 26, 2006

hrm. added user.js in my profile folder, even changed keyword.URL in about:config and still am getting "The URL is not valid and cannot be loaded." Any ideas?
posted by missed at 9:24 AM on October 26, 2006

I typed "search from location bar" in my location(URL) bar and got a page of helpful Google results.
posted by Mr. Gunn at 9:52 AM on October 26, 2006

Are you at work? The URL search feature doesn't work for me when I try it at work because it's blocked by the proxy server.
posted by octothorpe at 9:55 AM on October 26, 2006

If that doesn't work, start firefox with the profile switch(directions vary by OS) and try it in that fresh profile. If it works there, you've done something to mess it up, either by modifying something in prefs.js or installing an extension that messed it up.
posted by Mr. Gunn at 9:56 AM on October 26, 2006

I think the problem may have been with one of my extensions (I don't use many). Got the URI bar feature to work after I pretty much disabled them all.
posted by missed at 10:30 AM on October 26, 2006

that would be Tabbrowser Preferences 1.3.1. heh
posted by missed at 10:35 AM on October 26, 2006

yeah the tab extensions (add-ons? WTF?) are notorious for breaking everything.
posted by Mr. Gunn at 10:45 AM on October 26, 2006

(add-ons? WTF?)

Add-ons = extensions + themes. The tab extensions are still extensions.
posted by Turd Ferguson at 11:57 AM on October 26, 2006

Awesome. I was having the exact same problem and disabling "Tabbrowser Preferences" fixed it. Thanks!
posted by blag at 3:33 PM on October 26, 2006