I can't seem to rebuild the indexing used for Finder on my Mac. I just want to search my computer with a Finder search facility. I don't need to search anywhere else. I can use other tools for that. It's a pretty basic thing to have - an index of your files!! Why is this so difficult?!!
[Re-Titled by Moderator]
MacBook Air (M2, 2023)
Your Mac does this automatically unless you turned off Spotlight or limited its search capabilities.
Go to System Preferences > Spotlight. Check both Search Results & Privacy tabs to make sure Spotlight is indexing what you want. (IMHO Search Results is misnamed; it's really "categories that will be searched (or not)."
If you really need to rebuild the Spotlight index, here are the instructions -> Rebuild the Spotlight index on your Mac - Apple Support
Your Mac does this automatically unless you turned off Spotlight or limited its search capabilities.
Go to System Preferences > Spotlight. Check both Search Results & Privacy tabs to make sure Spotlight is indexing what you want. (IMHO Search Results is misnamed; it's really "categories that will be searched (or not)."
If you really need to rebuild the Spotlight index, here are the instructions -> Rebuild the Spotlight index on your Mac - Apple Support
Find Any File...
http://apps.tempel.org/FindAnyFile/index.php
Hold Option or alt key when selecting Find to Find All.
I just need an index for the files on my computer's hard drive. Having an index for files on your hard drive has always been a basic requirement on an operating system??!!
I have followed your instructions for rebuilding a 'spotlight' index which included excluding my hard drive files. I don't know how the spotlight index interacts with Finder, but I still can't use Finder to find files on my hard drive (and Spotlight doesn't look apparently).
Please give me instructions on rebuilding an index for my local hard drive files as this hasn't worked.
Thanks
How to resolve Finder Indexing Issue on MacBook Air
