Google Prefetches Results in Firefox

By: Nick W [privmsg - website] On 31st Mar 2005 In
- Tools & Technology

Source Title:
Enhanced searching with Firefox

Source Url:
http://www.google.com/googleblog/2005/03/enhanced-searching-with-firefox.html

Story Text:
Apparently Google are now prefetching results when you type into the search box in Firefox - Sounds like a neat idea, but i wonder if it has any performance issues? They do tell you how to stop the prefetching though.
Wonder how long it will be before we see something Autolink like for Firefox, and in what form it will come in?

- Y! MyWeb

Now that is damn sensible coding by Google.

Good on the guys n gals at the plex IMHO

By JasonD at Mar 31 2005 - 09:56

only the top result

On some searches, Google automatically instructs your browser to start downloading the top search result before you click on it. If you click on top result, the destination page will load faster than before.

Actually i don't think i click on number one that often. It seems to me that number one is not the typical result that i'm interested in, but perhaps that's just me.

I haven't really tracked this but i've disabled the "i'm feeling lucky" thing in Firefox as i never use that function for regular search. I also have 100 results displayed by default.

---
How-to:

Type "about:config" in the address bar. Then type "keyword" in the search field below the address bar.

Locate the entry with the Google search string, double-click it, and delete the part that says "I'm feeling lucky" (or: paste your own preferred search string into it - it doesn't have to be a Google search)

As far as i recall the only requirement is that the (equivalent of the) string part "q=" should be the last one - the query is inserted after this part.

By claus at Mar 31 2005 - 10:32

Searchbox

I dont have a searchbox at all on FF, i like my interfaces minimal, i know how to get to Google, but i tend to use other engines these days more often than not...

By Nick W at Mar 31 2005 - 10:35

i like my searchbox

It's attached to my right click menu as well and sends queries to Yahoo, Google, Dictionary.com, Babelfish and more. By default it shows Yahoo. Searching Google is done by just typing terms in the address bar (the "keyword:" thing from the post above).

By claus at Mar 31 2005 - 10:39

That is a great how too claus, thanks. I don't particularly like the "I feel Lucky" search from the URL address bar. So I changed it to a straight Yahoo search.

> Wonder how long it will be before we see something Autolink like for Firefox,

That part has me worried.

By Brad at Mar 31 2005 - 11:34

Worrying

erm... just what exactly is being communicated between my Firefox and Google for this to work?

By Nick W at Mar 31 2005 - 11:40

~

From the Link prefetching FAQ:

Quote:

Do prefetched requests contain a Referer:header?
Yes, prefetched requests include a HTTP Referer: header indicating the document from which the prefetching hint was extracted.

This may impact referrer tracking that is commonly used on many sites. (...)

As a server admin, can I distinguish prefetch requests from normal requests?
Yes, we send the following header along with each prefetch request:

X-moz: prefetch

Of course, this request header is not at all standardized, and it may change in future Mozilla releases.

So if you're no. 1 on a prefetched search (I haven't found one yet), you'll get traffic even if the searcher doesn't click on your link. G can prefetch with an HTTP link header, so it may not be visible in the source code.

By encyclo at Mar 31 2005 - 13:38