How to get the most out of search engines in Vivaldi

d_A_y_x

I'm Firefox refugee and used there "Context Search X" extension with very convenient option: to move some searches (e.g. most used ones) outside submenu - in main context menu. I would like to see this in Vivaldi too
screenshot from mozilla add-ons
My default search is Yandex, and I added several searches, like imdb, last.fm, torrent, urbandictionary. Using them mainly from context menu of selected text.

Pesala

Rather than editing of only specific menus, we need to be able to edit all of them to suit our needs.

@pesala said in Feature requests for Vivaldi 1.14:

Allow Editing of Menus

greybeard

At first install I Delete Yahoo and Google.
Usually use Startpage, Ixquick or DDG although I prefer SP or Ixquick as they allow searching through E.U. servers in their settings.
The problem with searches and the surfing in general is that any traffic going through a U.S. route is deemed as being a possible target for the TLAs (Three Letter Acronyms).
As a former researcher however I have found that Bing returns the most Relevant results, not just the most results.
Also at least Microsoft (Bing) has always been up front with their Terms of Use where others have not.

An_dz

@d0j0p: POST is an HTTP method.

When you load a website you are using the GET method, which, as the name suggests, gets the resource in the server. Following the logic POST is to post a message to the server.

The thing is that some searches are not available with GET, only POST, so they were impossible to be added in Vivaldi before. Other search engines, like DuckDuckGo, works on both.

The main difference between both methods is that with GET you don't send any message, only headers, you are only instructing the server to give you a resource. That's why search engines with this method add the searched text in the URL as query parameters, which are the things added after the ? (question mark), like search=something.

With POST you send a message, the URL generally does not include any query and all commands are sent inside the HTTP message. One of the advantages of this method is privacy and security as the information is not in the URL, which is "public", your ISP can see the URLs you type and so anyone sniffing your traffic. As the message is inside the message itself it can be encrypted like when using HTTPS and so nobody can know what the request really was.

For example, when using DuckDuckGo the search result would come as duckduckgo.com/?q=MySearch&t=vivaldi with GET, where MySearch would include whatever I searched for, while when using POST it would always be https://duckduckgo.com/.

So if someone would sniff my connection when I'm using POST they would know I use DuckDuckGo, but not what search for.

POST is the default method used when logging in on any website and when saving preferences and account information.

An_dz

@para-noid: I think only with Mozilla nowadays. They used to have partnerships with many browsers before, but they created their own and achieved monopoly so they don't need to pay others anymore.

D0J0P

@an_dz I see. Thank you. I wish I had known that when using DDG hoping that my searches were private.

I did read online that GET is faster than POST. However, I don't really see a difference in speed when using DDG on POST and on GET when searching for something, like for example "dogs".

QuHno

@aronand It is not about bundling the Ecosia search, that was done, but about the search predictions for Ecosia - which is not in by default. Just tested again with clean profile - see last comment in VB-27327 - maybe the string should be added at some point too

An_dz

@d0j0p
One of the "disadvantages" of searches with GET is that you won't be able to go back to those searches when looking in your history. You'll have to retype what is shown there. But that's a choice each person can make for themselves.

Tip

Also, if you want to always force POST in DDG, including in private windows, you can add &kg=p at the end of the search string. This will force POST. Obviously the Use POST checkmark must be checked as well.

D0J0P

@an_dz When I edit my DDG search in Vivaldi settings, it shows "https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%s&t=vivaldi" as the search engine address. Where in there do I put &kg=p? I tried it after the .com/, and I tried it at the very end, and then going to that URL, but it did a custom search for me.

An_dz

@d0j0p
It should be at the very end, https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%s&t=vivaldi&kg=p

When you search kg=p will tell DuckDuckGo the setting for using POST must be set.

3dmax

Suggestions to the Search Field:

Replace the icon of the magnifying glass with the icon of the currently selected search engine. Also show system icons in the context menu "Search with".
Reset search engine after performed search to the search engine by default. With the setting of the delay before the reset, if not click again in the search field.

An_dz

@tonycr You did not add where the query must be placed so it only opens the Google frontpage. Add &q=%s at the end of the url and it will work.