Update, Mozilla Firefox asks me every time I use the little search box on the toolbar which search engine would I like to use. It took me back a little that it defaulted to Yahoo!
I have already reset back to my regular default engine. While it still pops a menu asking which one I would like to use, ignoring that will just use your default. Which was Yahoo!, until you change it in your settings. There is also a link to change your settings in the menu.
Not only was Google already the default before the update, but I was under the impression that Mozilla, Firefox was the property of Google? So has there been a change of owner, or maybe Google has swallowed Yahoo! ?
No, I don’t think Mozilla was ever owned by Google. They are an independent organization, spun off from Netscape back in the First Age of Middle Earth.
And my hat’s off to you if you have the testicular fortitude to keep using Firefox in this day and age. I gave up on it long ago as an unmanageable resource hog.
That looks messed up!
Trying to revert to Google it says “You need a Mozilla-based browser to install extensions”
If Firefox isn’t Mozilla based I don’t know what is" (Ubuntu 14.10 Utopic Unicorn)
My recent upgrade of Linux Mint 17.1 Rebecca is the same.
Mozilla partnered with Yahoo recently. Previously they had a partnership with Google. Presumably Yahoo is offering them more money. (Mozilla gets millions in revenues from these partnerships.)
You shouldn’t need an extension to make this change. Go to Tools, Options, Search and do it there. (At least that’s how the Windows version works. Presumably the Linux version is the same.)
Exactly what I did.
They’ll fix it soon enough no doubt.
Edit:
And I see it has changed 
If you want to return your browser to its prior mode of operation, open your configuration by typing “about:config” in the address bar (sans quotes, of course). Search for “browser.search.showOneOffButtons”, and set this to FALSE.
I pretty much only use Google for searching, but I do look things up in Wikipedia. The new widget makes it easy to search Wikipedia without having to switch your search window over. I like it.
There are three browsers on my pc, and only two I will use. FF, Chrome, and the ever popular Internet Explorer. The only use I have for IE is to download FireFox. Chrome is my backup once in awhile. I really should use it more so I can learn how to use it better. Will probably never happen unless Mozilla crashes and burns making FireFox unavailable.
It should not have reverted anyone who was currently using Google as their default. That it did is one of a huge list of bugs on this poorly implemented upgrade. It was something that was supposed to be in Firefox 37, but they rushed it out for some reason. They could have just changed new users over to Yahoo by default, and waited to get the full experience, but no.
Have you also noticed that you very often can’t see the entire search suggestion, so you don’t know if you picked the right thing? Or that the header and settings buttons are much larger than the actual parts you would regularly click on? Or did you Google how to revert back to the old way until it was fixed and find that the option doesn’t work properly?
It’s worse than the halfbaked implementation of the built-in malware scan, where they forgot to give you an option to go ahead anyways, full well knowing that the system would give a lot of false positives just because the program was not recognized.
The quality of Mozilla’s work is going downhill, fast. I know I’m the guy who promotes Firefox on here, but even I’m starting to try and transition to Chrome. If only they let me have multiple rows of tabs, I’d already be there. I’ve transitioned everywhere but on my main computer, and transitioned all the people whose computers I manage.
Is there anyway to get the old search engine style back? I liked clicking in a specific search engine and it leaving it there until I switch it. Anyway to restore it? Can I uninstall this version and roll back?
Anyway, my Google remained the default engine upon update.
As soon as I upgraded (automatic) to Firefox 34, it started crashing, 3 or 4 times the first day. I immediately reverted back to to 33, and the only problem I had was that Firefox alerted me every couple of hours to upgrade, so I had to reset to never alert me (not recommended for security issues, it warns me). Now there is a tab on Yahoo mailbox to click to upgrade, but that’s easy to ignore. 33 works fine. It’s still better than Chrome, in my opinion – more user-friendly and less intrusive into my other sites which are under the Google umbrella. I refuse to even install Chrome.
As for default search engine, I just keep one in my bookmarks toolbar, to click when I want to search.
I just installed Firefox 33 again and everything is back to normal. I hope someone makes an extension to add the traditional(normal?) search engine back. I hate not having it.
Somewhere in the drop-down menu there’s an option to choose your default search engine. It took me a few minutes to figure out but once I did I’m back to the old (Google) search even with the latest version of Firefox.
Is that why it keeps telling me I need to update my Shockwave Flash?
I love that Firefox’s new “one click search” actually takes two clicks; one to bring up the menu and one to select a search engine from the menu.
Someone felt a need to mess with something that wasn’t broken. Maybe Jony Ives is moonlighting.
It seems to be the fad, take a whole toybox of broken half working toys, and ignore them. Then take this functional toy that everybody knows and enjoys and make it flashy, and destroying half the functionality by changing every control. Then throw it in the toybox with all of the other crap and ignore all the WTH?
It might just be me though. I would enjoy an hour or two tweaking and poking around finding the settings I wanted. Many, many, years ago. Not so much anymore.