March 1, 2005
Opera Customised Search.ini - Tutorial
I've uploaded a copy of my customised search.ini for all to use. It will give you more searches via the drop down search box, and you can add more searches to the address bar. Furthermore, if you enable your personal bar (right click on the address bar - customise), you can put a whole bunch of searches there.
In the interests of full disclosure, the search box of Google sends you to my customised Google search page, so that I recieve the advertising from the paid links in your searches - normally Opera would be the one recieving them (no longer true, but it now defaults to Yahoo Search). Similarly for Amazon.com and .co.uk searches. I personally don't use Google any more, since Yahoo seems to have more accurate results. Also, you won't be able to set the number of searches per page through the Opera preferences.
Instructions:
Just download this (Updated for Opera 8.01). UnRar to your Opera Profile Folder (*not* the root Opera folder that has opera.exe in it) the exact location of which is explained here, or you can also refer to this. This will ask you to overwrite the existing search.ini - say yes. If you have problems, the default search.ini can be copied over from the root Opera folder.
Start Opera.
Simple huh?
Suggestions/Shortcuts:
If you updated Opera to either 8.0 or 8.01, they might have overwritten your old customised search.ini - but it'll have been backed up to something like search.001 or something in your profile folder - if that happens just close Opera, delete the current (new) search.ini and rename the old one, editing the new search.ini to change the version number to the current version - currently 6, as of 8.01. Or just download the file again from above.
If you want to know how to enable the personal bar look here. If you want more screen real-estate as a result, you can turn off the menu bar by pressing ctrl-F11 (this might change in Opera 8). And so it has, you now have to customise your keyboard shortcuts in advanced settings - use the Unix shortcut of Alt-F11, if you ask I might bother to post a download you can put in your profile folder.
To add more searches to the personal bar, right click on it and hover over "show searches". To move the search boxes around, press and hold the "shift" key while dragging and dropping. That's also the easiest way to move search boxes to the address bar to complement the drop down box. The other way is to right click and customise - the searches are under "buttons" category "search".
Press shift-F8 to highlight the drop down search box, shift-F7 to go to the first personal bar search.
Your right click menu is also enhanced so now when you right click after highlighting a word or phrase, your "dictionary" will be dictionary.com and "encyclopedia" will be wikipedia. All the available searches are also available under "search with". The default "search" will send you to Google, or the last thing you "searched with".
If you want to find out the various keywords to search in the address bar with, go to Preferences (Alt-P) - "search". There are examples in the preference menu to explain further.
When pasting something from your clipboard into a search/address field, you don't have to press ctrl-v and then enter, just press ctrl-d.
List of Searches:
Google, Yahoo, IMDB, Dictionary.com (ad-blocker advised), Wikipedia, TVTome, Isohunt, Shareprovider, Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, Google News, Neoseeker, Urban dictionary.com, Chicago Reader Short Reviews, Allmusic.com for Artist/Song/Album, Pricegrabber, Pricewatch, Ebay, Cracks.am, Astalavista, Yahoo Bizfinder in Singapore. (there, have been changes, have a look at the trackbacks)
Further Reference:
All this was done with the Opera Search.ini Editor.
To move between different browsers, try Optool.
Also feel free to download the companion Customised default bookmarks, and Customised Toolbar Setup. Or all of these together as one file, together with the Opera Not So Compact skin, to unRar into the profile folder. These are also for me to customise peoples' setups when I install Opera for them. (This is too old now, you'll probably just want to get the search.ini provided above)
Note: if you want to keep up to date with this, you can comment, and then check the box to subscribe to changes to this post. I'll be tidying up the search.ini as I find the effort. It is now tidy - most hotclicked items are near the top etc.
Posted by subtitles at 10:07 PM | TrackBack
Proxomitron Made Simple/Idiot-Proof - Advanced Ad-Blocking
I'm uploading a copy of Proxomitron for you to download - it's my own setup, based on JD's filters. But what that means for you is that it'll cut out ads - so aggressively your head will spin.
Just download, unRar, preferably into Program Files or something. Then run Proxomitron.exe when you want it to be on - remember to set up your proxy settings in your browser to point to "localhost", port 8080.
In Opera this means Alt-P, Network, Proxy Servers, under "http", add those values. It also works with FF and IE.
If you need more details, the help/installation files are included as a directory of html files. If you want proxo to startup with windows, just create a shortcut to it in your "startup" folder in your start menu.
I'm doing this, at least in part, because proxo can be difficult to set up properly and tweak till it's useful - this way you just unpack it and you're ready to go. The best thing about these filters is that the pages still end up looking nice and nicely formatted, and you'll start to realise how much ads can mess up site layouts. I had problems with a couple of sites, but I just added them to my blocklist and they work fine.
Again full disclosure prompts me to say that I've added my own domain to the blocklist, which means ads will show on my site. I put a lot of effort into making my ads fit the look and feel of the site, so I set it up so that I can monitor them when I browse myself. If you want to delete the entry, the file is in the directory called "Lists", "Bypass Lists.txt". The entry is [^/]++.fallingbeam.org/ - just delete it.
I'll probably make this post definitive. Hopefully it'll be part of my series on advanced Opera techniques. There are a bunch of files in the directory that don't actually need to be there, but I can't be bothered to figure out which those are, so there.
Posted by subtitles at 12:34 AM
August 16, 2003
Day 1
So you've decided to try using Opera. Clever you.
There are nice easy instructions to be found on how to download and install Opera here.
The default settings are more than adequate for your installation so just go ahead and follow the above instructions.
Once Opera starts up, just carry on having a look around you, most things are self explanatory and encountering things for the first time, you should read the dialogs and understand what they're telling you.
Don't worry though, everything can be put back if you change it, nothing you can do is irrevocable. When you know more about what you're doing, you'll be better able to decide how/whether you want these things to help you.
The best advice I can give is to just start browsing around - if you're adventurous, you can use the provided bookmarks to find out new things; and there are convenient bookmarks to a bunch of sites including many to Opera resources for you to explore at your own leisure. Otherwise just visit your favorite sites and see how perfectly Opera handles them.
Essential Tips:
If you don't like the bookmarks being on your left like that, you can turn that off by pressing F4. Pressing F4 again will bring it back.
Pressing F12 gives you options that you might want to change more often. Just to start off, you might want to use the option that says "Open requested pop-up windows only", which will block unwanted pop-ups (one of the best reasons for using Opera). Most pop-ups you'll want will still come up - but if you're having problems, going back to "Accept pop-up windows" might help (highly unlikely)
That's already alot for most people on the first day, so just keep browsing around and appreciate how nicely Opera does things. If you're ready to move on, you can carry on to Day 2.
Posted by subtitles at 3:33 PM
Mom-Proof Opera Guide
I've decided that I must start on my Switcher's guide to Opera/Gentle Day to day tips for Opera Migration. I'm aware of but have not read a similar guide called 30 Days to becoming an Opera-Lover, and I suppose this is quite similar, thought that was specific to Opera 6.
This is meant to be a very gradual guide that gives suggestions and helpful info that anyone can follow - I'm writing this with my Mom in mind - if she can do it, all of you people should be able to.
This was meant to be the Day 0 post, just to get some things out of the way, a kind of preamble if you will. Most of this will probably end up with proper formating on my Opera Fanboy Site.
Posted by subtitles at 3:05 PM