Best Spotlight replacement?

[VideoBeagle]

Ok, Spotlight is and has always been awful.

I can do Ctrl F, type in the full name of a folder, and rather than it pop up, I get tons of garbage until I go the next step of saying "kind is folder"

Ridiculous. And Apple will never fix it, because they don't fix anything.

So, what's a good or best file search replacement? HoudahSpot? something else?

 

[Ganesha]

Ok, Spotlight is and has always been awful.

I can do Ctrl F, type in the full name of a folder, and rather than it pop up, I get tons of garbage until I go the next step of saying "kind is folder"

Ridiculous. And Apple will never fix it, because they don't fix anything.

So, what's a good or best file search replacement? HoudahSpot? something else?

Finder's Find and Spotlight are two different things.

 

[VideoBeagle]

Only in interface. The use the same algorithm and systems and they're awful.

 

[Joshsand]

spotlight filtering

I struggled with spotlight - especially as there seems to be no documentation.

In finder I have set - under VIEW
1. tick - AS LIST
2. Tick - ARRANGE BY = KIND

This means that as you type in your search "details" then spotlight / finder then produces list of results by different category .
ie - FOLDER
DOCUMENTS
PDF
etc - it sorts as it finds. Therefore no post filtering req'd.

 

[GGJstudios]

Ok, Spotlight is and has always been awful.

I can do Ctrl F, type in the full name of a folder, and rather than it pop up, I get tons of garbage until I go the next step of saying "kind is folder"

Ridiculous. And Apple will never fix it, because they don't fix anything.

So, what's a good or best file search replacement? HoudahSpot? something else?

If you want the kind of results you're looking for, don't use Spotlight to search. Instead, perform searches in Finder, which gives you far more control over your search criteria. As long as your drive is properly indexed, you'll find whatever you're looking for.

 

[Ganesha]

Only in interface. The use the same algorithm and systems and they're awful.

That may be, but if you initiate a search with option-command-space that search returns items ordered based on your Spotlight preferences. If you set folders as the top level spotlight result it will return those first every time. If you initiate the search with command-F it always starts off items sorted by name.

 

[Weaselboy]

Ok, Spotlight is and has always been awful.

I can do Ctrl F, type in the full name of a folder, and rather than it pop up, I get tons of garbage until I go the next step of saying "kind is folder"

Ridiculous. And Apple will never fix it, because they don't fix anything.

So, what's a good or best file search replacement? HoudahSpot? something else?

I have been using iFileX instead of Finder. It does not use the Spotlight index and is very configurable.

 

[VideoBeagle]

If you want the kind of results you're looking for, don't use Spotlight to search. Instead, perform searches in Finder, which gives you far more control over your search criteria. As long as your drive is properly indexed, you'll find whatever you're looking for.

My point is...If I hit cmd-F and type in the name of a file,. THE FIRST THING I should see is the actual name of a file. I shouldn't need to go into the pull down menus to add criteria.

Look at the screen shot.. There's a folder with the name I'm searching for.
Those items that show up aren't even in that folder. It is conceivable that the closet those files have to do with the folder I'm looking for is that I've discussed the PDF with the person that folder is shared with. (and this is an example, this is not a search for folder problem alone.).


*************

WeaselBoy, thanx for the recommendation. I'll give it a look!

 

[GGJstudios]

My point is...If I hit cmd-F and type in the name of a file,. THE FIRST THING I should see is the actual name of a file. I shouldn't need to go into the pull down menus to add criteria.

Look at the screen shot.. There's a folder with the name I'm searching for.
Those items that show up aren't even in that folder. It is conceivable that the closet those files have to do with the folder I'm looking for is that I've discussed the PDF with the person that folder is shared with. (and this is an example, this is not a search for folder problem alone.).

When you search, it defaults to searching the contents of files and folders for your search criteria. If you want to limit it to searching just the names of files or folders, you have to specify that.

 

[davedev100]

If you use Spotlight itself (magnifying glass, upper right) it will return the search results grouped by category with the folder easily clickable in the results.

 

[robgendreau]

Yeah HoudahSpot. You can create templates which should speed up repetitive searches.

 

[Dark Dragoon]

Those items that show up aren't even in that folder.

In Finders preferences in the Advanced tab, you can choose what the default search scope is.
I prefer to only search the folder I'm in and its subfolders so I choose "Search the Current Folder" from the drop down.

 

[ElectronGuru]

Spotlight on pad and mac is geared toward content, something I rarely search for, so I rarely find it useful. Check out easyfind in the Mac App Store. The way file search should be.

 

[Fishrrman]

Just tried iFileX on the recommendation of Weaselboy in post 7 above -- it's very nice.

I've never liked Spotlight nor its indexing which goes on in the background.
I prefer a utility which I open, set my parameters, then it does its thing, then it presents me with results.

The only shortcoming I see with iFileX is that it doesn't seem to search for "text content" within files.

Back in the Mac Classic days, there were utilties such as "SearchText" that could scavenge files for text content, but I have yet to see a really good equivalent in OS X.

So, questions for all:
Other than Spotlight, what do you use for "searching for text strings" in your files?
Anything that can search text in pdf files, as well?