Firefox Add-on ContextSearch

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Firefox extension ContextSearch provides customizable select-rightClick searches.

The user selects a piece of text on a page, right clicks, and chooses the search engine they want to use. The very basic functionality is available in many browsers at least for the default search engine, but ContextSearch allows you to add additional search engines, and also to use this for sites that aren't search engines at all but encode actions in their URL

Search use cases

General

• go straight to google maps for an address search
  • search string https://maps.google.com/?q=

• go straight to google translate to see the translation of the selected foreign word
  • search string https://translate.google.com/?sl=da#auto/en/

• go straight to wikipedia for a search that would otherwise be polluted with sales spam
  • search string https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=

• search for the word on your own mediawiki
  • search string https://your.wiki's.URL/index.php?search=

• find out more about a book on goodreads:
  • earch string https://www.goodreads.com/search?q=

Specific to Winnipeg - but similar would apply elsewhere

• add your local library catalog to see if a book is available for loan, rather than being launched to amazon with a generic search
  • search string for eBooks https://winnipeg.overdrive.com/search?query=
  • search string for paper catalogue https://winca.ent.sirsidynix.net/client/en_US/default/search/results?q=

• Winnipeg reddit - often they will have local news and info before "the news" do
  • search string https://www.reddit.com/r/Winnipeg/search/?restrict_sr=1&sr_nsfw=&q=

Stretch use cases

Right-click edits on mediawiki

ContextSearch can do some other things in cases where the URL encodes actions, and the actions don't need to be in a specific order. For example, usually mediawiki opens a page in edit mode by appending action=edit to the end of the URL, like https://wiki.squirrelslair.ca/index.php?title=Internal:Firefox_Add-on_ContextSearch&action=edit but it will treat it the same if the URL has the action=edit before the title, e.g. https://wiki.squirrelslair.ca/index.php?action=edit&title=Internal:Firefox_Add-on_ContextSearch This means you can use the following search string to select-rightClick open a page in mediawiki using the following "search" string:

• for regular edit: https://your.wiki's.URL/index.php?action=edit&
• for PageForms edit: https://your.wiki's.URL/index.php?action=formedit&

Of course if you do this for a selected text that doesn't have a page on the mediawiki yet, it will try to create a new page for you.