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Comment by ncann | Hacker News Reader

I can't remember the last time I used Windows search because it's worse than useless - there have been multiple occasions in the past where it can't even find a file in the current folder right in front of my eyes. Nowadays I just use Everything which I think is one of the best piece of software ever.

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An important thing that it took me a long time to realize is it doesn't search file names by default, only file contents. To search by name you have to use the 'name:' prefix. This is nonsense, but it's also easy to overcome once you know about it.

Wow really? I never knew that. Who thought it would be a good idea to have the Explorer search NOT do filename search by default?

It's probably how the first iteration worked before anybody knew what would and wouldn't be intuitive for this kind of utility, and they just haven't updated it since

Also when files were mostly just text, it would have made a lot of sense

No, this search was new in Vista (iirc).

Oh, well then there you go ;)

Edit: I was wrong about this behavior. Could've sworn this had happened. `name:` definitely helps speed up and refine the search, at least

Honestly interested how this plays with Control Panel, various config screens / apps, etc.

It seems the worst offender of "type in exactly what the link / window header is titled, does not show up in results."

I haven't figured out if this stuff just isn't indexed, is de-ranked below everything else (my guess), or is using some weird non-user-visible tags that aren't named identically.

what? ridiculous, of course it searches filenames

I don’t think this is right. I just did a test with a text file and Windows not only found a word only in the title (not in the document text), but also highlighted the title match in the results.

Hmm. Maybe I'm thinking of macOS? This definitely happened on one of the two and I was pretty sure it was Windows

Trying this right now with various commonly opened files and still getting no results. It's incredible how bad it is.

Off topic, but is Google Drive search this way too?

For me Windows Explorer search became useful when I learned about its syntax. I can't remember it exactly right now, but I think it's something like `name:*.jpg` for example (and worst thing is it's localized, so you have to use whatever Windows Language you use). This way it does not try to be smart and just searches for file names. I think that in default mode it searches inside an indexed files or something like that, which probably is useful for ordinary users trying to search inside theirs docs.

Advanced Query Syntax https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/lwef/-search-...

Quite useful

One of the things I miss most from Windows is the CHM help system. Now selecting Help in the menu opens a web page in Edge regardless of your default browser, or in an awkward, sluggish help minibrowser app.

The query syntax should be available offline right in the operating system, not in a web page.

https://www.voidtools.com/

Concur - 'Everything' is one of the first tools I install on a fresh PC. Blazingly fast file-system search with many useful options

Yep. One of very few pieces of software that when it runs I swear I can actually hear the zillions of transistors in the CPU doing their job. Unlike an Electron app that tasks 16 cores with endless fucking apologizing for their creator's love of layers upon fucking layers of abstraction...

Sorry, my PC's acting slow today, I'm tired and had a glass of wine already :P

I also like how it can make a machine unusable for like an hour after an update while it rebuilds the indexes. I have some laptops where it will take upwards of 45 minutes to log in after a patch. Windows 10 really hates slow spinning HDDs, and these are machines with plenty of memory (8GB) to avoid paging.

Found Everything back in the Windows 7 days and have never used anything else. It still amazes me that a silly little freeware search outperforms what Windows has. Really goes to show Microsoft's utter contempt (or apathy) toward the user.

Technically though, there is still a use for Windows search on the start menu: pulling up Windows components like the Control Panel or Disk Manger quickly.

> Technically though, there is still a use for Windows search on the start menu: pulling up Windows components like the Control Panel or Disk Manger quickly.

And not even that since some times typing "Panel" will not find Control Panel or "Power" not find "Dell Power Manager". I am baffled as to what is the actual algorithm behind this "search". I am quite sure it is not an indexing problem as searching the same items by prefix usually works.

And as usual when it fails to find what you were looking for, you are just one Enter key away from being sent to a browser and Bing. Way to raise your ratings...

And for extra fun, sometimes you'll start typing and get "Contro" in and it will pop up "Control Panel" at the top, but then by the time your fingers have caught up and stopped typing you've got "Control Pan" and you mash the enter key and... it suddenly replaced it with a bing search for "Control Pan".

I actually generally enjoy Windows 10 as an OS, but I actively dislike the start menu search. It's worse than useless.

I just went and punched "drive" in a few times. The first couple times it gave me "Computer Management" since it's related to drivers apparently. Then it decided to give me "Create and format hard partitions". Meanwhile, the several options that contain the literal "drive" in the name are all ignored as the "Best Match".

I too am completely baffled by what sort of algorithm it's using to find and select the most relevant search results.

I have PowerToys installed and have "PowerToys Run" bound to Win+R. I use that pretty much exclusively these days as an app launcher.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everything_(software)

https://www.voidtools.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=590

This is closed source software (Freeware) as far as I can tell. I realize you're already on MS Windows, but downloading a binary blob from some third party that's reading all files on your system seems a little too trusting.

Everything has become ubiquitous enough over the many years to be completely trustworthy for most Windows sysadmins. Additionally, I agree with OP that it's one of the best pieces of software ever.

Voidtools is well known and really good.

I've been using them for years now.

I can't live without Everything!

Slightly off topic, but I ditched windows explorer for most things years ago. I’ve been using a neat indie app I found called fman. Not affiliated, just a fan

https://fman.io/

I use Q-Dir, a quad-pane file explorer. http://www.softwareok.com/?seite=Freeware/Q-Dir

Haven't used Everything but I am very happy with locate32 https://locate32.cogit.net/

FileLocator Pro is another nice one. It's handled my Ctrl+F hotkey ever since the early days of Win7. Doesn't index, but uses techniques that quickly scan the MFT.

FileLocator Pro for me (there's a free personal version). Been on that since Windows 7 quite frankly.

Thanks. Hadn’t heard of this before.

fman is another rad File Explorer alternative.

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