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Level 1

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The world's most advanced OS cannot search network drives?

I have set up my mac at work to connect to the smb network, yet I cannot search the shared folders via the finder.

I have looked high and low for a solution, read various threads (such as https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2677028?start=15&tstart=0 ), yet there does not seem to be a way to search via the finder.

I will pre-empt the apologists here, thanks, I don't want to hear you point of view about how I don't need this fuction. I don't want to hear how os x uses and index and apple are wise to disable it in network drives (yet they are not wise enough to implement any other way to search said drives...). I want to put my point across that they better fix it soon.

I also want to hear other people who 've run into this problem and if they 've found any work arounds. There's a free app called easyfind but I am not that happy with it, and there's also some convoluted terminal work around that has to be repeated every time os x starts from what I 've been reading.

I will also be submitting feedback to apple. Ios looking fancy artifacts are all good and well (I dislike them, but I am not that much bothered) but what about some real functionality in core os services such as the finder?

Does any one at the os x team really think it's acceptable in 2012 that your mac connects to a network drive in an office and can't search it? I am using a folder in the network to store my work and I can't search that folder to quickly find something to show to a colleague? What do you expect me to do copy it over to my local drive, use a third party app to sync it to the network, and search my local drive instead?

Mac OS X (10.7.3)

Posted on Feb 23, 2012 2:57 AM

17 replies

Csound1

Level 9

59,973 points

Oct 4, 2012 5:47 AM in response to two freckles

two freckles wrote:

And? He didn't quote himself did he ? It was Apple support's asnwer as far as I understand (if thats not the case I appologize).

You have some proof of that I assume,

Oct 9, 2012 5:53 PM in response to applesuper

I work in an office with 10 + macs of various models and ages. Most are running Snow Leapord or Lion. We keep our master image file on a Mac Pro and when I need an image I select the shared folder on that Mac Pro over the network and type a keyword and hey presto all the files containig that word in the file name or meta description are displayed as results.

Last week I updated my iMac to Mountain Lion and suddenly I can't search over the network. I get either no results or results that I know to be ommiting files that exist.

As with the original post on this thread I've re-indexed Spotlight on both machines, repaiered permissions, zapped p-ram and all the other usual fixes with no luck.

Strangly on the iMac when I search locally it also does not display results correctly. I use Photoshop actions to make multiple size versions of raw images for use in different formats. After running the Photoshop action I then use search to quickly find the new images. For years now when I search my computer it would show me the new images right at the top of the results because I was displaying by date created. Now when I create new images they appear at the bottom of the search results under the heading "No Date", yet if I select the image I can see the correct date and time created in the file info.

Something is seriously wrong with Spotlight in Mountain Lion and it really needs fixing soon.

The world's most advanced OS cannot search network drives?