If you are like me and spend many hours per day interacting with the world-out-there-via-the-web, you surely have developed preferences in the way you like and expect these interactions to take place. One simple example of this is returned search results and more specifically domains that have high ranking and yet little use for one's circumstances.
Here is a simple way to remove these undesired domains from your search using Firefox and the Linux Mint Google search plugin which I have mentioned here before. Although this is quite specific, I know this can be easily adapted to various OS and search plugins.
- First, locate the Firefox directory "searchplugins". In our case, it could be found at /usr/share/firefox/searchplugins
- Edit the appropriate xml - google.xml, in this specific case - file with your favourite editor. Add the following line as a search parameter: <Param name="as_eq" value="site%3Aexample.com"/>.
- Save and enjoy!
Here's what my google.xml file looks like:
<SearchPlugin xmlns="http://www.mozilla.org/2006/browser/search/">
<ShortName>Google</ShortName>
<Description>Google Search</Description>
<InputEncoding>UTF-8</InputEncoding>
<Image width="16" height="16">[--- snip ---]</Image>
<Url type="application/x-suggestions+json" method="GET" template="http://suggestqueries.google.com/complete/search?output=firefox&client=firefox&qu={searchTerms}"/>
<Url type="text/html" method="GET" template="http://www.google.com/cse">
<Param name="cx" value="002683415331144861350%3Atsq8didf9x0"/>
<Param name="q" value="{searchTerms}"/>
<Param name="ie" value="utf-8"/>
<Param name="oe" value="utf-8"/>
<Param name="cof" value="FORID%3A1"/>
<Param name="sa" value="Search"/>
<Param name="as_eq" value="site%3Aexperts-exchange.com"/>
</Url>
<SearchForm>http://www.linuxmint.com/start</SearchForm>
</SearchPlugin>
