MemeMachineGo!

Here’s an amazingly cool feature for Mozilla and Firebird — look up something on your favorite site for looking stuff up. For instance, if I look up ‘metonymy’ in the American Heritage Dictionary, 4th ed., the results page has the URL http://bartleby.com/cgi-bin/texis/webinator/ahdsearch?search_type=enty&query=metonymy&db=ahd&Submit=Search

Now if I bookmark that, go to manage my bookmarks, go to that bookmark’s properties, replace ‘metonymy’ with %s, and associate the keyword ‘ah’ with the bookmark, then forevermore, I can look things up in the dictionary just by entering, e.g. ah synecdoche in the address bar (where one would normally enter a URL.)

Works with any lookup that refers you to a URL that includes the query term in it. Phone numbers, maps, movie listings… have fun!