''Restoring Google Search page as the home page''

What you are looking at on the web page is a '''search form''', not a search bar.   Mozilla changed the default home page to '''about:home''' which is supposed to be faster because it is on your computer, but they piled on a few ornaments.   There is a space which is essentially advertising space for Mozilla, or to tell you that you have a previous session available below the search form area.

You can replace that page with a real Google Search page  http://www.google.com  which like other Google pages has links at the top to other Google applications and tells you if you are logged into Google such as for GMail.

"Alt" > Tools > '''Options''' > General > 
:When Firefox starts:  "Show my homepage":
:Home Page:   http://www.google.com
:Press  "Ok" at the bottom of the options window.

Specific information on installing a home page is in
:http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/How%20to%20set%20the%20home%20page

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''Some problems with terminology''

The '''search bar''' is part of your toolbars and you can bring up any search engine you want in it. 

Google has their  own "Google Toolbar" extension, which you would do well to avoid.


The large empty space on the '''about:home''' default home page, is to tell you that you have a previous session available.   You don't need that notification you can bring up your "Previous Session" from the History menu, and after that you can bring up previous windows (or all of them also from same History menu).

In fact if you would like to see the notification at the end of your session, enabling you to restore your current tabs see item #31 (#tabslost) in the following: ...

You can make Firefox '''Firefox 5.0'''  look like Firefox 3.6.18, see numbered items 1-10 in the following topic [http://dmcritchie.mvps.org/firefox/firefox-problems.htm#fx4interface Fix Firefox 4.0 toolbar user interface, problems (Make Firefox 5.0, or 4.0.1, look like 3.6)].  ''Whether or not you make changes, you should be aware of what has changed and what you have to do to use changed or missing features.'' 

''the-edmeister added or would replace the above also in Q850348 with  this, which
I'm not sure what it is changing''

With only the '''about:home''' homepage loaded, paste this code into the URL / Location Bar, and hit Enter.

     
 javascript:{localStorage["search-engine"]="{\"name\":\"Google\",\"searchUrl\":\"http://www.google.com/search?q=_searchTerms_&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a\"}";void(0);}
  

This code is supposed to reset the '''searchContainer''' search engine on the about:home "page".

If the '''Google''' logo doesn't reappear and the searchContainer is still dead after running that code, your '''localStorage''' may be disabled. If so, '''localStorage''' will need to be re-enabled and that code run again.

Let us know it that works or not.  



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You can foil most attempts to change your about:config setting of keyword.URL by setting the preference in your  user.js file in your profile, which you can modify while Firefox is up, simply add the following two lines  (the first is a comment).
  
   // override unauthorized attempts to change keyword.URL
   user_pref("keyword.URL", "http://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=");

'''user.js''' does not exist by default you have to create the file in your Firefox folder which you can get to quickly  through  about:support   then click on "Open Containing Folder:" and create or modify user.js

More information on user.js  in
*http://kb.mozillazine.org/User.js_file

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This is not something that would happen to me as I never allow any external search to occur at the Location Bar except through a keyword shortcut,  so there are fewer accidents to be made when searching.   I probably have a couple of hundred specialized search keyword bookmarks specifically relating to search engines.
*http://dmcritchie.mvps.org/firefox/search.htm
*http://dmcritchie.mvps.org/firefox/kws.htm