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Spotlight search keeps reindexing and not working

Hi there:

Long story short; Any idea at all why spotlight keeps reindeing, crashes and never finishes?

Background & Symptom:

Since upgrading to Mavericks my Spotlight haven't been indexing and searching properly. My main issue is Mail App because I search there 30-50 times a day but I can see the symptom is also there with searching for Apps or files. I've tried absolutely everything, been Googling and been on chat and phone support with Apple (still have time left on my extra warranty) at least 20 times and must say its shown no results so far.

Detail:

I've got 2 drives in it - 1 HDD and 1 SSD - everything OS, Apps and Mail is on the main SSD drive and I've even tried to have spotlight just index that but to no avail.

It worked prior to the upgrade from Mountain Lion to Mavericks.

I can see in console that my mds_stores crashes constantly (which maybe explains the behaviour) - maybe ~20 times a day.

The main thread that crashes is "com.apple.metadata.spotlightindex" but there are a couple of others too rarely (MDSSecureStore and com.apple.libdispatch-manager)

The other thing they all have in common is this message:

Exception Type: EXC_BAD_ACCESS (SIGSEGV)

and 50% of the mds_stores crashes have this in common:

Exception Codes: KERN_INVALID_ADDRESS at 0x0000000100000001

Here's some of the things I've done (and some of them many times in various orders):

- Reinstalled OS X Mavericks bare and reinstall/repaired on top of the existing install

- Moved a lot of the IMAP mails into local folders

- Tried different user account

- Uninstalled all kinds of stuff on the machine in case anything of that was the culrit

- Spotlight reindexing (both by dragging my drive into the spotlight exclusion as well as via the command line mdutil commands etc)

- Turned off FileVault (had to in order to get into Safe Mode)

- Reset PRAM (Cmd+Option+R+P)

- Have repaired disk permissions

- Have rebooted in safe mode

- Have rebooted in Recovery console and run resetpasswd/resetpassword and fixed ACLs

- Tried disabling everything but my mails in spotlight (Mail App)

- Lots of other things...

Any ideas at all?? I had to write here because I've rn out of options and I have on faith that Apple can sort it out (its been more than a month of open support cases).

Thanks a lot even for any ideas you might have!!

Cheers,

Daniel

MacBook Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Dec 9, 2013 4:22 AM

39 replies

Jan 23, 2014 4:54 PM in response to Daniel_iversen

Another beta release 3 of 10.9.2 was just released (build 13C44) - wonder if Apple has fixed it, anyone going to give it a go?

Jan 24, 2014 2:57 AM in response to Daniel_iversen

Seems like Apple isn't very responsive to bug reports on this e.g.:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5490918?answerId=24613758022#24613758022

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5490918?answerId=24618591022#24618591022

Its very bad manners that they don't respond at all if you ask me!

I've also just today created a bug report 15898059 via https://bugreport.apple.com (and included the result from mddiagnostics as was suggested earlier), lets see what happens.

I woul like to get my hands on on the patch 10.9.2 beta build 13C44 to see if that helps, or has anyone tried it yet?

Also I just deleted my envelope indexes but that didn't help either.

Any further thoughts on how to sorting out mail search is much appreciated.

Cheers,

Daniel

Jan 24, 2014 3:14 AM in response to Daniel_iversen

Hope they figure out that we are talking about the same problem so it can get the "votes" to get attention. They get about 6600 reports every day. The first to hope for is that it gets the "Duplicate" status.

I installed 13C44 this morning. No reindexing yet. But it is too early to tell. It could also be because I excluded the 6 GB of my email I have on iCloud. Perhaps there is one mail in there causing the problem.

Perhaps my habit of leaving everything in my inbox is bad. I could archive most of it. That might make life easier for the indexer.

Cheers

Henrik

Jan 27, 2014 8:23 PM in response to Henrik Dalgaard

After a few days now, that patch does indeed solve the problem completely for me, thanks Henrik also for testing on your end!

Jan 28, 2014 12:05 AM in response to Daniel_iversen

The problem has not come back, and I now index my entire Mac. I believe that Apple fixed this one!

And the problem is still on my other Mac which is not upgraded to 10.9.2.

Selv tak,

Henrik

Feb 2, 2014 9:03 PM in response to Daniel_iversen

Well... just curious about this problem (That is a reality for me, but I have TWO similar computers with the same MAC version... and the same information). Why? cause I wanted to upgrade my computer. I have a lot of problems with space with the other computer (MACB AIR MID 2011) and the other computer lastest version (MID 2013, with twice ram mem and twice SDD), that I got four days ago.

SO I copied all the info to the new computer using the TIME MACHINE backup... guess what... in the former computer I DO NOT HAVE the problem... I can search and everything works fine... however in the new one... NADA FUNCIONA (NOTHING WORKS with the email search).... I can not search with email... same software... same computer... same information... so I can guess this problem is a bug with the connection with hardware of the NEW computer. I am an electronics engineer and LONG TIME AGO even I use design Electronic cirtuits and develop software from mainframe to micros.... but NOW I am in business... so i prefer to buy a new software that waiting for the solution. Anyway lets try a couple of questions to you guys...

- I already use OUTLOOK for the emails of my company(I can not use MAC MAIL with the info of the company). BUt the outlook is a REALLY BAD SOFTWARE:... crashes 10 times the day.... so what other MAIL software do you recommend to work with icloud?

- Second: were can I find the 10.9.2 upgrade software?...

FOr more than 10 years I am just in business. I do not do any electronics neither programming (neither go to command console....LOL). In the past I was bored of patching or debuggin PC software... that was the idea of buying a MAC... now I am a usless guy with all the commands you recommended to make... EVEN. ... I do not have time for that.

Thanks in advance for the recommendations.

Alfredo

Feb 3, 2014 1:42 AM in response to Alfredo_RA

Hi Alfredo

The 10.9.2 update comes automatically when it is released. Probably in a not so distant future.

Apple Mail supports Microsoft Exchange when you add an email account. Did that not work? If not that is a good subject for a new thread.

Kind regards,

Henrik

Mar 29, 2014 9:39 AM in response to Daniel_iversen

I'm not sure where the problem is...I'm getting emails to appear in Spotlight but Office for Mac Outlook 2011 won't search. It used to work before upgrading to Mavericks and after the upgrade it stopped.

Nov 17, 2014 7:37 AM in response to Daniel_iversen

Having this problem in 2014.

Opened Console and noticed this: 11/17/14 10:20:07.796 AM mdworker32[3228]: (Warning) Import: import uti:com.makemusic.mus plugin:/Library/Spotlight/Finale.mdimporter uuid:8F7AD1E0-0DB3-11D9-95E0-000A95BA3EA2 1.1 exceeded cpu use limits (12) after 16998 milliseconds sizing:0 - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 4482807

Found a thread that links this problem to Finale 2011 http://forum.makemusic.com/default.aspx?f=6&m=337028

I deleted the offending file and the problem seems to be resolved.

Spotlight search keeps reindexing and not working