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Why does the web address bar double as a google search now? Why would I need TWO google search bars??

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  • Last reply by cor-el

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I recently updated from I think version 4.0 to the latest Firefox. It used to be I could just type the name of a website without ".com" at the end of it, and it would take me directly to the website. Now, it takes me to a google search result. I thought that was the purpose of the dedicated google search bar NEXT to the web address bar. Why would I want both of my search bars to be a google search??

I recently updated from I think version 4.0 to the latest Firefox. It used to be I could just type the name of a website without ".com" at the end of it, and it would take me directly to the website. Now, it takes me to a google search result. I thought that was the purpose of the dedicated google search bar NEXT to the web address bar. Why would I want both of my search bars to be a google search??

All Replies (3)

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Beats me because I don't like the confusion of unanticipated searches.

See the following page where I set up my about:config preferences to prevent that, since if I want a search I would initiate it from a keyword shortcut for exactly the search that I want.

and my more on using Keyword shortcuts in the following

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Just found this addon: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/browse-by-name/ can confirm it makes the web address bar behave as expected.

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You can modify the pref keyword.URL on the about:config page to use Google's "I'm Feeling Lucky" or Google's "Browse By Name".