Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Search Engines

duarte.framos

Search engines would be stored as regular bookmarks in a folder, like Speed Dial tabs are currently stored a regular bookmark directory tagged as such; and in the same vein as the suggested Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Web Panels feature request.

They already are a sort of glorified bookmark, with an URL field, nick name and search suggestion. Basically in more broad terms it could just mean supporting wildcards in bookmarks (%s) like Firefox does. Plus an additional optional field for search suggestion, nicknames we already have

Why? This could solve several issues and feature requests:

They would be easy to backup - Apparently it is not currently trivial to find where they are saved, and the storage method is fragile and precarious at best.
This would basically solve exporting/restoring search engines issues.
By becoming bookmarks they would be a lot easier to manage, as in renaming, sorting, organizing into folders, etc.
It no longer requires maintaining a separate (and somewhat lacking) UI for managing Search Engines with duplicate functionality, making it tidier and simpler by unifying everything in on place.
They would automatically just become synced, along with all other regular bookmarks.
By allowing organization of search engines into folders the Right Click > Search with menu could also benefit from folder derived sub menus categories, like Insert Note currently does.

Para-Noid

Why not create a bookmark folder for search engine only? I do.

My search engine folder sits comfortably in my bookmarks bar.
And the bookmarks panel. And the bookmarks menu by clicking the "V" in the upper left of the GUI.
So much can be done with custom bookmark folders. You can always add them to Start Page too.
There is always the drop down menu in the search field found in the upper right of the GUI.
Your list is basically bookmark in nature.

duarte.framos

@para-noid How do you search using those search engines, can you use them directly from the address bar?

Do you click on the menu, browse for an entry, click on it, wait for it to load, then insert the text in the search box and press enter?
That is a whole lot of steps compared to searching directly from the address bar

Para-Noid

@duarte-framos I have the search box/field in the upper right corner of the GUI. In the address bar use the nickname. Vivaldi even allows the user to add their own search engines. This might help.

Settings>Search
Settings>Search>Show Search Field

duarte.framos

@para-noid I don't use a search box, I have mine intentionally turned off, I'd rather do everything from the address bar and enjoy a cleaner UI.

What I mean is how do you use the search engines you have saved in a bookmark folder, apart from opening them regularly?
I guess you can't use a nickname+search_string workflow directly, because bookmarks don't take parameters nor allow use %s of wildcards like Firefox does, which is what I'd like to see supported.

It requires manually maintaining two identical search engine lists which is redundant and pointless. I am aware of the current search engine configuration UI, which is what I suggest getting rid of for the above stated reasons.

Para-Noid

@duarte-framos In Settings>Quick Commands you can use bookmark nicknames. You can also search using nicknames in the address bar. You can select your search engine in the address bar by using the nickname as the prefix as in; g (Google), b (Bing), y (Yahoo), s (Start Page) etc.

I'm having a bit of a problem understanding what you want. To me it seems everything you want can be either bookmark and/or settings and/or address bar related. Mostly settings and bookmarks.

I'm sure you have but if not see https://help.vivaldi.com

edit: additional see https://help.vivaldi.com/article/search/#address

derDay

@para-noid said in Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Search Engines:

You can also search using nicknames in the address bar.

therefore you have to save the searchengine in the searchsettings before. and that is what @duarte-framos want to simplify
only a folder with searchengine entrys like speeddial or bookmarkbar

duarte.framos

@derday said in Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Search Engines:

@para-noid said in Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Search Engines:

You can also search using nicknames in the address bar.

therefore you have to save the searchengine in the searchsettings before. and that is what @duarte-framos want to simplify
only a folder with searchengine entrys like speeddial or bookmarkbar

Exactly what @derday said, thanks. Not sure what the confusion is

Pesala

I have to admit to being puzzled about what this would achieve. I don't see it happening, just because the Search Engines in Settings already does what users need, with drag and drop sorting, easy editing of searches, easy adding of search engines, etc.

Search engines are already synced.

Folders in the search with menu? I suppose some users have dozens of search engines, but if you have to navigate another layer of submenus to find the right one it's a slow method.

I got used to inserting notes because I can do it all with the keyboard. For example, to insert my system specs it is:

Menu Key, I, V, S

I can also access my Search With submenu with the keyboard, but it's a bit harder. E.g. to search a selected word with my Oxford dictionary it would be:

Menu Key, S, S, Enter, O

Specs: AMD A10-6800K, 8 Gb on Win 10 64-bit build 17134.320 • Snapshot 2.1.1328.4 (64-bit)

Para-Noid

@pesala Thank you. The only thing I could see that the OP was after is to add a search engine in the settings and/or then save to a bookmark folder. As you said search engines are by default synced. I can see why you prefer the keyboard method. You have simplified the process. It works for you. I'm still old school, I like bookmarks. To each their own.

@Pesala Once again you have proven how flexible and customizable Vivaldi really is. Again thanks.

loxaxs

FOLDERS is what search engines as bookmark would achieve.

Current Firefox user looking into Vivaldi here. I'm here to say that wildcard bookmarks are a greatly underrated feature. Here is my pledge to why it should be added to Vivaldi, if Vivaldi truly is a browser for power users.

Before I started using wildcard bookmarks, I had struggled for a long time with search engine entries. Those were hard to edit or add and they were not synced between computers. Even today, they are still not imported when migrating between browsers.

Today, I have 61 wildcard bookmarks on Firefox, 18 of which I used within the last 48 hours, and 53 of which I'm likely to use within the next four weeks. I checked each of them, the only 8 useless ones are 4 general search engines, 2 language translation wildcard bookmarks between languages that I rarely use (and rarely want to translate between) and lastly, 2 uncategorised wildcard bookmarks.

My bookmarks are sorted in 7 categories:

General search engines (1 (+4))
Dictionaries (3)
- Translation dictionaries (5 (+2))
- Synonyms dictionaries (2)
Knowledge (3)
Programmer page query (7)
Programmer search tools (5)
- Stack Exchange (3)
Info page query (6)
The Internet (12)
6 (+2) uncategorised
(One of the sites has 6 entries just to enter search prefixes (it's the only one ATM))

I create about 1 new wildcard bookmark every month, maybe more.

I have already tried to manage many search engines in Chrome in the past. It's not enjoyable at all. I gave up on adding more after the 20th I added, and reverted to Firefox within 3 days, because I can't do without that feature. Firefox may be the slowest of web browsers at times, but with the wildcard bookmark feature, it is the fastest, because the amount of time to go and look for a search bar is far greater that of a loading page. You just Ctrl+L your way to the search bar and you are free to go wherever you want within seconds.

I looked at what Vivaldi can offer in terms of search engines ATM. There is a lot of room for improvement.

N There is no way to manage your engines by categories. (duarte.framos's 3)
N The URL boxes have fixed width, so even when fullscreen, you can't see the full URL at once.
N How do you backup your search engines ? Especially since the Restore button lets you delete all of them in two clicks, on all of your computers if you use syncing (I guess). (duarte.framos's 1 (&2 I guess))
N You can't import search engines from other browsers (nor wildcard bookmarks).
(Correct me if I'm wrong)

On the positive side:

P The autocompletion API field ("Suggested URL") is refreshing. I expect I would be going to like it if I was moving to Vivaldi.
P You can set the engine to use POST. This is definitely new too, and a lot better than the alternative of using a REST client.
P Private search engine. Mozilla says they are focusing on privacy but they are lagging behind on that point.
P The search engine list extends vertically when you have more than 10 of them (it was a worry I had until I tried adding new engines).
P ~~Drag & drop search engines to reorganize them.~~ Everybrowser has that today.

(1N), (2N) and (3N) would be fixed if the proposal was implemented. Also Vivaldi would be one step closer to solving (4N). duarte.framos has stated more arguments than I did.(duarte.framos's 4) makes a lot of sense to me. As for (duarte.framos's 6), I'm not a Vivaldi user and I haven't tried that feature, but it seems to be a totally valid point too.

I hope I convinced you to migrate from Vivaldi to Firefox. Vivaldi, you guys have done a wonderful job so far. You have infinite history with a great search interface and, since quite recently, this is synced to the cloud, so I don't have to worry about it when changing OS or computer. I definitely like the idea of needing almost no addons to make my browser worth.

I'll keep reading Vivaldi update changelog headlines to know the day wildcard bookmarks (or bookmark search engines) are available so that I can finally move to Vivaldi.

duarte.framos

@loxaxs Great points, agree with it all. I really miss Firefox's Bookmark wildcards, I'm even considering going back some day just because of that.

Another bonus is that when I used Firefox I never really bothered to set up traditional search engines, I simply set them all up as regular bookmarks with %s.
This has the unexpected benefit of seamlessly syncing with all other browser instances, including the mobile version for Android. Since many mobile browsers don't even let you setup custom search engines (force you to use Google), nor do they have bookmark nicknames, this essentially allowed me to have unlimited custom search engines on my phone without additional work.

pafflick

@duarte-framos You should've linked your old thread. For us, people not familiar with Firefox bookmarks and wildcards it can be quite confusing. I admit that I already forgot what it was about, even though you explained it to me quite nicely back then...

duarte.framos

@pafflick Yes that post explains it more thoroughly. There is already a link to it in my first post.

ROTFL

@duarte-framos said in Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Search Engines:

This could solve several issues and feature requests

Partially yes, but IMO this solution would be just ersatz.

search engine is not a bookmark - mixing these types / terms is not logical nor user friendly
it would still require separate UI section that works in a bit different way. And adding exceptions and mixing them is not the best UX approach.

derDay

look, what mozilla announces:
Live Bookmarks will be removed starting with Firefox version 64

(don't hit me, I'm just the bearer of the bad news)

duarte.framos

@derday This is a different thing, doesn't seem to affect the use of nicknames and wildcards in the URL hopefully.
They sound like a cool concept, though I never actually used live bookmarks myself.

I'm an avid strong RSS reader user, but sadly I guess I'll never get to try Live Bookmarks now. There are good alternative feed readers out there though, like FeedBro so not all is lost

loxaxs

@loxaxs said in Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Search Engines:

On the positive side:

P The search engine list extends vertically when you have more than 10 of them (it was a worry I had until I tried adding new engines).

Well this is actually false. Vivaldi will vertically expand from 10 to 13, but won't go further.

loxaxs

@loxaxs said in Dedicated Bookmarks Folder for Search Engines:

I have already tried to manage many search engines in Chrome in the past. It's not enjoyable at all.

I can confirm that it isn't enjoyable at all in Vivaldi either.

Pesala

@loxaxs This is false, as far as I can tell. I have added some dictionaries to test this, and now have 15. I have read elsewhere about users with many more search engines. Presumably @TsunamiZ has a lot or he would not be asking for an Option to Sort Search Engines Alphabetically. One user replying to that thread says he/she has 20 or so.

Perhaps your problem is that you have set the scrollbars to autohide?

Specs: AMD A10-6800K, 8 Gb on Win 10 64-bit 1809 build 17763.253 • Snapshot 2.3.1420.4 (64-bit)