ExpressionEngine

Search devot:ee From Your Desktop

August 31, 2010
by Jacob Russell

We’ve recently re-worked our search to include the search string in the URI. Aside from letting you cut and paste searches, it also allows you to search our add-on library from your desktop. Here’s how to do it with a number of common launch apps!

On Mac

Quicksilver

Getting custom web searches working in Quicksilver is a little bit touchy, but works great once you’ve set it up.

  1. Update to the latest version of Quicksilver, which can be found here on GitHub.
  2. Open the Quicksilver preference window, click ‘Plug-ins’ and verify that the ‘Web Search Module’ is installed.  If not, you can find it under All Plug-ins (you may need to refresh).
  3. Click ‘Triggers’ and then add a new HotKey by clicking the plus at the bottom of the pane.
  4. Paste “http://devot-ee.com/search/results/search&keywords=***&channel=addons/” (without quotes) into the top input entitied ‘Select an Item’.
  5. Hit tab to move to the next input, entitled ‘Action’; if ‘Search for…’ is not the selected option, arrow down until it is.
  6. Click on the last input, ‘Target’, and hit command + x until it’s empty, you may have to do this several times and delete won’t work.
  7. Click save.
  8. Double click in the ‘Trigger’ column and select a keystroke trigger for the search.

To use the search simply hit the keystroke you set, type your search, and hit enter.  I had a bit of trouble getting this set up myself, although I wasn’t able to pin down a specific issue, but these instructions should get you there.

Alfred

This search is easy to setup and use in Alfred.

  1. Open the Alfred Preference window, click ‘Features’ and then ‘Custom Searches’.
  2. Click the plus button.
  3. Paste “http://devot-ee.com/search/results/search&keywords={query}&channel=addons/” (without quotes) into the ‘Search URL’ field.
  4. Type “Search devot:ee” or something similar into the ‘Display Text’ field.
  5. Enter your keyword of choice into the ‘Keyword’ field, I chose “dvt”.

To use the search launch Alfred and enter your keyword of choice followed by your search term and hit enter.

LaunchBar

LaunchBar’s searches are the easiest to setup, but the slowest to use (although not by much).

  1. Open LaunchBar, click the gear icon, and go to ‘Index’ - ‘Show Index’.
  2. Scroll down until you find ‘Search Templates (UTF-8)’ and click it.
  3. Click ‘Add…’ at the bottom of the pane and type in “devot:ee”.
  4. Paste “http://devot-ee.com/search/results/search&keywords=*&channel=addons/” into the ‘Details’ field.

To use the search launch LaunchBar, start typing ‘devot:ee’, hit space and then type your search.

On Windows

Launchy

Launchy is a slick app launcher for Windows, although to be honest I don’t know any real competition for it, and it works great with the search.

  1. Open Launchy Options and click the ‘Plugins’ tab.
  2. Make sure Weby is installed and click it to bring up its options, then click the plus button at the bottom of the window.
  3. Enter “devot:ee” as the name and “http://devot-ee.com/search/results/search&keywords=%1&channel=addons/” (without quotes) in the URL field.

To use the search launch Launchy, start typing ‘devot:ee’, hit tab and type your search.

 

11 Comments:

Moonbeetle 09.02.10

Moonbeetle

You can also add Devot:ee as a search engine for Safari using Glims.

  1. Install Glim
  2. Safari > Preferences > Glims > Search Engines List
  3. Add > Fill in Name, Query URL and keyword fields

Name would be “Devot:ee”. In order to take advantage of the keyword feature, use something without : in the name. For example “ee” (without quotes)

Query URL example 1 – search Devot:ee for EE1 and EE2 add-ons

http://devot-ee.com/search/results/search&channel=addons&keywords;=#query#

Query URL example 2 – search Devot:ee specificallt for EE2 add-ons

http://devot-ee.com/search/results/search&channel=addons&addon_version_support=EE2&keywords;=#query#

luvd 09.02.10

luvd

To add devot:ee search to IE (tested with IE8, Windows), follow the steps from this page: http://www.ieaddons.com/bd/createsearch.aspx

Use as URL: http://devot-ee.com/search/results/search&keywords=TEST&channel=addons/  (note: %1 has been replaced with TEST).

Kevin Shoesmith 09.09.10

Kevin Shoesmith

Another easy Devot-ee search option for Firefox 3 users is to add Devot-ee search directly to your browser’s search bar.

Do this:

1. Install the Add to Search Bar extension from Mozilla.

2. Restart Firefox.

3. Go to the Devot-ee.com homepage and right-click in Devot-ee’s native search box.

4. Select “Add to Search Bar…”

You’re done. Now you can search Devot-ee from your browser’s search bar the same way you can search Google, Amazon, or Wikipedia.

Craig Allen 09.14.10

Craig Allen

Kevin, that is the best tip ever!

Ian Pitts 09.21.10

Ian Pitts

I was using this as well on my Mac in Butler but recently switched to doing the same thing but searching google for “site:devot-ee.com {keyword}.

Ryan Masuga 09.21.10

Ryan Masuga

Thanks for the great search tips, everyone.

Ian also recently created a bookmarklet for searching devot:ee.

CheifWiggam 09.29.10

CheifWiggam

The question more importantly is: how did you do it ?

Jacob Russell 09.29.10

Jacob Russell

How did who do what?

Tyssen 10.07.10

Tyssen

I’m having trouble with the Quicksilver method. I can set it up fine and it works after I set it up, but after restarting my Mac, all the fields get wiped, just leaving a trigger that doesn’t do anything.

lebisol 11.05.10

lebisol

How did who do what?

– how did you make the search? is this solspace ‘supersearch’ or did you just use query module and segments?

Thanks!

Jacob Russell 11.05.10

Jacob Russell

devot:ee’s search is built using supersearch

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