Adding New Searches
On-line resourcesThe easiest way to add new on-line resources (search engines, dictionaries and encyclopaedias) is to use the IntelliWebSearch Wizard (installed with version 3.1 or better). Simply select Wizard from the red i icon menu (or Wizard from the Archive Window Window menu). If everything works well, the Wizard should be self explanatory. However if the Wizard is unable to extract the data it needs, you will normally see an error message like the one below.

This error message provides useful information on how to try again manually (without the Wizard). Method tells you which of the instructions below to follow (GET method or POST method). Encoding
tells you if the Wizard has failed because the site uses encoding which
IntelliWebSearch does not support. If it says
anything apart from UTF-8, Windows-1252 or ISO-8859-1, IntelliWebSearch
may only access the site using Form Fill mode (see below). Frames
tells you if the site uses HTML frames and their type. If there
are frames, it may be possible to extract the necessary data using
with the Wizard by inputting one of the internal frame URLs. This
however requires a little knowledge of HTML. If you do not feel up to
it, you could try asking the Users' Group for help or simply force the site using Form Fill mode.
In order to improve the tool, I would appreciate it if you could let me know the addresses of any sites that do not respond to the Wizard despite having compatible encoding and no frames.
Note that, unlike the main IntelliWebSearch program, the Wizard component only works with the most common browsers.
When the Wizard has finished, simply add a Key Label (see figure 3 below), click Save and close and add the new search to the appropriate Group (see Archive Window).
The following keys have specific functions during the Wizard:
F1: Pressing F1 calls up this help page.
F2:
For certain browsers in certain circumstances, the Wizard may ask you
to input a specified shortcut key. If you input the wrong key or if the
Wizard no longer works correctly after inputting it, press F2 at the Introduction Window to reset the default value.

Figure 3
– Edit Window
Adding on-line resources manually (without the Wizard)
Search engines, on-line dictionaries
and on-line encyclopaedias use one of two methods
to submit the search terms you input: GET or POST. Luckily it is very
easy to tell which method is used. With the GET method, the search
terms are visible somewhere in the result page address string (URL). If
the POST method is used, they are hidden. Here is what to do in each
case:
GET method (e.g. Acronym Finder)
This is the most widely
used method.
- Type the Acronym Finder address into your browser: http://www.acronymfinder.com.
- Type who
into
the "abbreviation to define" box, choose "abbreviation" and
click the "find" button.
- the URL of the page which appears is:
http://www.acronymfinder.com/af-query.asp?Acronym=who&Find=find&string=exact.
- Open
IntelliWebSearch's Edit window (right click the red "i"
icon in the system tray and
choose Archive>Edit>Add new search).
- Copy
the part up to the word who (shown in red above) and put it
in IntelliWebSearch's Start
string.
- Copy the part after the word who (shown in blue above)
and put it
in IntelliWebSearch's Finish
string.
- Add a Key Label and Description of your choice.
- Click Save
and close.
POST method (e.g. IATE)
These are more difficult
to find since you will have to use a third party freeware application
such as Slim
Browser or the Firefox add-on NeedleSearch.
Fortunately this method is much less commonly used. Here is what to do
using Slim Browser:
- Install and run Slim Browser: www.flashpeak.com.
- Type the IATE address into Slim Browser: http://iate.europa.eu/iatediff.
- Select the IATE languages and options you are
interested in (e.g. IT>EN and "Type of search").
- Put the cursor in the IATE "You are searching for" box.
- Choose "extract search engine data" from Slim Browser's
"Tools" menu.
- A message box appears with the URL you need:
http://iate.europa.eu/iatediff/SearchByQuery.do;jsessionid=999?method=search&saveStats=true&query=$key&valid=Search+&sourceLanguage=it&targetLanguages=en&domain=0&typeOfSearch=t.
- Open IntelliWebSearch's Edit window (right click the
red "i" icon in the system tray and
choose Archive>Edit>Add new search).
- Copy the part up to "$key" (shown in red above) and put it
in
IntelliWebSearch's Start
string. In this case, experiments have shown that ;jsessionid=999 is
superfluous.
- Copy the part after "$key" (shown in blue above) and put it
in
IntelliWebSearch's Finish
string.
- Add a Key Label and Description of your choice.
- Click Save
and close.
- Close Slim Browser.
Even after following the above instructions correctly, IntelliWebSearch
may not be able to access certain sites due to their use of
java-script-driven frames, server settings (at least in theory) or
encoding different from those supported by IntelliWebSearch. A
brute-force method
may be used to
deal with these infrequent cases called Form Fill mode (v. 2.0.5 or later). This method should only be used as
a last resort when the normal method fails: it is
slower and
more susceptible to the whims of other software installed on the system
(especially the browser).
Form Fill mode (e.g. Le
Grand Dictionnaire)
- Copy the Le
Grand Dictionnaire address into IntelliWebSearch's Start string: http://www.granddictionnaire.com.
- Put what you
would normally
type into Le
Grand Dictionnaire into IntelliWebSearch's Finish string using
this convention:
@ = the word(s) to look up;
{special key} = a special key, e.g. {Enter} or {Tab}.
For example @{Tab}{Tab}{Tab}{Tab}{Down}{Enter}
sets
français>anglais and starts the search (this works in
Opera and probably
in other
browsers too, but it does not
work in Internet Explorer 7). For a
simple Le Grand Dictionnaire search with the default parameters, just
write @{Enter}
in the Finish
string.
- Add a Key
Label and Description of your choice.
- Click Save
and close.
- After launching the search, Le
Grand
Dictionnaire opens in your browser, shortly followed
by a message
showing the string of keystrokes IntelliWebSearch would like
to type
into the page. Only
hit Enter (or click OK) when the Grand
Dictionnaire page has completely
finished loading.
IntelliWebSearch knows Form Fill mode is to be used when it finds an
"@" in the Finish string, so make sure you include one.
For a full list of the special keys you can include in the Finish
string, see the Key Names table found here: http://www.autohotkey.com/docs/commands/Send.htm.
Local
dictionaries
It might seem paradoxical, but it is much easier to access an on-line
dictionary than a local one. All websites have a common front door key:
the URL. Whereas every local dictionary is designed completely
differently. Realistically IntelliWebSearch is never going to get into
all local dictionaries, but it should be able to get into most with a
bit of fiddling about. In other words, local dictionary access should
be considered a bonus feature and not a primary function.
The technique in the case of local dictionaries is similar to Form Fill mode
above.
- Copy the dictionary
path into IntelliWebSearch's
Start
string, e.g. D:\LocalDictionary.exe.
- Put what you
would normally
type into the dictionary interface into IntelliWebSearch's Finish string using
this convention:
@ = the word(s) to look up;
{special key} = a special key, e.g. {Enter} or {Tab}.
For example @{Enter}
in the Finish
string would probably enter the search
string and launch the search. You may need to clear the results of a
previous search. To do this you may find these keys useful: {Home} takes cursor to beginning of
line; ^{Del} deletes from cursor to end of
line; ^{F4}
may close a previous result window.
- Put an unambiguous non-variable representative
part of what appears in the dictionary window title bar when the
dictionary is open in Window
Title , e.g. LocalDictionary.
- Add a Key
Label.
- Click Save
and close.
For a full list of the special keys you can include in the Finish
string, see the Key Names table found here: http://www.autohotkey.com/docs/commands/Send.htm.
As you can see from these examples, defining your own customized
"search" is in fact extremely simple*.
In any
case, if you need help,
there is also an IntelliWebSearch
Users' Group on the Internet, hosted by Yahoo! Groups where you can pick the brains of expert users.
Press
F1 for
context-sensitive help.
*
For further
information and illustration of advanced search options
see:
General
http://www.searchengineshowdown.com/features.
Specifically
for
translators
http://www.term-minator.it;
http://web.ticino.com/multilingual/Search_Interfaces.htm.
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