separate address and search bar in safari 6

Great news! But first the bad news. Hang in there, I've saved the best for last. I just spent half an hour on the phone with very friendly Apple support techs. They had a pow-wow with the whole floor and came up with a definitive answer that I have found nowhere else on the web:

YOU CANNOT HAVE SEPARATE ADDRESS AND SEARCH BOXES / BARS 😢

Yes it is very sad, but there's a glimmer of hope! Read on...

YOU BASICALLY CAN'T (AND SHOULDN'T) GO BACK TO AN OLD VERSION 😟

YOU CAN CHOOSE ONE OF THREE DEFAULT BROWSERS 😐

redsneekers (above) mentioned that you can change the default browser by clicking the magnifying glass in the address bar. Here's another way to do the same thing:

1. Safari --> Preferences (or command comma)

2. under the General tab

3. set "Default search engine" to either Google, Yahoo! or Bing

Apple confirms that it is impossble to customize any further, as you can with Opera for example.

YOU CAN REMOVE THE GOOGLE SUGGESTIONS WHEN YOU TYPE AN ADDRESS 🙂

The dropdown box gives you the top six Google results as you type. It's reminiscent of the old search box, but it puts more real estate between your cursor and your bookmarks. Disable it like this:

1. Safari --> Preferences (or command comma)

2. click the Privacy tab

3. at the bottom, check "Prevent search engine from providing suggestions"

Now, try typing "app" in the address bar. You will get a dropdown with four sections. You can't change their order, but now you've at least trimmed it down a bit. Check it out:

Notice that there is only one line under "Google Search" instead of six! Tip: if the down arrow is too slow, you can also use [command + down arrow] to skip through the 4 sections above.

And now...

THE BEST NEWS!!! YOU CAN GET THE OLD ADDRESS BAR FUNCTIONALITY 😎

See where it says "Go to Site "app""? Yes, all the way at the bottom? Click here or go down using your arrow, and you will have the exact same functionality you had on your older-version Safari address bar.

Example, I want to go to http://www.chevrolet.com but I've never been there before, so it's not in my history or bookmarks. I don't know if it's chevy or chevrolet, but I'm positive the site exists and I expect my browser to take me there. I type "chevy" in the address bar. If I hit [enter] on the new Safari 6.0, it will take me to a page with Google search results. But if I look at the drop down list that appears and choose "Go to site "chevy"", it will do what the old Safari used to do with less effort. Voila! It was chevrolet.com but I'm there in one click without ever visiting Google.

ISN'T THERE ANOTHER BROWSER I CAN USE?

I have failed to find any browser with legitimate address and search boxes. Prove me wrong please! Opera has two boxes, but don't be fooled. If you type "apple" into the address bar with no .com after it, Opera will direct you to a search page just like Safari does. The good part is that you can customize your search engine to anything you want. One person (wfaulk) showed how to obtain old-Safari functionality here http://tinyurl.com/d4stze7 Granted wfaulk was talking about Google Chrome, but the same trick worked for Opera. The downside with this fix is that while your new Opera address bar now acts like the old Safari one, the search bar no longer serves its purpose! That's because the two boxes are practically the same. So there's little advantage over the new Safari, besides a wider selection of search engines.

Hope this helps! Don't forget to visit http://www.apple.com/feedback/ and ask them to at least give us the ability to choose a search engine outside of the Big 3.

I agree that combining the two, while however helpful it may seem for first time users that don't understand the difference between URL and Search field) is a big annoyance with Safari 6. When I am doing research, having the Search Field that keeps my last search is helpful.

Let's say I search for "striped big cat, rainforest" and I find some results, but after opening a few, I realize it isn't specific enough. I used to quickly see, and ammend my search to make it more specific if what I was finding wasn't what I needed, like "striped big cat, rainforest, chile, peru, valley". Now I either have to go back, and hope that the search results page loads my search criteria properly (Google often reverts to older searches, not the most recent", remember what I typed and retype it plus my new words, or I have to try and tab all my windows I open and close them to get back. This is a frustrating user experience.

Why can't we have the option of bringing that window back? It is incredible useful and helpful for doing research when I need to find specific information on the web. This is a step backward.

Please leave feedback at:

http://www.apple.com/feedback/safari.html

PLEASE BRING BACK THE SEARCH FIELD APPLE DEV TEAM!

I agree that the combined address and search bar is annoying.

To change search engins either you have to go to Safari > pref > then select search engin OR in the address bar, highlight the current address, then delete the curent address so that the seach icon is displayed then click on the seach icon to find the search engine of choice.

Previously the search icon was always in view so all one had to do was click on the icon.

AND to view the address of a page after a search item is entered, you have to reload the page.

I wish the engineers would compare the clicks and steps before making a change OR offer the change as a user preference option. How hard is it to make a design feature a user preference option?

Are you listening, engineers????

I'm in the same boat, I'm using my own TLD "zz" at home for my servers.

Now typing in any server address xxx.yyy.zz goes to google, thanks for that one, AAPL :-(

The only remedy is to write http://xxx.yyy.zz into the dumbed-down address bar, so there is no google search.

I also agree that SEARCH & URL in the same place is strange.

For one it doesnt help people who are new to computers - they often dont realsie the difference or know what a URL is.

2nd, exactly as theab42 says, what if i want to search for "www.zzz.com" or i have an custom address that does fit with safari

However, I have to reluctantly accept that this is the way things are going - you probably have to get used to it.

redsneekers, I feel you.

redsneekers wrote:

AND to view the address of a page after a search item is entered, you have to reload the page.

If you typed in a search term, but now you're frustrated because you can't see the URL for the page you're currently on, just press [escape]. Pressing it once hides the dropdown box, and pressing [escape] again restores the URL as it had been.

I'll just add to the tally here. I really hate the new locaction/URL bar in Safari 6. I would go back if I could. I'm trying to get used to Firefox for just this reason, but I have so many Safari specific habits that it's tough. However, having a myriad of internal TLD's in addition to having no control over how many "top hits" appear before the search results is just killing me.

Why Apple? Why?

If it ain't broke, don't fix it...

I am not particularly tech savvy, so forgive me if I am not understanding your dilema correctly.

I too hate the new set up; however, I found that I can do "command + L" which will open up the traditional

address bar. When I search from there, I have the option to refine my search.

Hope that helps.

I could live with the combined bar, but no matter what it shows, it always opens up the search in yahoo. I have selected google as my search engin but even though it shows it, it Safari, still opens in yahoo.

Does anyone know how to stop it from using the yahoo search for anything, ever?

2 additional reasons why this is such a very poor behaviour.

1) I cannot use Googles search parameters to customise my search.

EG: http://www.google.com/search?gl=UK&q=pets

Using the gl= I can search as if I was located in the UK, US or wherever - after I search I want to be able to edit the URL & change my search or parameters, but Safari changes the URL to be just "pets" - which is pointless since its already right there in the search box in google.

2) I cannot copy & paste the URL for a search.

I have a very simple solution: If Apple refuses to provide an option for a separate search bar, or even to allow us to reinstall the previous version of Safari, I can refuse to use their browser. I have uninstalled Safari and now use Firefox exclusively. If I ever feel the need for a combined bar, I will use Chrome.

Microsoft has lost customers by arrogant, incomprehensible changes to their software. It would be very sad to see Apple fail to learn from that example.

Apple Guys:

Just an FYI here; I know people take time to get use to changes and sometime, it is for the better, but this change really needs to be an option. I spend much of my day jumping between configuration screens on many devices, and I do so by IP address. When you type an address in the combined bar that is incorrect, you get the google results of searching that address. This is worthless. Also, when I type just the address without the HTTP:// on the beginning, I get the google search. Again, not what I want to have happen.

Also, when I just emply mis-type a URL, I want to fix it. I don't want to go to the google search results screen.

We had previously standardized on Safari on all our machines, but to be honest, this issue is causing us to reconsider. It is a major pain the butt.

Would Apple please make some statement about this issue? If there is a direction to provide an option, we may suffer through while you all come up with a fix. If there is no direction to fix this issue, then we will choose a competivive browser which either does not have these short comings or is user configurable.

Thanks,

JL

Like all of you, I really hated the new Safari 6, and upon some digging around I found this:

Details: http://archive.org/details/Safari6RemovalTool

Download: http://ia701504.us.archive.org/3/items/Safari6RemovalTool/s6rt.dmg

It contained a small script to remove Safari 5, and the manual install Safari 5.1.7 package from Apple.

Hope that helps!

Cheers.

It is very bad when do searches. I get the searched link directly BUT there is not go back to what I typed!

Id very frustrating because I have to retype, get the Google list and then do something...or remember to force Google to open in another tab.

The only good thing of Safari 6 is the reading list...the rest is the worse browser...or Apple think that their users are now the children that play with the iPod touch ?

J456, while your info was helpful, it's not working for me!

I checked "Prevent search engine from providing suggestions" but a drop down shows up, complete with bookmark history, which is totally annoying.

And Private Browsing doesn't seem so private anymore. While history isn't stored, when I do a search, I get a drop down auto suggesting things from history or bookmarks. I don't understand it. Never used to happen before.

😠😢😮