Automatic Web Results when typing?

[keegan]

Hello everyone,

I apologize in advance if this is a super easy answer... But I am wondering if Alfred has the ability to show results as I type for resources like DuckDuckGo or Wikipedia?

For example... With Spotlight search, if I start to type the name of someone famous but I can't remember how to spell their last name I can usually start typing what will be close to that and it will automatically show me the Wiki result. In seems that in Alfred I would need to type "Search + x name" and then preform the search in browser. Is there a way for it to populate in the Alfred display?

 

Thanks,

Keegan

[vitor]

Welcome @keegan,

 

It is possible, but it’s not instant because the query needs to do a roundtrip. Here’s a Workflow for it. The first run will probably be slower than subsequent ones.

To add another website, follow the pattern in the Workflow: add another Script Filter and edit the final part of the single line of code to the website you want to search.

[iliyan]

Many thanks for the workflow! Sadly none of the examples bundled with it seem to work. I get no search results. Any idea how to debug?

[vitor]

Open the debugger, set the log output to “All Information”, perform the failing action, and post the output.

[iliyan]

21 hours ago, vitor said:

Open the debugger, set the log output to “All Information”, perform the failing action, and post the output.

 

Thanks! Here's what I get when I try "wp cat":

[11:15:08.769] Logging Started...
[11:15:13.546] Web Search with Preview[Script Filter] Queuing argument 'cat'
[11:15:14.179] Web Search with Preview[Script Filter] Script with argv 'cat' finished
[11:15:14.184] ERROR: Web Search with Preview[Script Filter] Code 1: mv: rename /var/folders/jq/lj0dg5095zx1qd2cw5ql3hy40000gn/T/tmp.M8suOhCT/ddgr/1.9/bin/ddgr to /var/folders/jq/lj0dg5095zx1qd2cw5ql3hy40000gn/T/tmp.4X2j8VaL/Workflow Data/com.vitorgalvao.alfred._sharedresources/bin/ddgr: No such file or directory
chmod: /var/folders/jq/lj0dg5095zx1qd2cw5ql3hy40000gn/T/tmp.4X2j8VaL/Workflow Data/com.vitorgalvao.alfred._sharedresources/bin/ddgr: No such file or directory
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/open3.rb:213:in `spawn': No such file or directory - ddgr (Errno::ENOENT)
	from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/open3.rb:213:in `popen_run'
	from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/open3.rb:159:in `popen2'
	from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/2.6/usr/lib/ruby/2.6.0/open3.rb:342:in `capture2'
	from ./websearch:14:in `<main>'

 

[vitor]

Looks like they made some changes to the search tool this relies on so it’ll need a one-time setup. Install Homebrew then run brew install ddgr (you may need /opt/homebrew/bin/brew install ddgr instead if on Apple Silicon). Redownload the workflow from the same URL, it has been updated.

 

Edited September 16, 2022 by vitor