Everything is the same as before except for the <os:Url> tag (I also changed the name since I still had both searches present).

<SearchPlugin xmlns="http://www.mozilla.org/2006/browser/search/" xmlns:os="http://a9.com/-/spec/opensearch/1.1/">
<os:ShortName>Ubuntu Forums Yahoo! Search</os:ShortName>
<os:InputEncoding>UTF-8</os:InputEncoding>
<os:Image width="16" height="16">data:image/x-icon;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAABAAAAAQCAYAAAAf8/9hAAAABmJLR0QA/wD
/AP+gvaeTAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAB3RJTUUH1gUYBy8UWHdfBwAAAcJJREFUOMuVk09IVFEUxn
/nNb7pkbV7r4jQQHKTbQya2rSxJJmoRbYLEqZl0MJolataFkW4k0ebmDaVCD4EEQdsEW+aTRuxdKGDCDMuhJjxNWN5WnjHzHkqntW958
/lu993PjhEhHjDId5iiHerkZO9mjXjtADdwGVgY+lLcqo0a3835ekU5R6ARNNg7uxRqmsOo
/UscKORb79Se1SatceBa0A2FoEqwoQ7jeocn6ojwFfAMuUa8LRWkYVkqy6LHxWaHwjcAeAt8AfdvMDoegewCnjAfeCOaS0C58WPKvIPutvKOvPAKYQVNqRbbpdLu3gZAR6Y65D40XNLM067ZpxBwnonEJm
/PN49bOIZUDfn3gaJH4GLzNe/0dXyBpFXbOpMnDLiR0XNOPeADuBXrAoHRd4/vuMWkTDE9HPOziHyAQBLrgLvYxapDXgH2MBn4LUlfrQkfvSSlP0DcLawygsd807GABgywwCTB8qYv3lkXxlTlCt7LlI
+bcUuUuKELvz+KcspyoUmEkVQzR3ro7rmQDK7YxjgyaVAr29JqQ9JU9jXTCHef2Y6M6BTp++ybSZJr/YcVkE0cIc1cBc1cLft/BckXKkAO9v5fAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==</os:Image>
<os:Url type="text/html" method="GET"
template="http://search.yahoo.com/search?n=10&amp;ei=UTF-8&amp;va_vt=any&amp;vo_vt=any&amp;ve_vt=any&amp;vp_vt=any&amp;vd=all&amp;vst=0&amp;vf=all&amp;vm=p&amp;fl=0&amp;fr=yfp-t-893-s&amp;p={searchTerms}&amp;vs=ubuntuforums.org">
</os:Url>
</SearchPlugin>

There isn’t much to it, but I’ll go ahead and give a quick run through of the tags and then all you need to do ti make your own is just plug in your own values to make your own.

The <SearchPlugin> and </SearchPlugin> begin and end the code block which contains the search engine information. The xmlns=”http://www.mozilla.org/2006/browser/search/” xmlns:os=”http://a9.com/-/spec/opensearch/1.1/” part in the opening tag is the namespace to tell Firefox what we’re doing.

<os:ShortName> and </os:ShortName> enclose the name which will appear in the searchbar menu.

<os:Image> and </os:Image> enclose the icon which appears beside the searchbar input, I have used the Ubuntu icon for this example.

<os:Url type=”text/html” method=”GET” template=””Search engine search string‘{searchTerms}&amp;’site search string’='url of site to search’“>
</os:Url> The os:Url tag is what tells firefox what search engine to use, how to use is and what site to search for a site search.

‘template’ is the search Url  with {searchTerms} in a place of the search string.This is where Firefox will insert the string entered into the searchbar.

This is the searchbar:

and the results:

Take a look at https://developer.mozilla.org/en/Creating_OpenSearch_plugins_for_Firefox for more information.

tsharitt@tsharitt-desktop:~$ vrms
Non-free packages installed on tsharitt-desktop

fglrx-modaliases          Identifiers supported by the ATI graphics driver
linux-generic             Complete Generic Linux kernel
linux-restricted-modules- Non-free Linux 2.6.28 modules helper script
linux-restricted-modules- Restricted Linux modules for generic kernels
nvidia-173-modaliases     Modaliases for the NVIDIA binary X.Org driver
nvidia-180-kernel-source  NVIDIA binary kernel module source
nvidia-180-libvdpau       Video Decode and Presentation API for Unix
nvidia-180-modaliases     Modaliases for the NVIDIA binary X.Org driver
nvidia-71-modaliases      Modaliases for the NVIDIA binary X.Org driver
nvidia-96-modaliases      Modaliases for the NVIDIA binary X.Org driver
nvidia-glx-180            NVIDIA binary Xorg driver
tangerine-icon-theme      Tangerine Icon theme
unrar                     Unarchiver for .rar files (non-free version)
Reason: Modifications problematic

Contrib packages installed on tsharitt-desktop

flashplugin-installer     Adobe Flash Player plugin installer
flashplugin-nonfree       Adobe Flash Player plugin installer (transitional pack
gstreamer0.10-pitfdll     GStreamer plugin for using MS Windows binary codecs
nvidia-common             Find obsolete NVIDIA drivers
nvidia-settings           Tool of configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
ttf-mscorefonts-installer Installer for Microsoft TrueType core fonts

13 non-free packages, 1.0% of 1306 installed packages.
6 contrib packages, 0.5% of 1306 installed packages.

Firefox search bar with Google site search for ubuntuforums.org

This is really a simple process which simply involves creating an xml configuration file and placing it in the correct directory. So, to start off, just fire up your favorite text editor to get started.

The first line tells Firefox that we have a search plug in and where to find the specifications for the xml mark-up.

<SearchPlugin xmlns=”http://www.mozilla.org/2006/browser/search/” xmlns:os=”http://a9.com/-/spec/opensearch/1.1/”>

Next, we want to give it a name. This is the name that will show in the search box when nothing entered.

<os:ShortName>Ubuntu Forums</os:ShortName>

Now we need to tell it what encoding to use for the input.

<os:InputEncoding>UTF-8</os:InputEncoding>

The next step is to enter our search engine information. Where you see sitesearch=ubuntuforums.org, this can be replaced with any site you would like to search.

<os:Url type=”text/html” method=”GET” template=”http://www.google.com/search?q={searchTerms}&amp;sitesearch=ubuntuforums.org”>
</os:Url>

Now just add the final line to close out the search plug in code block.

</SearchPlugin>

The only thing left to do now is save the file in your ~/.mozilla/firefox/profile/searchplugins folder. I saved mine as ~/.mozilla/firefox/0k978qn5.default/searchplugins/ufsearch.xml

Now you should be able to search your favorite site with Google from the Firefox search bar. Enjoy!

Search plug-in in action

Note: You may have noticed that I have an Ubuntu icon next to the search box. While creating the icons are beyond the scope of this tutorial (and my knowledge), feel free to add the information (or a link) in the comments section. The code for the Ubuntu icon is :

<os:Image width="16" height="16">data:image/x-icon;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAABAAAAAQCAYAAAAf8/9hAAAABmJLR0QA/wD/
AP+gvaeTAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAB3RJTUUH1gUYBy8UWHdfBwAAAcJJREFUOMuVk09IVFEUxn/
nNb7pkbV7r4jQQHKTbQya2rSxJJmoRbYLEqZl0MJolataFkW4k0ebmDaVCD4EEQdsEW+aTRuxdKGDCDMuhJjxNWN5WnjHzHkqntW958/
lu993PjhEhHjDId5iiHerkZO9mjXjtADdwGVgY+lLcqo0a3835ekU5R6ARNNg7uxRqmsOo/UscKORb79Se1SatceBa0A2FoEqwoQ7jeocn6ojwFfAMuUa8
LRWkYVkqy6LHxWaHwjcAeAt8AfdvMDoegewCnjAfeCOaS0C58WPKvIPutvKOvPAKYQVNqRbbpdLu3gZAR6Y65D40XNLM067ZpxBwnonEJm/PN49bOIZUDfn
3gaJH4GLzNe/0dXyBpFXbOpMnDLiR0XNOPeADuBXrAoHRd4/vuMWkTDE9HPOziHyAQBLrgLvYxapDXgH2MBn4LUlfrQkfvSSlP0DcLawygsd807GABgyww
CTB8qYv3lkXxlTlCt7LlI+bcUuUuKELvz+KcspyoUmEkVQzR3ro7rmQDK7YxjgyaVAr29JqQ9JU9jXTCHef2Y6M6BTp++ybSZJr/YcVkE0cIc1cBc1cLft/
BckXKkAO9v5fAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==</os:Image>