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Shortcuts in Firefox

Shortcuts work in Firefox. If you are having problems, some browser settings may require changes to make shortcuts work. In particular, you may need to reconfigure your browser's search settings.

Firefox users, please do/check the following:

  1. Type "about:config" in the address bar
  2. Filter on keyword.  Find keyword.url and keyword.enabled
  3. Set keyword.url = http://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=
  4. Set keyword.enabled = true
  5. Make sure Google is set as the default search engine from search box drop list.
  6. Also, make sure you don't have "fixup" enabled. Type "about:config" and set browser.fixup.alternate.enabled to false.

If shortcuts still don't work after configuring your search settings, please check if you have installed any web accelerators. They may interfere with shortcuts. 

If you have ruled out any toolbar or web accelerator issues, please try the following tests to show you are properly directed to our OpenDNS guide page.

  1. Type "opendns" in the address bar, and note whether you land on the OpenDNS Guide Page. The URL should look something like this: http://guide.opendns.com/?url=opendns
  2. Now, type "opendns opendns" in the address bar and note whether you land on our OpenDNS Guide Page. The URL should look something like this: http://guide.opendns.com/?url=opendns+opendns&client=ff20

If you are properly directed to our guide page, please note whether your shortcuts are defined network-wide or in your personal OpenDNS account.

For network-wide shortcuts, make sure the following is true:

  1. The given shortcut is defined in the OpenDNS account .
  2. Shortcuts are enabled in network preferences.
  3. All or tagged shortcuts have been applied to your current network.
  4. Your current IP address matches the IP for the network in your OpenDNS account .
  5. If your current IP does not match your IP for your OpenDNS account, update it by doing the following:
    • Make sure Enable Dynamic IP Update is ON, via MyAccount/Networks/(wrench icon)/Dynamic IP Update
    • Either, verify you have a DDNS client installed to handle automatic IP updates
    • Or, go to My Account/Networks and click on the Manual IP Update button (green arrows icon) between two network IP addresses, previous IP and current IP. If a manual IP update is necessary, please wait 5 -10 minutes for the shortcuts to be applied to the new IP.

For personal shortcuts, make sure the following is true:

  1. You are signed in to your OpenDNS account from your browser.
  2. The given shortcut is defined in your OpenDNS account.

If you land on an unexpected website when you type in your shortcut, please check your previously defined keywords associated with bookmarks.

If you type a shortcut, and www. and .com are appended, (i.e. yahoo goes to www.yahoo.com ) , then either you are NOT using OpenDNS or you have a default search engine that interferes with OpenDNS shortcuts. If this is the case, please see the previous instructions related to default search engine settings.

Note: Firefox users may have the habit of hitting CTRL-ENTER or CMD-ENTER after typing a name in the address bar. Make sure you are not inadvertently doing this when typing your shortcut. This will lead to .com completion and the shortcut will not be resolved properly.