Speed Search with Simple IE Hack

Find word or slang definitions, weather for any ZIPcode, googling at warp speed, pictures, bargains, freeware or what have you with this easy Address bar hack.

So, you're working away with half a dozen browser windows open and the curiosity bug bites you. Just how many episodes did Raymond Burr play Perry Mason? Now you know you can go to www.imdb.com, wait for the page to load and type in Perry Mason or Raymond Burr in the website searchbar as soon as you spot it. There is a quicker way.

Using the free TweakUIXP, currently available at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/powertoys/xppowertoys.mspx or one of the other GUI registry editors,like X-Setup, under Internet Explorer, Search, add the following italicized aliases for instant fun in your Address bar. Typing the alias in the Address bar followed by a space and your search query word or phrase and hitting the Enter key will take you to the appropriate website and present you with your results without waiting for the site's homepage to load. So, you could just type "imdb raymond burr" in the Address bar and get right to it. Scrolling down we find that Raymond was in 271 episodes of the original series from 1957-1966. Whew! That was vital, curiosity bug swatted.

You can add your own aliases via TweakUIXP for any website with a Search box! Highlight and copy the search string from the address bar for any search you've made on that website. Replace your search word or phrase with %s and give it an easy to remember alias.

For example: At www.snapfiles.com, use their search box to search for "DVD Burn" The address bar changes to:
http://www.snapfiles.com/downloadfind.php?action=s&st=DVD+Burn

Highlight the contents of the address bar and Copy the string to the clipboard. In TweakUIXP, under Internet Explorer, Search, select the Create radio button and type in "snap" (no quotes). Paste the website's search string into the URL box, and replace DVD+Burn with %s, thus:

http://www.snapfiles.com/downloadfind.php?action=s&st=%s

Hit OK to exit from TweakUIXP.

Now, from any visible Address bar, (I keep one as part of my double line taskbar at the bottom of the screen, an advantage of 24 inch CRT goodness), you can type "snap media player" for instance, without quotes, and get the results you're looking for instantly.

Do you find yourself visiting websites with long URL names? Of course, you can mouse your way through the Favorites menu or organize these frequently visited sites in the Links toolbar (see previous article [plug mode on!] at: http://myotherhead.blogspot.com/2006/07/missing-linksfree-custom-start-menu.html). Why not alias 'em? There is one additional trick to make this work though. IE wants to be helpful and will use the alias as a search string or just try adding http:// to it. When you type the alias, you must add a space and any character at all. My own blog at http://myotherhead.blogspot.com/ is aliased to "head". I just type "head x" to go there quickly. To search on the blog "findhead" is aliased to:

http://myotherhead.blogspot.com/search?q=%s.

BONUS TIPS:Don't forget, type in the meat of a URL or website address, like "cnn" and hit Crtl-Enter to add the http://www/. and .com. Also, holding the Shift key when clicking on a web link will open the link in a new window, except when the link is javascript. (That will open a new window on its own, just check the status bar at the bottom of the browser window to see if the actual URL says java anything.)

My Favorite URL aliases:

pix or image find images on the web
http://images.google.com/images?q=%s
amazon search amazon
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/ref=br_ss_hs/002-6940686-1537663?field-keywords=%s&platform=gurupa&url=index%3Dblended
ask ask.com search engine
http://www.ask.com/web?q=%s&qsrc=0&o=0&l=dir
def define words
http://www.google.com/search?q=define:%s
froogle find bargains on the web
http://froogle.google.com/froogle?q=%s&btnG=Search+Froogle
g google anything
http://www.google.com/search?q=%s
imdb search Internet Movie Database for popstars or movie titles, etc.
http://www.imdb.com/find?s=all&q=%s
ms microsoft MSN search
http://search.microsoft.com/search/results.aspx?View=en-us&qu=%s
mskb Microsoft Knowlege Base
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=%s
random Random Wikipedia article
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Randompage
slang Definition of any slang words
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=%s
tor Find available bittorrent file downloads
http://www.fulltorrent.net/search.php?q=%s
wiki Find wikipedia article on specific subject
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=%s&fulltext=Search
weather Weather report for any ZIP code (must follow alias with ZIP code!)
http://weather.gov/%s