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I've paid and used Kagi for about six months. I used DDG for a while, but I found myself putting !g after every query (especially when looking for answers relat

I've paid and used Kagi for about six months. I used DDG for a while, but I found myself putting !g after every query (especially when looking for answers relating to programming). With Kagi I very, very rarely need to use Google. It has some nice features, like lenses, URL rewriting, and the ability to bump sites to the top. I have a lens for programming. It shows only certain sites, like GitHub and Stack Exchange, and I enable it when appropriate. For URL rewriting, I have Kagi set to rewrite URLs from Twitter and Reddit to my own self-hosted instances of Nitter [0] and Teddit [1], so that when I open a Kagi result that would've gone to twitter.com, it goes to nitter.mydomain.com, which lets me use Twitter without an account. Lastly, I use the site bumping feature to move Wikipedia results to the top. [0]: https://github.com/zedeus/nitter https://github.com/zedeus/nitter [1]: https://github.com/teddit-net/teddit https://github.com/teddit-net/teddit

raybb 4y ago
Kagi is great for letting you customize your own bangs (!g, etc). One thing I'd like to do, that's pretty specific, is having a site with my own bangs that do specific things like for example: open the url in archive.is and archive.org or open OpenLibrary.org and GoodReads. Similar nice functionality might include stripping of spaces for certain queries. Does anyone know of a tool like this? Otherwise, it would probably be simple enough to build my own and have a kagi bang that directs to it as needed.
- g_p 4y ago
  The team behind kagi are also building a browser (Orion). One of the new features that's been teased could likely be put to use doing something like this... Think natural language input to a browser.
  - shepherdjerred 4y ago
    I tried out Orion, but I wasn't really impressed by it.
  - sebazzz 4y ago
    I'm not convinced of the added value of another Chromium clone. I'd rather use Firefox, given its privacy features.
    - g_p 4y ago
      Interestingly, it's not actually a Chromium clone - it's webkit based, but with WebExtension APIs added to give compatibility with (a growing range of) Firefox & Chrome web extensions. I am a Firefox user too, but Orion feels to hit an interesting spot on mobile in terms of the benefits of Safari's power optimisations (via using webkit), with extensions and similar.
- dkha984hkjfdo 4y ago
  with firefox bookmarks, you can use tags for something similar to your own bangs. For instance, I have `https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query= https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=` bookmarked and tagged as `yt`, so I can just type `yt` and then tab, and I'll be able to put in my search query like that.
- cpleppert 4y ago
  You can easily do all that with alfred on mac. For example, I have a keyboard shortcut to open the current url in archive.is and the wayback archive for instance. Just a simple applescript to get the current url from chrome and then open up the two websites. Easier to manage than writing a browser extension or some kind of bookmarklet. I have lots of custom searches accessed by a keyword, usually two letters, and I can modify the query string any way I want or take some other action with it. My 'lucky' searches use DDG to go straight to the top result on the site(wikipedia, mdn etc) but they also stuff the query into the system wide find pasteboard. If the top result isn't right I can immediately jump to a google search of the site with the search query with a keyboard shortcut.
  - raybb 4y ago
    Using AppleScript to get the current URL from Chrome is very clever. I don't use Chrome but I'm going to look into how one might do this for Firefox. Thanks for the pointer. I used Alfred for a while and then didn't use any similar tool and now have been using raycast for about a year and quite enjoy it. They have a built-in quick links feature that lets you paste whatever to open a search but accessing the current URL could improve it so much!
- monort 4y ago
  Here is a bookmarklet to open current page in archive.is: javascript:location.href = "https://archive.vn/ https://archive.vn/" + location.href
- quinncom 4y ago
  Just so you know, Kagi does offer direct links to a result in archive.org; it’s under the menu (screenshot: https://send.strangecode.com/f/screenshot-2022-12-30-at-18-2 https://send.strangecode.com/f/screenshot-2022-12-30-at-18-2... ). It would be fantastic if they let us add custom “Open in…” options; I’ll add that as a feature request! Edit: feature request added at https://kagifeedback.org/d/1178-allow-custom-open-in-options-under-the-in-addition-to-archiveorg https://kagifeedback.org/d/1178-allow-custom-open-in-options...
dopu 4y ago
I haven't switched due to finding the $10/month subscription too steep at the moment, but I concur that the quality of search results is high. Often higher than Google actually. Sadly, pre-pending !g to general searches on DDG is practically muscle memory by now.
- torstenvl 4y ago
  Why not just use DDG !g search as your default search? E.g., in Firefox, bookmark https://duckduckgo.com/?q=!%s https://duckduckgo.com/?q=!%s and save it with the keyword gg (or whatever) Now whenever you enter gg searchterm in your location bar, it's the same as searching !g searchterm on DDG.
  - uranusjr 4y ago
    If I understand correctly DDG !g simply redirects you to Google so this is effectively the same as using Google plus a superfluous redirect.
- gandalfgreybeer 4y ago
  Been using it since the beta and would agree about the search quality. $10 is also to steep for cost of living in my area. Hopefully something like region-dependent pricing comes in the future (although I feel like that's going to be tough with managing expenses so I understand if that's not going to happen). I do hope this succeeds though.
dmonitor 4y ago
Twitter dropped the requirement to have an account to view tweets and scroll through profiles at some point in the last couple months
- aendruk 4y ago
  And then more recently it came back without explanation.

raybb 4y ago

Kagi is great for letting you customize your own bangs (!g, etc). One thing I'd like to do, that's pretty specific, is having a site with my own bangs that do specific things like for example: open the url in archive.is and archive.org or open OpenLibrary.org and GoodReads. Similar nice functionality might include stripping of spaces for certain queries. Does anyone know of a tool like this? Otherwise, it would probably be simple enough to build my own and have a kagi bang that directs to it as needed.

g_p 4y ago
The team behind kagi are also building a browser (Orion). One of the new features that's been teased could likely be put to use doing something like this... Think natural language input to a browser.
- shepherdjerred 4y ago
  I tried out Orion, but I wasn't really impressed by it.
- sebazzz 4y ago
  I'm not convinced of the added value of another Chromium clone. I'd rather use Firefox, given its privacy features.
  - g_p 4y ago
    Interestingly, it's not actually a Chromium clone - it's webkit based, but with WebExtension APIs added to give compatibility with (a growing range of) Firefox & Chrome web extensions. I am a Firefox user too, but Orion feels to hit an interesting spot on mobile in terms of the benefits of Safari's power optimisations (via using webkit), with extensions and similar.
dkha984hkjfdo 4y ago
with firefox bookmarks, you can use tags for something similar to your own bangs. For instance, I have `https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query= https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=` bookmarked and tagged as `yt`, so I can just type `yt` and then tab, and I'll be able to put in my search query like that.
cpleppert 4y ago
You can easily do all that with alfred on mac. For example, I have a keyboard shortcut to open the current url in archive.is and the wayback archive for instance. Just a simple applescript to get the current url from chrome and then open up the two websites. Easier to manage than writing a browser extension or some kind of bookmarklet. I have lots of custom searches accessed by a keyword, usually two letters, and I can modify the query string any way I want or take some other action with it. My 'lucky' searches use DDG to go straight to the top result on the site(wikipedia, mdn etc) but they also stuff the query into the system wide find pasteboard. If the top result isn't right I can immediately jump to a google search of the site with the search query with a keyboard shortcut.
- raybb 4y ago
  Using AppleScript to get the current URL from Chrome is very clever. I don't use Chrome but I'm going to look into how one might do this for Firefox. Thanks for the pointer. I used Alfred for a while and then didn't use any similar tool and now have been using raycast for about a year and quite enjoy it. They have a built-in quick links feature that lets you paste whatever to open a search but accessing the current URL could improve it so much!
monort 4y ago
Here is a bookmarklet to open current page in archive.is: javascript:location.href = "https://archive.vn/ https://archive.vn/" + location.href
quinncom 4y ago
Just so you know, Kagi does offer direct links to a result in archive.org; it’s under the menu (screenshot: https://send.strangecode.com/f/screenshot-2022-12-30-at-18-2 https://send.strangecode.com/f/screenshot-2022-12-30-at-18-2... ). It would be fantastic if they let us add custom “Open in…” options; I’ll add that as a feature request! Edit: feature request added at https://kagifeedback.org/d/1178-allow-custom-open-in-options-under-the-in-addition-to-archiveorg https://kagifeedback.org/d/1178-allow-custom-open-in-options...

dopu 4y ago

I haven't switched due to finding the $10/month subscription too steep at the moment, but I concur that the quality of search results is high. Often higher than Google actually. Sadly, pre-pending !g to general searches on DDG is practically muscle memory by now.

torstenvl 4y ago
Why not just use DDG !g search as your default search? E.g., in Firefox, bookmark https://duckduckgo.com/?q=!%s https://duckduckgo.com/?q=!%s and save it with the keyword gg (or whatever) Now whenever you enter gg searchterm in your location bar, it's the same as searching !g searchterm on DDG.
- uranusjr 4y ago
  If I understand correctly DDG !g simply redirects you to Google so this is effectively the same as using Google plus a superfluous redirect.
gandalfgreybeer 4y ago
Been using it since the beta and would agree about the search quality. $10 is also to steep for cost of living in my area. Hopefully something like region-dependent pricing comes in the future (although I feel like that's going to be tough with managing expenses so I understand if that's not going to happen). I do hope this succeeds though.

dmonitor 4y ago

Twitter dropped the requirement to have an account to view tweets and scroll through profiles at some point in the last couple months

aendruk 4y ago
And then more recently it came back without explanation.