2011-09-24 05:59:07 +00:00
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In my ongoing efforts to distance myself from Google I started using
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[DuckDuckGo][duck] as my default search engine. I tried the DDG Safari
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extension but didn't really like it, especially
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since it needed to add an entire new toolbar to the browser. Other
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suggestions for adding DDG to Safari involved [hacking the binary][hack]
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or other extensions, which I wasn't interested in.
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[duck]: http://duckduckgo.com/
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[hack]: http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20030514035516436
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2018-01-22 12:11:40 +00:00
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**Update 2018:** Safari and most other browsers now support DuckDuckGo
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in their default search engine list. 🎉
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**Update 2012:** There an easier way to achive what I describe below: Just
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2012-01-21 03:25:27 +00:00
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add a hosts file entry for search.yahoo.com that points at DuckDuckGo's
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IP address and set you search engine to Yahoo! in Safari. [See DuckDuckGo
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for the full instructions][hosts].
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[hosts]: http://help.duckduckgo.com/customer/portal/articles/255650
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2011-09-24 05:59:07 +00:00
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My solution to the problem was to hijack the Bing option in the default
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search box for use with DDG. **Note:** This solution assumes you will
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never want to go to the `www.bing.com` domain, not a problem for me. The
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steps to implement it are:
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Add an entry for `www.bing.com` to `/etc/hosts` that points the domain to
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your local machine:
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127.0.0.1 www.bing.com
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Next configure an Apache virtual machine to respond to the `www.bing.com`
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domain and redirect the request to Duck Duck Go (or your search engine
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of choice). This works because DDG accepts the search query in the same
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query string parameter, `q`, as Bing and ignores the other Bing related
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params.
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`/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf`:
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<VirtualHost *:80>
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ServerName www.bing.com
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RewriteEngine On
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RewriteRule ^/search(.*)$ http://duckduckgo.com/$1 [redirect,last]
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</VirtualHost>
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For this to work you will need to have "Web Sharing" enabled in the Sharing
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preferences pane and have the the following line included in
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`/etc/apache2/httpd.conf`:
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Include /private/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf
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Restart Apache (`sudo apachectl graceful`) and set your search engine
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to Bing in Safari. Do a search and you should end up at the DDG
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results. One of the neat features of DDG is its [!bang syntax][bang],
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which allows you to search to 100s of sites directly. One of which is
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`!g` for those times when you need to fall back on Google.
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[bang]: http://duckduckgo.com/bang.html
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