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Unwanted extras in a URL

Sometime in the last couple of days I was at a hospital (don’t worry) that offered free wi-fi. Like many free wi-fi services, it required saying yes to something on a “welcome” page before allowing me to move along to the page my browser had requested.Now I’m elsewhere, but the page — Google — won’t come up. Instead the browser substitutes this URL: https://wireless.lifebridgehealth.org/logon?http://www.google.com/ . I can edit the URL to remove all but the google part, but the browser automatically fills in the rest of the unwanted lifebridgehealth.org text.

How do I get rid of that? Anybody know? The browser is Firefox 2.0.0.6.

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Doc Searls

10 responses to “Unwanted extras in a URL”

  1. Petar Vasić Avatar
    Petar Vasić

    I’m not sure, but try emptying cache in Firefox, that might help…

    Reply
  2. Sheila Lennon Avatar
    Sheila Lennon

    Sounds like your autocomplete is ruling. If you start to type “g-o-o” in the location, a dropdown should appear with that wrong url in it. Put your cursor on the listing in the dropdown and hit the Del key. Then type Google as usual, and the write one should take over.

    Reply
  3. Jim Thompson Avatar
    Jim Thompson

    Two things:

    First, attempt to flush the Firefox cache with Preferences->Advanced->Cache->Clear Now (on a Mac, anyway)

    otherwise, type “lookupd -flushcache” at a Terminal session.

    Reply
  4. Doc Searls Avatar
    Doc Searls

    it’s not autocomplete. And the hospital URL doesn’t begin with google.com. It ends with that. It’s good to know I can delete unwanted autocompletes, though. Didn’t know that berfore.

    Reply
  5. Doc Searls Avatar
    Doc Searls

    Okay, fixed it by clearing the cache.

    Thanks, all.

    Reply
  6. Sheila Lennon Avatar
    Sheila Lennon

    Did you lose anything else when you deleted your cache?

    Reply
  7. Jim Thompson Avatar
    Jim Thompson

    lose? Unlikely anything he can’t get back. Firefox will eventually over-write the older cache entries.

    The real fault here is the hospital’s “c(r)aptive portal” software, likely sending back a 301 (permanently moved) when he attempts to ‘hit’ google.com

    Reply
  8. Doc Searls Avatar
    Doc Searls

    Not sure yet. We’ll see. Right now I’m busy taking pictures of the new grandchild. 🙂

    Reply
  9. Sheila Lennon Avatar
    Sheila Lennon

    Jim, I’m always remembering something I want to go back and get for a blog post, and it’s often easier to find it in the cache than in the history. I’ve made a habit of leaving the cache alone.

    Reply
  10. CGHill Avatar
    CGHill

    I even put a shortcut to the actual cache folder on the desktop (yes, I’m one of those Wintel people), sorted by date. The filenames are not much use, but time and size go a long way to identifying files.

    Reply

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