search engines do not work, search settings are greyed out, restoring search settings to default does not help

Strangiato

Hi

I can't search using the url or search fields. I type a search term, press enter and then nothing happens. As you can see in the screenshot below, the search settings are greyed out and google and duckduckgo search engines are listed three times. Click on "Restore defaults" or "Reset search settings to default" buttons and then restarting Vivaldi does not solve the problem.

Any idea on how to solve this problem? I do not want to delete my Vivaldi profile.

pafflick

I haven't seen anything like this before. Can you add new Search Engines? If so, try adding something (doesn't have to be a valid one) and set it as default for everything (Private Window and Image Search). Then, try deleting everything else manually and restoring defaults.

luetage

You don’t have to delete your profile, but make a backup of your profile before attempting anything. Turn off settings sync in vivaldi://settings/sync/ and fix your search as described above, then “reset remote data”. Then turn on settings sync again and let your local profile populate the sync server. Should theoretically work, if it’s a sync issue.

Strangiato

I can't add a new search engine. Tried "Add as search engine..." from the context menu of a search field and "+" button (no text field appears) in "Search" page of Vivaldi settings, without success.

I never sync Vivaldi settings, I only select Bookmarks and History in sync settings.

The bug persists after using "Reset remote data" feature and then re-activating sync.

Pathduck

@Strangiato In Help > About, find Profile Path.

Close the browser, go to profile path and delete the file Web Data.
Start the browser.

Strangiato

@Pathduck said in search engines do not work, search settings are greyed out, restoring search settings to default does not help:

@Strangiato In Help > About, find Profile Path.

Close the browser, go to profile path and delete the file Web Data.
Start the browser.

Unfortunately the bug persists.

Pathduck

@Strangiato That doesn't make any sense, that file is where the search engines are defined.

I guess you have to delete your profile.
Just back up your important data like bookmarks and passwords, then delete it.

Strangiato

The new profile, with sync activated, fixes the bug.
I use two computers, two operating system are installed on each, I use Vivaldi on all these operating systems, only this Arch install was buggy.
And what a bizarre bug.

Thank you all for the help.

Pathduck

@Strangiato Good

Did you ever install the DuckDuckGo extension? I know there are cases where this extension messed up search engines.

Anyway now you know how to recover from such strange errors, hopefully it will be rare

Strangiato

I have never installed the DuckDuckGo extension