06 Aug 2004 | Robbie said...

Uhm, I just tried it and you CAN do a Google search by right-clicking a selection in Safari. Good ideas on the other stuff, though.

06 Aug 2004 | ML said...

"Amazon" it would be nice too.

06 Aug 2004 | JP said...

I'm almost positive this is currently possible...somehow. Maybe Saft adds this feature--I can't remember, and I don't have it installed any longer.

06 Aug 2004 | Craig Mod said...

Wouldn't it be nice to be able to customize which engines you can feed the query into and how it's fed... From the perspective of someone often reading Japanese websites who would love to right-click and get a definition for kanji.

06 Aug 2004 | Darrel said...

Firefox does the search-google on a right-click as well, but yea, it'd be nice to pick from other engines. I imagine it wouldn't be too difficult to make a FF plug-in for that.

06 Aug 2004 | Tomas Jogin said...

There is no such thing as "right clicking" on a Mac. It would be nice, however, if there was; but that doesn't seem to fall within the boundaries of "thinking different".

06 Aug 2004 | Brad Hurley said...

There is no such thing as "right clicking" on a Mac.

Only if you use an Apple mouse. Right-clicking works with any two-button mice, and if you have a laptop or an Apple mouse you just control-click to get the contextual menus.

06 Aug 2004 | brian w said...

Install IceCoffee to move the Services menu into the contextual menu item. Install ACP Web Services or roll your own to add whatever searches you'd like available. Voila.

06 Aug 2004 | RS said...

Install IceCoffee to move the Services menu into the contextual menu item. Install ACP Web Services or roll your own to add whatever searches you'd like available. Voila.

Doh. From the IceCoffee readme: "(currently, Safari support is disabled pending Safari bug fixes)."

06 Aug 2004 | Matthew Oliphant said...

Add to this wish list:

Blog it.

Which would also include the URL for you as well as the selected text. If no text selected, just the URL.

06 Aug 2004 | Wilson said...

LiveDictionary is an interesting (if a little ugly) extension for Safari that lets you mouse over a word with an option key modifier held down and it will look up the definition in a user-selected dictionary and float the definition above your mouse. It works with ultralingua.net bilingual dictionaries, too - so I use it for my daily scan of Italian newspaper headlines. Check it out at: http://www.mikeash.com/software/livedictionary/ (or just select the name and right click to do a google search, if you have Saft)

07 Aug 2004 | James Wheare said...

There's also the oft-overlooked (though admittedly mostly useless) Services menu item in all "[Application]" menus. The Search With Google item can be called with cmd-shift-L in any application.

07 Aug 2004 | CM Harrington said...

Actually, the Services menu is quite useful. You just need to use more Cocoa-based applications, as only Cocoa apps get Services "for free". Carbon apps can also use them, but it requires effort on the part of the programmer (see BBEdit as an example of a carbon app that is Services aware).

I can create a new weblog entry from a selection, look up words using quite a few dictionaries, look up a word in a thesaurus, send a selection to the command line, and about a bajillion other things I use on a daily basis.

If anyone would like more info about Services, visit my site, and email me. I'll be happy to help you track down some useful services.

07 Aug 2004 | c3o said...

Incidentally I have exactly those options here in Firefox thanks to the DictionarySearch extension.

08 Aug 2004 | Mark Eichin said...

OnMyCommand, if you want to run arbitrary scripts and commands from the context menu - which *does* work with Safari, I use it for a homebrew tool that dumps the selection and context into a database... there's also SockhoEasyFind which gives you a menubar item to choose what the Safari Search Box goes to, though that may be more steps than you're looking for, unless you operate in "modes" rather than wanting to choose search-by-search.

09 Aug 2004 | Lance Osborne said...

You mean something like bookmarklets?

10 Aug 2004 | One of several Steves said...

Darrell, did you install a plugin for that functionality? Because my Firefox installation certainly doesn't include that.

10 Aug 2004 | Clark MacLeod said...

Nisus Thesaurus is available from the services menu. Select text in Safari and voila.

12 Aug 2004 | ML said...

Aha. Select a word in Safari so it's highlighted (as if you were going to cut and paste it) and then right-click (or control-click)...you'll see "Google Search" as an option.

30 Jan 2005 | compatelius said...

bocigalingus must be something funny.