- Archived
Adding One-Click Search from sites without OpenSearch
Ages ago, with the separate search bar enabled, Firefox would allow the addition of any "searchable" site to the dropdown options for a search. This option is still avail… (read more)
Ages ago, with the separate search bar enabled, Firefox would allow the addition of any "searchable" site to the dropdown options for a search. This option is still available on specific sites, shown by adding a green + to the search icon (see Capture3.png).
At some point, this addition was "overridden" so that this option was available only to specific sites that have enabled the OpenSearch description within a separate xml file (from my best understanding from my best understanding). I'm sure that there is a security reason for this, but given that there are many sites available that don't have this option for whatever reason, including Wolfram Alpha and Dogpile, I used to be able to still add these sites as one-click searches and I would still like to do so.
If the "Add X"/green + is not available, the only option to add new search engines these days appears to be through the "Find more search engines" link under Options which sends the user to Add-Ons site specifically to search for an applicable add-on.
It doesn't seem like I should have to include an entire Add-on to switch search engines, especially since search engines I'd had from previous Firefox versions seem to have carried over just fine. For example, Thesaurus.com and Wolfram Alpha can't be added on my newer, fresh Firefox installations on other PCs, but I've got Thesaurus.com available from my long-standing profile (Capture4.png).
I've found a method to edit the search.json.mozlz4 file and manually add searches, there must be an easier way to accomplish something that seems relatively simple, and do so without a new add-on.