This 'cheat' will work with the side effect that the glyphicon class will change the font for the input control.
<input class="form-control glyphicon" type="search" placeholder=""/>
If you want to get rid of the side effect you can remove the "glyphicon" class and add the following CSS (There may be a better way to style the placeholder pseudo element and I've only tested on Chrome).
.form-control[type="search"]::-webkit-input-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
.form-control[type="search"]:-moz-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
.form-control[type="search"]::-moz-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
.form-control[type="search"]:-ms-input-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
Possibly an even cleaner solution:
CSS
.form-control.glyphicon {
font-family:inherit;
}
.form-control.glyphicon::-webkit-input-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
.form-control.glyphicon:-moz-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
.form-control.glyphicon::-moz-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
.form-control.glyphicon:-ms-input-placeholder:first-letter {
font-family:"Glyphicons Halflings";
}
HTML
<input class="form-control glyphicon" type="search" placeholder=" search" />
<input class="form-control glyphicon" type="text" placeholder=" username" />
<input class="form-control glyphicon" type="password" placeholder=" password" />