Ruling the Galaxy with Custom Chrome Search Engines

If you love Chrome, shortcuts, and speed as much as the C.A. does, then you'll surely have had your own run in with Chrome's custom search engines.

Yes, blog fans, it's time for another post about your host's favorite browser.

The latest episode is that for the longest time, I couldn't find out why in the world some of my search engines in Chrome just weren't cutting the mustard.

However, after much (and believe me, when I say "much," I mean a lot of) snooping and searching of my own feelings, I stumbled upon the simple answer: I wasn't adding a required "s" to some engine URLs!

So if you've been searching the Web asking, "Why won't my Chrome search engines work?!" You may want to try adding an s to your %.

What?

Time for a little Web lesson courtesy of the C.A.

When you go to www.google.com to perform a search for "Cougar Abogado" your search will actually look like this: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=active&q=cougar+abogado&btnG=Search&aq=f&oq=&aqi=. Amazing, isn't it?

Another example is that to search for a translation on SpanishDict.com, the query syntax goes as follows: http://www.spanishdict.com/translate/

Seeing as this is the code to tell SpanishDict to make a search, to search for the word "food," as seen in the image to the left, I would have entered http://www.spanishdict.com/translate/food into the search bar.

Now, since I can add SpanishDict as a custom search engine, I just add the same URL . . ./translate/ but this time I add "%s" to the end to tell Spanish Dict to replace the "%s" with whatever I enter as my search term(s).

(Mind you, I'm alluding to when I right click the address bar in Chrome and select "Edit Search Engines," then "Add," and finally I paste the search URL right into the text box that says "URL:" Make sense?)

Thus, if I were to type in playlist.com and then the Tab key in Chrome, it will turn into this, "Search Playlist:" I simply add my search term and voila! I have my search results, straight from the address bar.

Yes, together with Google, Chrome, and a little %s, we can rule the galaxy as search engine and Web users. (Search your feelings, you know it to be true!)