my favorite tools: Opsed2004.07.09

As many of you know, I switched several months ago to Opera and haven't looked back since. But it's been a small add-on tool that has taken my Opera and transformed it into an even more work-friendly, easy to use and optimized tool.

Opera has a built-in search toolbar, much like the Nutshell toolbar which I used heavily when IE was my primary browser. But unlike Nutshell, the Opera search bar is filled with a whole bunch of stuff that really doesn't matter to me: Teoma search, Price comparison.com search, etc. I'm all about the customized search bar - I know which sites I want to search. I don't want to have to dig my way through a whole bunch of options I don't care about.

And while the Opera search.ini file is editable, it's a pain in the patootie to edit. I am not a programmer, though I do program from time to time. But I don't want to have to worry about syntax errors when all I'm trying to do is customize my interface.

Enter Opsed. Opsed is a search.ini editor for Opera. It's a simple little tool but it does its job very, very well. I can modify, delete, or add new search areas. I can add separators, add hotkeys, all with a few little clicks. It's even got a wizard to walk you through setting up a new search URL if you're not as familiar with hacking querystrings.

Right now, my search toolbar has the following options:

Google
Toronto.com
IMDB.com
Amazon.com *
Amazon.ca *
Chapters.ca *
Ebay.ca
Dictionary.com
Thesaurus.com
Wikipedia.com

(* I do my own price shopping, thank you)

It's an incredible time saver for me, given how often I search these sites. And free. Which is v. cool.

At some point, I'll probably get around to adding a few stock photo sites, as well. Time saver is what I'm all about these days.

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