Everyone who is anyone knows that you can add different types of search engines into Firefox. You know, you’ve got your IMDB, your Netflix, your Wikipedia, your SanduskyCabinets.com, and what have you. It’s real quick and easy to just add searches to that dropdown in the upper right, but it’s a tad inconvenient to really use them.

You know what I mean you lazy, laptop-lit bum. You have to move your mouse ALL THE WAY to the upper right… then you have to click on the dropdown… and actually click on the search you want. And don’t get me started on how then you STILL have to click or erase the search box and type in what you are looking for! Ugghhh it’s the worst.

Well friend, today is your lucky day, because I have recently discovered the most fabulous and sneaky feature in Firefox.

Instructions

When you click ‘Manage Searches’ in the search dropdown, there is a column in the dialog box list called ‘keyword’. When you have a search selected, you can hit ‘Edit Keyword’ and type in any old keyword you like. For example I just have the word ‘i’ for IMDB.com. After you have saved some keywords for your searches, get ready to rock.

When you want to search for something on a specific site, just type directly into the URL bar your keyword and then your search term. For example, if I wanted to read all I could about the movie Lifeforce on Wikipedia (sweeeeet), I just type ‘w Lifeforce’ (where w is my keyword for Wikipedia) into the URL bar and hit enter. Voilà. Instant search results from the search site you specified, for the keyword you typed. When you combine this with CTRL+L, the shortcut to put your cursor into the URL bar, you can get super speedy with your searches.

Keyword Search Galore

Want to search Amazon for that copy of  Her Passionate Pirate (you know… to fill out that Harlequin American Romance Series collection you have going…)? CTRL+L and then type “a Her Passionate Pirate” and boom! You’re there!

Now all you have to do is add all the different searches you want and give them good keywords. Google is obvious (g) and I even added Google Maps (map). You can really go crazy with it… go on… go crazy!

YOU’RE WELCOME.