As I understand it, this makes use of the 'Smart keywords' feature that's native to Firefox[1]. Take a search URL, add a keyword to it, and you can then use it as 'keyword search_term'. I use this for a few of the sites that I frequent.
What's a pity is some browsers don't promote their native features, which leads most to be unaware of them and then browser makers likely see metrics showing little use of them.
Opera (pre-Chromium) had this feature to begin with, then Firefox (using bookmarks to store the keywords instead). Vivaldi browser retains the Opera style custom search UI and whenever I find myself searching a site enough I just create a nickname for it (eg: to archive the URL directly to archive.org/is, search caniuse.com, among dozens of others).
> What's a pity is some browsers don't promote their native features, which leads most to be unaware of them
Too true. I've wondered for a while what the keyword field in a bookmark was for.
I also found out just the other day that I can add search engines to Firefox[1] if the site supports the OpenSearch API[2]. I didn't know they could be added this way, nor did I know about OpenSearch, if I hadn't have searched for an easier way to search a site I frequent then I would never have known.
Chrome also has this feature: I recently realised this as a Firefox user after being semi-forced to half-switch to Chrome for a good portion of my work.
It's incredibly well hidden though, and the UX is horrific, which I'm convinced must be deliberate.
Yeah, I use this feature constantly. I have e.g. wp to search wikipedia, im to search imdb, di to search dictionary.com.
For anyone else on Firefox, there's no need to go through a search engine or install anything. Just follow the instructions in that link. It'll change your life.
Opera (pre-Chromium) had this feature to begin with, then Firefox (using bookmarks to store the keywords instead). Vivaldi browser retains the Opera style custom search UI and whenever I find myself searching a site enough I just create a nickname for it (eg: to archive the URL directly to archive.org/is, search caniuse.com, among dozens of others).