3 ms·

Setting stuff up for that in any browser worth it's salt isn't too difficult, skipping the entire middleman of any search engine.

fooqux 3y ago
But it's already set up for you in DDG, so why not use it? Aside from the fact it's another HTTP request, but these days on the majority of computers and connections, that's a trivial thing. I'll add that !aw to search the Arch Wiki and !aur to search the AUR are my two most favorite commands.
- plugin-baby 3y ago
  > Aside from the fact it's another HTTP request You’d think DDG could avoid this via JavaScript if they wanted to. Might be better for privacy, if not for their usage stats.
- AdmiralAsshat 3y ago
  > But it's already set up for you in DDG, so why not use it? Because if I wanna search Reddit, I'd prefer to have '!r' search directly within Reddit and not litter my browser history with tons of duckduckgo entries like this: https://duckduckgo.com/l/?uddg=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dkobo&rut=a7f75aa6f1d891d12067590995ac4cec77267fe4a9cd1d2aa7ed0f3eb96d1da5 https://duckduckgo.com/l/?uddg=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%...
  - dingnuts 3y ago
    weird example considering just how bad Reddit's internal search is and always has been -- that's a site I've always preferred to search with an external search engine, be it Google, DDG, or Kagi lol doesn't hurt to have options! to each his own
    - AdmiralAsshat 3y ago
      Best example I could come up with on-the-spot, because I already swapped out Google, Amazon, and Wikipedia on my Firefox install for native search engines, and needed to quickly generate search results from a DDG bang so I could show the accompanying history page. :P
wharvle 3y ago
Years and years ago I'd configure this stuff in FF, but using DDG effectively auto-configures it for any browser, exactly the same, everywhere, all I have to do is set the default search engine. And it includes some that I do use but probably wouldn't have bothered to configure on my own.
- kevincox 3y ago
  Firefox Sync is end-to-end encrypted and will sync your keyword bookmarks across all of your devices. Sure, you have to set them up but it seems worth it to get the ones that work for me, not whatever duck duck go thinks is popular.
  - wharvle 3y ago
    I've never wanted one and not found it in DDG, or found it named differently from what I'd have named it. Every now and then I try to guess one blind, and I don't think I've ever had it surprise me. And it works in any browser.
    - kevincox 3y ago
      I guess you are the perfectly average human then. I am not so lucky. I have `s` to search sourcegraph.com, DDG has !sg. `t` to use Google Translate, DDG has !gt, `i` to search IMDB, DDG has !imd or !imdb, v to search animated images, DDG has !gif, `ni` to search nixpkgs issues which DDG doesn't have (although they do have one for the nix repo at !nr which is pretty impressive. I use `nc` for this). Not to mention personalized shortcuts like searching my company's GitHub organization or JIRA tickets that would never be a public bang, much less have a 2 character shortcut. I stopped there but it is clear to me that I benefit from making my own short aliases for the searches that I use most. Plus it is nice to not send my logs to a third party and get improved performance.

fooqux 3y ago

But it's already set up for you in DDG, so why not use it? Aside from the fact it's another HTTP request, but these days on the majority of computers and connections, that's a trivial thing. I'll add that !aw to search the Arch Wiki and !aur to search the AUR are my two most favorite commands.

plugin-baby 3y ago
> Aside from the fact it's another HTTP request You’d think DDG could avoid this via JavaScript if they wanted to. Might be better for privacy, if not for their usage stats.
AdmiralAsshat 3y ago
> But it's already set up for you in DDG, so why not use it? Because if I wanna search Reddit, I'd prefer to have '!r' search directly within Reddit and not litter my browser history with tons of duckduckgo entries like this: https://duckduckgo.com/l/?uddg=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dkobo&rut=a7f75aa6f1d891d12067590995ac4cec77267fe4a9cd1d2aa7ed0f3eb96d1da5 https://duckduckgo.com/l/?uddg=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.reddit.com%...
- dingnuts 3y ago
  weird example considering just how bad Reddit's internal search is and always has been -- that's a site I've always preferred to search with an external search engine, be it Google, DDG, or Kagi lol doesn't hurt to have options! to each his own
  - AdmiralAsshat 3y ago
    Best example I could come up with on-the-spot, because I already swapped out Google, Amazon, and Wikipedia on my Firefox install for native search engines, and needed to quickly generate search results from a DDG bang so I could show the accompanying history page. :P

wharvle 3y ago

Years and years ago I'd configure this stuff in FF, but using DDG effectively auto-configures it for any browser, exactly the same, everywhere, all I have to do is set the default search engine. And it includes some that I do use but probably wouldn't have bothered to configure on my own.

kevincox 3y ago
Firefox Sync is end-to-end encrypted and will sync your keyword bookmarks across all of your devices. Sure, you have to set them up but it seems worth it to get the ones that work for me, not whatever duck duck go thinks is popular.
- wharvle 3y ago
  I've never wanted one and not found it in DDG, or found it named differently from what I'd have named it. Every now and then I try to guess one blind, and I don't think I've ever had it surprise me. And it works in any browser.
  - kevincox 3y ago
    I guess you are the perfectly average human then. I am not so lucky. I have `s` to search sourcegraph.com, DDG has !sg. `t` to use Google Translate, DDG has !gt, `i` to search IMDB, DDG has !imd or !imdb, v to search animated images, DDG has !gif, `ni` to search nixpkgs issues which DDG doesn't have (although they do have one for the nix repo at !nr which is pretty impressive. I use `nc` for this). Not to mention personalized shortcuts like searching my company's GitHub organization or JIRA tickets that would never be a public bang, much less have a 2 character shortcut. I stopped there but it is clear to me that I benefit from making my own short aliases for the searches that I use most. Plus it is nice to not send my logs to a third party and get improved performance.