Address Book search function doesn't work

Hello Zach:

Try deleting your friend and then reentering the information. Perhaps something went wrong when the item was originally entered.

Barry

Hi again:

Try trashing the preference file (com.apple.addressbook.plist) and restart the computer.

Barry

P.S. If the does not work, I would try reinstalling the application. If that does not help, I would do an archive and install. If that fails,???????

Barry

Hi Zach:

The application is bundled, but I think you can extract it from the software install DVD and then reinstall it. I have not needed to do this myself. In the "old days" people used a separate program to do this. I dimly remember reading that a separate program is not necessary any more

Barry

Hi The Zack,

In case you think you are crazy, I can confirm that in this area you are not. I just switched from years of PC drudgery to the the new Mac religion. I even switched all my email/address/calendar stuff to pure Apple. Some bumps and hiccups, but still I guess the real test is when I log back onto my old PC I feel like I am watching a rerun of a black and white sitcom.

I digress. On of my hiccups is exactly the same as yours. Address Book is always able to search. It seems a good number of the names in my address book can not be found by typing in any part of their information in the search box. I could not fix this by duplicating the address entry, but I could get it work by hand typing in a new duplicate address entry. I am hoping you and Barry discover a cleaner solution to this.

Thx, Kmon23

Ah...make that "Address book is NOT always able to search."

I just noticed the same exact problem. Search is not working properly within the Address Book app. I deleted my plist file and rebooted - no effect, other than to trash all my preferences, thank you very much.

This is a bug and it should be reported and addressed as such. Please do not recommend reinstalling the OS unless you're familiar with the cause and fix for the issue. This is a huge waste of time for the unsuspecting user.

Found a half-assed workaround if this only affects a few entries... Making any edit to the contact willl fix the search function for that contact. You don't even have to enter edit mode - just click in the notes field and type a space and a backspace and that will fix that person's contact. However I have over 200 contacts in my address book and this is not a practical option. Plus I'm concerned about what caused this issue and when it might occur again.

If someone talks to Apple support, please share their feedback here...

Quit Address Book and drag ~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook/AddressBook-v22.abcddb to the desktop. It will be rebuilt from the details in Metadata when you restart AB. I find this fixes the problem - but I don't know what causes it.

You're welcome.

Can't take credit for the fix, though. I quoted Austin Kinsella1's answer from a related thread... ;-D