In Mozilla Firefox, Opera and Google Chrome you can use keywords to activate any web site that supports custom input (like google.com for example). Mapping sites are easy to set up for keyword shortcut searches as long as you know how to configure them.

The way to use the keyword search once configured is to go to your address bar, type the word MAP followed by a space, then the location you want mapped. You can also load up quick driving directions using Google Maps in particular, which I’ll cover in a moment.

We’ll cover three popular mapping sites, Bing Maps, Google Maps and Yahoo! Maps.

Note the following web addresses. These are not for clicking but rather for copying/pasting per your respective browser.

Bing Maps: http://www.bing.com/maps/default.aspx?where1=%s

Google Maps: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=%s

Yahoo! Maps: http://maps.yahoo.com/?q1=%s

How to use via MAP keyword in your browser

Google Chrome

1. Click the wrench icon and select Options.

2. Click the Basics tab, then click the Manage button next to Default Search:

3. The Search Engines window will pop up. Click Add on top right.

4. From the new small pop-up window that appears, fill it out with the appropriate information:

Mozilla Firefox

1. Go to your mapping site of choice and bookmark it using CTRL+D or by clicking the star at the far right of the address bar.

2. Click Bookmarks then Organize Bookmarks.

3. From the new window that appears (Library), select Recently Bookmarked.

4. Edit the mapping site bookmark by clicking it once.

5. Change to suit, like this:

(The two things changed above were Location and Keyword; the rest were left as is)

Opera

1. Drop down the menu for your search bar and click Manage Search Engines:

2. From the pop-up window that appears, fill out the information to suit:

..and click OK.

How to use

Once set up, go to the address bar of your browser, type the word map, followed by a space, and then the place you want mapped.

Example using Google Chrome:

Getting quick driving directions using Google Maps

The from: and to: operators will work using this keyword shortcut.

Example using Firefox:

If you have your browser configured to use Google Maps, typing the above in the address bar will load Google Maps with driving directions per the locations you used. It works with almost any type of location, from vague (as shown above) to very specific addresses.

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