If you enter text into the Location bar that is not a valid Internet address (URL), Firefox will try to direct you to the location you intended.

Table Of Contents

• Internet Keyword search
• Turning off and on
• Changing the keyword service
• Domain Guessing
• Turning off and on
• Changing the prefix or suffix

Internet Keyword search

Firefox will first try to send your request to a keyword search service. By default, this service is Google's Browse by Name service. For example, If you type mozilla foundation into the Location bar, Firefox will submit a query to the Google Browse by Name service, since this is not a valid URL. The service will direct you to its best match for your request, and direct you to http://www.mozilla.org. An entry without a clear match to a URL will display search results for the entry.

Turning off and on

You can control whether the Internet Keywords search is active by editing your Firefox configuration.

1. In the Location bar, type about:config, and press EnterReturn.
   • The about:config "This might void your warranty!" warning page may appear. Click I'll be careful, I promise!, to continue to the about:config page.
2. Search for the preference keyword.enabled.
3. Double-click the keyword.enabled preference to toggle it between true and false.
   • false disables Internet Keyword searches.
   • true enables Internet Keyword searches.

Changing the keyword service

You can specify any valid URL to perform the Internet Keywords by modifying the keyword.URL preference in the about:config page.

For example, to set the the Internet Keywords service to perform a Yahoo! search, keyword.URL can be set to http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=. The text you entered into the Location Bar will be appended to the url.

Domain Guessing

If you enter an incomplete URL, Firefox can try to "fix up" the URL by adding a prefix, suffix, or both to what you types. For example, if you type www.mozilla the Location Bar, Firefox will append .com to complete the URL. If you type mozilla.org, Firefox will prepend ''www." to complete the URL. This "guessing" is secondary to the Internet Keywords search described above - it does not work unless Internet Keywords are disabled.

Turning off and on

You can control whether Domain Guessing is active by editing your Firefox configuration.

1. In the Location bar, type about:config, and press EnterReturn.
   • The about:config "This might void your warranty!" warning page may appear. Click I'll be careful, I promise!, to continue to the about:config page.
2. Type fixup into the Filter prompt at the top of the about:config page.
3. Double-click the browser.fixup.alternate.enabled preference to toggle it toggle it between true and false.
   • false disables Domain Guessing.
   • true enables Domain Guessing.

Changing the prefix or suffix

You can specify a prefix (such as www) or suffix (such as .net) for the Domain Guessing feature.

In the about:config page, double-click the browser.fixup.alternate.prefix or browser.fixup.alternate.suffix preference. Enter in the prefix or suffix you want Firefox to add to incomplete URLs.

Based on information from Location Bar search (mozillaZine KB), Domain Guessing (Mozilla.org End user documentation), and Internet Keywords (Mozilla.org End user documentation)