Bug 477142

The above-mentioned URL parameter in the Startpage.com settings which defines a new search engine entry via menu Edit > Preferences > Other > Manage search engines has a wrong value. With this value searches using the Startpage search engine entry in the search bar do not work. I cannot remember how I generated the wrong value for the URL parameter which I specified above. Is this wrong value maybe a preset value by Falkon? 

These values for the parameters for a Startpage search engine entry work, i. e. searches with Startpage through the search bar execute successful searches by Startpage.com:

Name: StartPage
URL: https://www.startpage.com/sp/search?query=%s
Post data:
Shortcut: sp

The search URL which I specified in my last comment is taken from this URL:

https://support.startpage.com/hc/en-us/articles/4520913488148-Search-strings-adding-Startpage-to-unsupported-web-browsers

An extra information to the initial description of the behavior described in the first post in this bug report:

The behavior as described above occurs even if the option "Search with Default Engine" is activated in menu Edit > Preferences > Tabs > Adress Bar.

Note here that the pattern "Search with Default Engine" is a quote from the Falkon GUI, this pattern should get corrected to "Search with default search engine" - the word "search" should be added, and the pattern "default search engine" does not require capital letters at the beginning of each word in it.

(In reply to Jens Radloff from comment #1)

> These values for the parameters for a Startpage search engine entry work, i.
> e. searches with Startpage through the search bar execute successful
> searches by Startpage.com:
> 
> Name: StartPage
> URL: https://www.startpage.com/sp/search?query=%s
> Post data:
> Shortcut: sp

Having created a completely new git clone of the Falkon source code in another local directory some days ago, then having compiled and installed this clone, I can confirm that the search URL "https://startpage.com/do/search" in the preferences for the Startpage search engine in the Preferences dialog > Other > Manage search engines/Search Engines Manager > Edit button > "Url" field is the search URL that is predefined in the Falkon source code. This predefined search URL results in non-working searches if StartPage is used for searching via the Search Bar.

Note that in the Search Engines Manager > Edit window for StartPage the field "Post Data" contains the string "query=%s&cat=web&language=english" as predefined by the current Falkon source code. 

Using this string in the "Post Data" field in connection with the search URL "https://www.startpage.com/sp/search?query=%s" (which itself works, see above) in the "Url" field of the Startpage settings results in erroneous search results when Startpage is used by using the Search Bar for searching for any string. 

I typed "duck" into the Search Bar (before that I selected Startpage as the search engine to be used for the search by selecting its corresponding icon left to the Search Bar), pressed ENTER, then Startpage showed the results of this search, and it appears that at the top of this result page the string "%s" is shown in the Start Page search field at the top of the result page. Thus Startpage had applied a search for the string "%s".

That means that the predefined string "https://www.startpage.com/sp/search?query=%s"  in the "Post Data" field in the settings for Startpage in the Search Engines Manager works improperly. But if you leave the "Post Data" field empty, then searches with Startpage via the Search Bar results in correct search result web pages.

Update for Falkon 24.07.90 (e86f7038a), KDE Plasma 6 + QT version 6.7.0, compiled and installed in Tuxedo OS 3:

Search engine startpage.com is now one of the default search engines in menu Edit > Preferences > Other > Manage search engines + searches with startpage.com using the Address Bar work.

But:

Changing the default search engine from DuckDuckGo to Startpage does not work: If "Set as default" search engine and pushed up to 1st position in the list of search engines in menu Edit > Preferences > Other > Manage search engines, and having closed the Preferences window, the icon of the search engine displayed at the left edge of the search fiels still shows the DuckDuckGo icon. A Falkon restart does not resolve this behavior.

Works: Adding the URL of a new search engine in menu Edit > Preferences > Other > Manage search engines (here: https://gruble.de, without any extra information, like specific search URL) => Searching with the newly added search engine works, but as described above, if set as the new default search engine does not work again.