Just like most of those in the know, Firefox 2 and Internet Explorer 7 are both now installed on my computer.
A great new feature in IE7 is the built-in search box, unsettingly similar to the familiar box Firefox has had for some time. One of the favourites sites on my blogroll, Lifehacker, blogged about creating a custom search plugin using Google’s site search feature a few weeks ago. I didn’t think much of it at the time, because I prefer using Lifehacker’s native search rather than Google.
If you’ve added any extra search plugins to IE7, you may have noticed the feature they provide for creating your own search plugin from any site with a search feature. I experimented with Lifehacker and some other sites, and it seemed like a pretty cool feature. So I went looking for how I could do the same thing in Firefox 2. I discovered that FF2 and IE7 both support the OpenSearch description format for search plugins. Web standards are great when the two most popular browsers choose to support them!
Get the Lifehacker search plugin
There is a new repository of OpenSearch browser plugins building up at searchplugins.net.
I have added a Lifehacker search plugin to the database. Visit this page in either FF2 or IE7 and click on the I to the left of the first Lifehacker entry. To make sure it’s the right one, hover your mouse over the S link and check that there is an 862 in the link in the status bar – only this plugin will correctly install the LH icon with your plugin.
While you’re there click on the R next to the second Lifehacker entry (number 515 on S link).
If you want to know how I created the plugin, and how you can create a plugin for any search engine you like, then keep reading …
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