The Flaru apps menu was a hub for the search service’s settings, information and help: an About page, language options, appearance preferences, social links and support guides. Those tools aren’t offered here any more, but the useful parts (a dark or light theme, results that open the way you like, the right language and quick access to help) can all be set up in your own browser and search engine in about ten minutes.
What the Flaru apps menu held
Flaru’s apps page worked as a navigation hub. It brought together general information on the About page, preferences for language and appearance, links to Flaru’s social channels (more on those in our piece on Flaru social media) and support documentation explaining how to use search. The settings covered choices such as the visual theme and how result links opened, while the language options helped visitors reach information in the language they preferred. The menu also described other features of the service.
Keeping preferences together in one place was a good idea. Today the same choices are split between your operating system, your browser and your search engine, which is why people so often can’t find them. Here’s where each one lives.
Theme: dark or light, everywhere at once
The easiest way to get a consistent theme is to set it once at the system level. On Windows, look under Personalisation in Settings; on a Mac, under Appearance in System Settings; on a phone, in the Display settings. Most browsers follow the system theme by default, and the major search engines follow the browser, so one switch changes everything.
If you want a different look for search alone, Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo each have an appearance or theme option in their own settings. The setup I’d recommend is “follow the system”, with your device switching automatically in the evening where it supports that.
How result links open
Flaru let you choose how result links opened, and it’s a surprisingly personal preference. Some people want every result in a new tab so the results page stays put; others find that leaves them with forty tabs by lunchtime.
Some search engines include a setting for opening results in a new tab or window. If yours doesn’t, or you only want it sometimes, there’s a shortcut that works everywhere: middle-click a link with a mouse, or Ctrl+click on Windows (Cmd+click on a Mac), to open it in a background tab. On a phone, a long press on a link offers an “open in new tab” option. Once that becomes a habit, you rarely need a setting at all.
Language and region settings
Language settings live in two places, and they need to agree. Your browser keeps a list of preferred languages, in order, which websites use to decide which version to show you. Your search engine has its own language and region settings, which affect both its interface and which results rank first.
If you keep seeing results in the wrong language or for the wrong country, check both. Add every language you read to the browser’s list with your main one at the top, and set the search engine’s region to where you actually want results from. For pages that only exist in another language, most browsers can translate in place; look for a translate icon in the address bar or an option in the browser menu.
A worked example: one setup, ten minutes
Nadia works with clients in English and Spanish, and she was tired of results flipping between languages and her screen glaring at her late at night. Here’s what she changed:
- Set her laptop to switch between light and dark automatically, and left the browser on its “use system theme” option.
- Added Spanish below English in the browser’s language list, so sites offer English first without hiding Spanish pages.
- Set her search engine’s region to her home country and its language to English, rather than letting it guess from wherever she happened to be travelling.
- Made her preferred search engine the browser’s default, so typing in the address bar searches it directly.
- Bookmarked the search engine’s help page and two research sites she relies on in a “Reference” folder on the bookmarks bar.
The whole thing took about ten minutes. She ended up skipping the new-tab setting and uses Ctrl+click instead, because she likes choosing tab by tab.
Keep help and reference pages one click away
Flaru put its support guides in the same menu as its settings, and that’s a habit worth copying. A small “Reference” folder on your bookmarks bar does the same job: your search engine’s help page, the help centre for any tool you use at work, and a guide or two you keep returning to. When something changes, you’ll reach the official explanation faster than you’d find a forum thread about it.
For the searching itself, our page on replacing Flaru search covers the operators worth knowing, such as quotes, site: and filetype:, and how to combine them.
FAQ
Are Flaru apps still available?
No. Flaru’s apps menu, its settings and the features it listed aren’t offered on this site. The preferences it covered can be set in your browser and search engine instead.
How do I change the default search engine in my browser?
Open your browser’s settings and look for a section about search or the address bar; Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari all have one. Pick an engine from the list, or add another if yours isn’t shown.
How do I make search results open in a new tab?
Check your search engine’s settings for a new-tab option. Otherwise, middle-click or Ctrl+click (Cmd+click on a Mac) any result to open it in a new tab without changing a thing.
