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Helpful answers
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Jul 3, 2016 6:09 AM in response to dialabrainby polarrrbear,Sort by size?
I have literally no idea how you're getting that to work.
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Jul 3, 2016 6:11 AM in response to polarrrbearby dialabrain,Okay. Time for an Eggo. Once you re-index Spotlight let me know how it goes.
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Jul 3, 2016 6:18 AM in response to polarrrbearby Barney-15E,Sort by size?
I have literally no idea how you're getting that to work.
We are getting it to work because our Spotlight index seems to be functioning correctly and the only matching item it can find is the single entry. It doesn't matter how it is sorted, arranged, or whatever. There is only one file to show so it will be first, last, and everything in the middle.
You are getting lots of seemingly irrelevant results--we don't know why but suspect a corrupt Spotlight index--and I don't know how it is sorting them, initially.
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Jul 3, 2016 6:24 AM in response to Barney-15Eby polarrrbear,Why is that irrelevant to the problem? I think that's establishing the problem as being with the way Finder's been developed.
If Google displayed searches alphabetically by default would it be usable?
P.S. I've begun reindexing Spotlight even though it's more or less a "have you tried turning it off and on" solution. A store-bought Mac pretty much shows this search irrelevancy problem with enough files. I'm just trying to figure out whether or not there's an alternative, or a couple of settings I can change to fix it.
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Jul 3, 2016 6:25 AM in response to polarrrbearby dialabrain,I have over one million files. I don't think that's it.
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Jul 3, 2016 7:08 AM in response to polarrrbearby Luis Sequeira1,You could type
"kind:application name:texte"
and it would find it.
As has been said already, instead of using Finder search to look for applications. Spotlight is way more effective.
Press Command-space, type "text" (without the quotes), press enter to run TextEdit. No need to even open a Finder window. Or press Command-R and have it selected in the Finder.
Finder search is extremely flexible, as you can define all sorts of criteria, and even combine them with Boolean operations (and, or, not) to search for everything and anything, but you have to understand how it works. As has been said also, typing "textedit" in the search box will search for any file that has it not only the name, but also contents. For example, I get a C header file that has code like "QLineEdit *textEditor;" because it contains the search string in it.
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Jul 3, 2016 8:04 AM in response to polarrrbearby VikingOSX,With a Finder window set to arrange by name, I can search for kind:app +textedit, click on This Mac, and have a single correct result.
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Jul 3, 2016 8:06 PM in response to dialabrainby polarrrbear,Ok, I reindexed Spotlight. Still, expectedly the same. Here's an example of searching for "apple" on an iMac running Leopard. Literally every result contains the word Apple as a title, and you'd probably expect it'd contain it within the file.
…And here's the same search term on El Capitan
I'm assuming "apple" appears in the metadata or it's showing me the file contents of a folder called 'com.apple…' but not the contents of the chat itself. I've got a bunch of scans and then a heap of recorded lecture videos.
10.5 consistently sorts by the same method each time, every time, which defaults to "last opened".
I set 10.11 to "none" and it changes each time, sometimes to last opened, sometimes to name… no idea how it picks.
I tried searching for iTunes in 10.5 and I got the iTunes app, Desktop & Screen Saver (presumably the iTunes screensaver?), iTunes folder, iTunes Library.itl, iTunes Music, Automatically Add to iTunes, CDs & DVDs...
...And in 10.11 even after having iTunes running and open, I had to relaunch iTunes to get it to appear "last opened", second after iTunes Library.itl. There's only 4 iTunes relevant results before music, and then header files and other stuff I don't recall opening.
Just as a side note, it seems that while 10.5 remains the same between tabs, 10.11 switches, and will also locate your last selected file and if it's in column view, open it. So basically once you're already disoriented and try switching tabs back to cover flow, you'll end up a level deeper. You can basically switch them back and forward quickly to open folders to lose your search result – it's great!
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Jul 4, 2016 2:19 AM in response to polarrrbearby Luis Sequeira1,You are right - in 10.11 the search includes the metadata. If you just want to search by content, type "content:apple" and it will produce the same result you got in Leopard. Or type "name:apple" to search for files with "apple" in the name. or "content:apple AND NOT name:stuff" for files that, well I think you get it the general idea.
It is extremely flexible and powerful. You just have to learn how it works.
As for the sorting: it is way easier to use list view (command-2) instead of icon view. You can then sort by any column just by clicking the column header.
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Jul 4, 2016 2:47 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1by polarrrbear,I don't know… I just tried a "contents" search using the drop down plus sign with no search term in the search field… huge amount of license.html files and other junk.
I still maintain that something's changed in search between 10.6 and 10.7 beyond and I definitely much prefer the old Finder (still just as powerful but extra steps weren't necessary.)
If anything, Finder's now worse than it ever was with All My Files and everything else no one ever asked for.
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Jul 4, 2016 2:56 AM in response to polarrrbearby appreciate,An apple article is there : OS X El Capitan: Narrow the scope of your searches
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Jul 4, 2016 2:58 AM in response to polarrrbearby Luis Sequeira1,polarrrbear wrote:
I don't know… I just tried a "contents" search using the drop down plus sign with no search term in the search field… huge amount of license.html files and other junk.
You searched for "anything", so you got "everything" :-)
If anything, Finder's now worse than it ever was with All My Files and everything else no one ever asked for.
"All My Files" is useless for me too. Just command-drag to take it out of the sidebar, and change the preferences so that a new Finder window opens to your home folder or whatever you prefer. Poof!! You don't see it anymore. It does not make the Finder worse, just do as I do and don't use it. Maybe some people like it, but it certainly doesn't bother me. I love Airdrop, on the other hand :-)
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Jul 4, 2016 3:04 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1by polarrrbear,A contents search for apple, just as you said. Not actually nothing. Sorry, I was unclear.
Yeah, I dragged it away ages ago. It's one of the first things I do when I get a new computer.
P.S. I would have preferred anything over All My Files… maybe a cut command as everyone's been asking for, (for about 10 years). Airdrop shows that more isn't really more, plus, there were a heap of complaints (I don't know if they're still around) about the performance issues it caused on many Macs. I don't know what's smart about a dump of files.
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Jul 4, 2016 4:00 AM in response to polarrrbearby dialabrain,polarrrbear wrote:
P.S. I would have preferred anything over All My Files… maybe a cut command as everyone's been asking for, (for about 10 years).
FWIW, there has been the equivalent of a cut command for I'm not sure how many years. Select a file/folder, press Command+C, navigate to where you want to move it to. press Command+Option+V.
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Jul 4, 2016 4:32 AM in response to dialabrainby polarrrbear,I forgot about that… whoops...
Thanks.



