Policy needed: "Go to an intranet site for a one-word entry in the Address bar"

Microsoft

Nov 14, 2019

Thank you, ToMMeR for confirming the dot fix works as expected! I'm glad to hear it meets your needs.

@ToMMeR, @Aaron Roma, @Omega47, @AngelPRU, @paf_skov and @stesch79, as for the search fallback, I'm pleased to report that we have an implementation ready for you to test! It should be available in the latest Dev channel build (80.0.320.5).

Since the implementation is in such a complex area of our codebase, we have put the fallback behind a command-line feature flag until we have sufficient test coverage to conclude it is behaving as expected, without any unintended consequences.

To test the search fallback, in addition to enabling the policy, please edit your shortcut for Edge Dev to include the feature flag.

Here are instructions:

Right-click on the taskbar shortcut
Right-click on the “Microsoft Edge Dev” item in the context menu which appears after step #1
Click on “Properties” in the second context menu that appears
In the “Target” field, please append “--enable-features=msAllowFallbackSearch” to “C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\Edge Dev\Application\msedge.exe” such that the Target field looks like, “C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\Edge Dev\Application\msedge.exe --enable-features=msAllowFallbackSearch”

Please update to the latest Dev channel build, apply the policy to go to an intranet site for single word entries, set the feature flag in your shortcut and launch Edge dev using that shortcut. You can then attempt to navigate to single word destinations that are not within your Intranets.

Please let us know how the fallback behavior works for you.

As always, thank you very much for your feedback!

Jared (and the entire Microsoft Edge Address Bar & Search Team)

ToMMeR
Brass Contributor
Nov 14, 2019
JaredB81 Fantastic!

I have tested the implementation and it works as expected.

I have tried various combinations of single word entries, and entries with "." and "-".
If the word is not resolved in our DNS it instantly does as Google Search.
If the word exists as a hostname in our DNS, but no web server responds to the request, then it also redirects to a Google Search after timing out (which takes about 20 seconds). This is of course quite a long time to wait, but I think it is acceptable as if the word exists as a hostname in DNS you are most likely trying to access that web server and not search for the word.

I will continue to run on the this Edge Dev version with the feature enabled and let you know if i stumble upon anything unexpected. But I think it works as wished 🙂

Thank you for implementing this feature.
- JaredB81
  Microsoft
  Nov 14, 2019
  Thank you, ToMMeR, for testing our implementation and for confirming this policy now meets your needs, end-to-end, for your organization.
  
  We will continue to monitor feedback from other members of the community and I would love to hear how others on this thread find the experience once they have done similar testing.
  
  We will also continue to conduct internal testing to make sure navigating and searching work seamlessly when this policy is enabled. Once we have completed our testing and have heard from anyone else from the community who is testing the policy with the search fallback command-line flag enabled, we will remove the requirement to set the command-line flag. I’ll post an update on this thread when that takes place.
  
  Finally, ToMMeR, I would be remiss as a member of the Address Bar and Search team to respond to your post without suggesting that you give Bing a try :-). Particularly with the new Microsoft Search in Edge feature which is designed to help members of your organization be even more productive, but with Bing relevance and performance improvements in general, we are working hard to make Bing the very best search experience in Microsoft Edge! Please give it a try – I’d love feedback on how Bing works for you as well :-).
  
  Thanks very much,
  
  Jared on behalf of the entire Address Bar and Search Team
  - ToMMeR
    Brass Contributor
    Nov 15, 2019
    JaredB81 I have found a scenario where Edge does not react the way I intended/wished.
    
    We have some internal websites that is using a self signed certificate not from our CA (Usually test systems, or appliances where it for some reason have been decided not to change the certificate).
    This of course results in the "Your connection isn't private" (NET::ERR_CERT_AUTHORITY_INVALID) screen where you can then choose to continue even though it is "unsafe".
    These systems do redirect to HTTPS if you try to access them on HTTP.
    
    When trying to access one of these websites using just their hostname I very quickly see the redirect to HTTPS as i see the "Your connection isn't private" for a split second and then i am redirected to a search engine search.

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Policy needed: "Go to an intranet site for a one-word entry in the Address bar"

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