I find that Google Instant is an annoyance. Not only is it distracting, but I find that the instant search suggestions that appear seem to interfere with my keyboard response, such that I end up with repeated characters and other typos while typing in a search query. This happens on all of my computers, not just on my Wary Puppy desktop.
While there are many ways to disable Google Instant, most solutions are either temporary or a workaround in my opinion. I don't know of any add-ons for Seamonkey that either disable Google Instant or allow me to permanently save the cookie that Google sets after I turn off the Instant search in Google preferences. Consequently, when I decide to "clear private data" in Seamonkey including cookies, I must re-set my Google preferences next time I do a search.
After researching the problem, and trying some file hacks of my own, I've come up with a solution that I like and works for me. The result is that I can now click on the search button in Seamonkey to access Google, without ever having to worry about Google Instant again, nor do I have to be concerned with clearing my cookies or re-setting my search preferences.
Here is what I did...
First of all I found that I needed to use Google with a different url, one that doesn't use Google Instant at all. That url is basically: http://www.google.com/webhp?complete=0 The last part "complete=0" is important because it tells google not to use any special features within its search parameters. Now since I am Canadian and speak english, I modified the url slightly to reflect that, and so my url is: http://www.google.ca/webhp?complete=0&hl=en If I were to bookmark either web address, then I can search without Google Instant or search suggestions ever distracting me again. Instead of bookmarking these or creating a new tab just for search (a redundant feature since Seamonkey already has search engine access built in) I wanted this to work with the browser search button, Here is where the file hacks are necessary.
There are two files that need to be modified: google.xml and search.json Basically I need to remove the default search parameters that Google uses and replace it with one of the aforementioned urls that overides Google Instant. Once I have saved the new info, I am done.
![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_smile.gif)
Locate google.xml by going to /usr/lib/seamonkey-2.3.2/searchplugins directory. Open up google.xml with geaney text editor and on the line (second from bottom) where it says: <SearchForm> delete the basic url for Google and replace it with the new url that I have mentioned already. You may want to modify it to reflect your locale as I did or you can set it at: http://www.google.com/webhp?complete=0 and it should work. Save your changes in geany. Then go to your home directory and click on the big eye to reveal your hidden directories. Open up the directory called: .mozilla From there, open up the seamonkey directory, then one last directory which for me is called: 3o1ptd5r.default I'm wondering if this directory is named a little differently for everybody, but in any event there are no other directories to choose from so whatever yours is named, open it and look for the file: search.json This is a sort of javascript file that Google uses in Seamonkey in conjunction with the browser's profile -- I believe. In any event, open this up in geany, then select "line wrapping" in the menu. Now, carefully look down the page for: Search","__searchForm": Right after this and inside the quotation marks you will see the default url for google. Replace this with the new url while making sure that you set it inside those quotation marks. Save your change in geany, close out of your directories and you should be done.
Now open up Seamonkey 2.3.2 then click on the search button and google should open up with the new url in the address bar. Try a search to confirm that Google Instant is permanently disabled. I noticed also that when I went to search settings to check my google preferences, the google instant button was on... but no matter because the new url overides this setting.
One last tip is that I copied the two files to my tmp directory before I modified the originals in case I made some typos or messed up the files otherwise thus making it easy to recover from possible mistakes.
Hopefully I do not come across as too long winded, as I want to make my instructions clear, and to explain why I wanted to make these changes. I am not a programmer or developer, just a seasoned "hacker" of sorts after nearly twenty years of using a computer. Feel free to ask me questions re: above if there is anything you aren't sure of. Finally, I realize of course that there is often more than one way to solve a computing problem... this is just one way that worked for me.
Cheers