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Search Engine toolbar vs Address toolbar

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What is the purpose of having a search engine toolbar in the middle of the Firefox screen if when you begin to type something into that toolbar, it immediately throws you up to the address bar? I can't figure out how to disable this ANNOYING feature. Please help.

What is the purpose of having a search engine toolbar in the middle of the Firefox screen if when you begin to type something into that toolbar, it immediately throws you up to the address bar? I can't figure out how to disable this ANNOYING feature. Please help.

Chosen solution

There is a preference for this but it does take a bit of work to find it because of the unusual name:

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button accepting the risk.

WARNING: Changing preferences through this interface not officially supported Hidden settings edited using the about:config tool are explicitly not supported, which means that Mozilla makes no guarantees they will be supported in the future, or that Mozilla will fix them if they break. Mozilla does not test these preferences, and will not in the future. That includes security and performance testing which these preferences may affect.

(2) In the search box in the page, type or paste handoff and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.improvesearch.handoffToAwesomebar preference to switch the value from true to false

Success?

More info on about:config: Configuration Editor for Firefox.


[Warning added by moderator.]

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All Replies (2)

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Chosen Solution

There is a preference for this but it does take a bit of work to find it because of the unusual name:

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button accepting the risk.

WARNING: Changing preferences through this interface not officially supported Hidden settings edited using the about:config tool are explicitly not supported, which means that Mozilla makes no guarantees they will be supported in the future, or that Mozilla will fix them if they break. Mozilla does not test these preferences, and will not in the future. That includes security and performance testing which these preferences may affect.

(2) In the search box in the page, type or paste handoff and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.newtabpage.activity-stream.improvesearch.handoffToAwesomebar preference to switch the value from true to false

Success?

More info on about:config: Configuration Editor for Firefox.


[Warning added by moderator.]

Modified by Chris Ilias

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that worked! thank you!!