Spotlight not working in Mail

[luminol]

Hi, until a few days ago everything on my mac was working fine with tiger... but now spotlight is not working properly in Mail. It no longer searches the entire text of my emails. The other search options all work (to/from etc) but when I select 'entire message' I always get no results no matter what i search for. Same thing happens when I do a full search of my system... it won't search text of mail messages.

Any suggestions?

 

[daveli]

Library Folder in Privacy

In the Spotlight Preference, did you put your Library Folder in the Privacy List. That will prevent Soptlight from searching in these locations. You email info is store in you Library Folder. If you have, take it off your list and Spotlight will search all your emails again.

 

[Mitthrawnuruodo]

Apple has a suggestion, but I'm not sure this applies here... have you tried the usual stuff: repairing permissions and a restart...?

 

[hupalmer]

same "entire message" problem

I have the same problem as the first poster, mail's spotlight will turn up search results when switched to "to", "from", or "subject", but displays zero results when switched to entire message. There's nothing in the privacy pane of spotlight preferences, so it's not that... has anyone any other ideas?
what's involved in repairing permissions as was suggested? not something I've ever done (on purpose, anyway!)
Many thanks
Hugh

 

[iMeowbot]

The privacy list trick can fix many spotlight problems. If you didn't happen to have your home folder in there as Apple suggests, try dragging your system disk into there, and then back out again. This will cause Spotlight to reindex everything from scratch. You could try dragging only your home folder in there and back out to see if that gets your Spotlight fixed more quickly, but it may or may not work.

 

[hupalmer]

problem solved..

Magically, everything is working as it should...all I did was download the new improved Tiger update v10.4.2..
Hope this works for anyone else who has met with this malfunction.
Many thanks
Hugh

 

[luminol]

hmm... still doesn't work for me

 

[Lacero]

Apple should just add a button in Spotlight preferences to allow for re-indexing without doing a song and dance with adding then removing volumes to force a re-index.

 

[luminol]

The privacy list trick can fix many spotlight problems. If you didn't happen to have your home folder in there as Apple suggests, try dragging your system disk into there, and then back out again. This will cause Spotlight to reindex everything from scratch. You could try dragging only your home folder in there and back out to see if that gets your Spotlight fixed more quickly, but it may or may not work.

i'm trying this now