Opera FAQs, Tips, Tricks & Tweaks

If you want to search for same thing in different search engines, Search panel is convenient compared to integrated search field in address field.

When you add a search engine to the Search panel, Opera will add search field instead of a button. The problem with search field is you have to enter the search term again if you want to search for already entered search term in global search field. Search field can be converted in to a button easily.

1. Add required search engine to the Search panel from Tools > Appearance... > Buttons > Search
2. Open toolbar configuration file and under [Search Panel Toolbar.content] replace SearchX, Y with ButtonX, "Search Engine Name"=Search, Y
3. Activate modified toolbar setup from Tools > Preferences... > Advanced > Toolbars > Toolbar setup to see the changes.

Search panel with Acronym Finder search field

Search panel with Acronym Finder search button

Toolbar content before modification.

[Search Panel Toolbar.content]
Search0
Button1, "Google"=Search
Button2, "Ask"=Search, 1
Button3, "Yahoo!"=Search, 2
Button4, "Amazon.com"=Search, 3
Button5, "Wikipedia"=Search, 4
Button6, "Ebay.com"=Search, 5
Button7, "Yahoo!Shopping"=Search, 6
Button8, "BitTorrent"=Search, 7
Search9, 31

Toolbar content after modification.

[Search Panel Toolbar.content]
Search0
Button1, "Google"=Search
Button2, "Ask"=Search, 1
Button3, "Yahoo!"=Search, 2
Button4, "Amazon.com"=Search, 3
Button5, "Wikipedia"=Search, 4
Button6, "Ebay.com"=Search, 5
Button7, "Yahoo!Shopping"=Search, 6
Button8, "BitTorrent"=Search, 7
Button9, "Acronym Finder"=Search, 31

One can locate a menu item easily and quickly by seeing an icon rather than text.

To add/change icon

1. Create/find an image in any image format (GIF, JPG, ICO or PNG but PNG is recommended) and resize it to 16 x 16 pixels. If you use large size, Opera will show resized icon. For example, we will add Google favicon as icon for Google Auto Translation menu item.
2. Place icon image inside a folder (for example, custom_buttons) and add folder to zipped skin file after creating a backup.
3. Open skin.ini from zipped skin file, add relative path to image with icon name as shown below under [Images] section and update it in skin file.

   google = custom_buttons/google.ico

4. To add/change icon for menu item, open menu configuration^! file, find menu item and specify icon name. For Google Auto Translation menu item, change

   Item, Google Auto Translation = Go to page, "http://translate.google.com/translate_c?u=%u"

   to

   Item, Google Auto Translation = Go to page, "http://translate.google.com/translate_c?u=%u", , , google

5. Activate modified skin and menu setup or restart Opera.

Similarly, you can add/change icon for custom buttons by editing toolbar configuration file.

Google Auto Translation menu item without and with icon

The general syntax for a button/menu item is

Button/Menu item = Command, parameter-1, parameter-2, button tooltip, icon name

If there is no parameter-1 or parameter-2 or button tooltip leave them blank. Since there is no parameter-2 and button tooltip in Google Auto Translation menu item, they are left blank.

To remove icon

To remove icon from menu item, remove icon name and if there is no icon name then you have to specify a dummy name to override the default icon as shown in the following example.

To remove icon for Go to Web Address from hotclick menu, in menu configuration^! file under [Hotclick Popup Menu] change

Item, M_HOTCLICK_POPUP_MENU_GOTO_URL = Go to page, "%t"

to

Item, M_HOTCLICK_POPUP_MENU_GOTO_URL = Go to page, "%t", , , Dummy

^! = You should not modify ui\standard_menu.ini (defaults\standard_menu.ini for versions below 10) file as Opera will overwrite it during update. Create a copy of standard menu and edit it.

You can use existing skin images as icons without modifying skin file.

Updates:
Feb 7, 2009
Aug 2, 2009