Apple took the user interface for setting the default Web Search page out of the Internet preferences panel. That means you have to override the built-in default in each Web browser, if you don't want to use Excite. I prefer Google, so my example uses Google. To change the default search page, open Terminal, and enter the following (immensely complicated) command
all on one line:
defaults write com.apple.internetconfig "Version 2.5.3" =
{ "ic-added" = { WebSearchPagePrefs = {"ic-data" =
"http://www.google.com/"; }; }; }; "ic-deleted" = (); };
Unfortunately, this hint will break when Apple bumps the version number. To learn the version number, do this:
defaults find Version | grep -2 internetconfig
Shame on Apple for removing this from the GUI.