"Modifying index location is disabled by a policy."

I am one of those strange sorts of people who find Windows
Search useful. I think Windows periodically decides to
rebuild the index. I've caught it in the act a time or two
and it was nothing I had done.

What I have done sometimes is to change the location where
the index is stored. I tried to do this tonight and
received the subject message.

I don't think this is because of anything I did. I'd
change the policy if I could find it... (Win 10 Pro). Did
an update cause this?

On 2018-04-06 22:24, Jason wrote:

I am one of those strange sorts of people who find Windows
Search useful. I think Windows periodically decides to
rebuild the index. I've caught it in the act a time or two
and it was nothing I had done.

What I have done sometimes is to change the location where
the index is stored. I tried to do this tonight and
received the subject message.

I don't think this is because of anything I did. I'd
change the policy if I could find it... (Win 10 Pro). Did
an update cause this?

Maybe here? -

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows
Search!PreventModifyingIndexedLocations

Using that Excel sheet I downloaded 5 minutes ago; check this out:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/down....aspx?id=25250

Regards,

--
! _\|/_ Sylvain /
! (o o) Memberavid-Suzuki-Fdn/EFF/Red+Cross/SPCA/Planetary-Society
oO-( )-Oo Where do forest rangers go to get away from it all?

In article ,
says...
Please take your machine to experts who are all visiting the Gold Coast
for the Common Wealth Games. You'll get hands on expertise from them.

Ah, I see the Bozo Bin has timed out. Thanks for your
usual helpful post!

On Fri, 6 Apr 2018 22:24:51 -0400, Jason wrote:


I am one of those strange sorts of people who find Windows
Search useful.


Useful? Yes.

Any good as compared to alternatives like Search Everything? No.

In article ,
says...

On Fri, 6 Apr 2018 22:24:51 -0400, Jason wrote:


I am one of those strange sorts of people who find Windows
Search useful.


Useful? Yes.

Any good as compared to alternatives like Search Everything? No.

I use Everything a lot. Unless you turn it loose to actually read the
files and index them I don't find it useful for content searches, but
it's great when you cannot quite remember the name of the file that you
are certain you created yesterda.... Windows search does index content
for times when that is what you need.

In article , says...
Using that Excel sheet I downloaded 5 minutes ago; check this out:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/down....aspx?id=25250

Regards,


Thanks! I was hunting around for something like that but hadn't found
it. I'll see if I can figure this out now. What I'd like to know is why
it is happening in the first place...

On Sat, 7 Apr 2018 16:56:26 -0400, Jason
wrote:

In article ,
says...

On Fri, 6 Apr 2018 22:24:51 -0400, Jason wrote:


I am one of those strange sorts of people who find Windows
Search useful.


Useful? Yes.

Any good as compared to alternatives like Search Everything? No.

I use Everything a lot. Unless you turn it loose to actually read the
files and index them I don't find it useful for content searches, but
it's great when you cannot quite remember the name of the file that you
are certain you created yesterda.... Windows search does index content
for times when that is what you need.

For content searches, many of us use Agent Ransack.

Other than to satisfy my curiosity now and then, (to remind myself that
it's still crap), I haven't used Windows Search since the beginning of
the XP days, back when I didn't know any better.

In article ,
lid says...
I haven't used Windows Search since the beginning of
the XP days, back when I didn't know any better.

I don't know how/if it's changed since XP days - that was
a long time ago. It becomes more useful if you spend the
time to customize it, i.e., changing default locations
where it searches and fiddling with filetypes that do or
do not get indexed.

Are there important differences between Agent Ransack and
Everything when used in indexing mode?

On Sun, 8 Apr 2018 11:03:26 -0400, Jason wrote:

In article ,
says...
I haven't used Windows Search since the beginning of
the XP days, back when I didn't know any better.

I don't know how/if it's changed since XP days - that was
a long time ago. It becomes more useful if you spend the
time to customize it, i.e., changing default locations
where it searches and fiddling with filetypes that do or
do not get indexed.

Are there important differences between Agent Ransack and
Everything when used in indexing mode?

I use Everything for filename searches because the results are provided
instantaneously. I use Agent Ransack for content searches, or other
specialized searches.

Like I mentioned earlier, I do try Windows Search every now and then to
make sure it's still awful. It is. :-)
I'm not interested in customizing it or messing around with its index
options. There are much better choices available.

In article ,
lid says...
There are much better choices available.

I'm willing to change to something better :-)

My understanding is that Everything monitors the MFT so
its searches are always up to date. Does Agent Ransack
indexing do that too or does one have to goose it to
update the index?

Jason wrote:
In article ,
lid says...
There are much better choices available.

I'm willing to change to something better :-)

My understanding is that Everything monitors the MFT so
its searches are always up to date. Does Agent Ransack
indexing do that too or does one have to goose it to
update the index?

The USN is a change journal available on NTFS. But not
on FAT32. Everything.exe could listen to that journal,
to keep the file list it keeps up to date. Everything.exe
doesn't index content or look inside files that I know of.

Agent Ransack is the free version of Mythic Software search.
It does both filename search as well as content search, but
with no preparation in advance. If it takes 2 hours to read
the hard drive from end to end, then a search scope involving
the entire drive and all of its contents, will also take 2 hours.
It doesn't make an index in advance. I can't find one.

Mythic Software FileLocator Pro ($$), keeps an Inverted Index.
But, the Index is "on demand", with the company recommending the
usage of Task Scheduler to kick off daily indexes. They don't
seem to tie into the USN Journal. A trial version is available.

https://help.mythicsoft.com/fileloca...-interface.htm

Windows Search Indexer listens to the USN Journal, and indexes
(or removes entries) according to what happens. It's not clear
how Windows Search Indexer handles FAT32 partitions. (You could
hook into ETW events, but that might be costly.]

*******

Everything.exe is fast on its first file listing run, because
it attempts to read the $MFT directly. However, all the $MFT
gives you for your trouble, is the filename. There is other metadata
that Everything also wants to include in the file list. This changes
a 2 second operation into a 15 second operation. This is one of the
inevitable tradeoffs - if you want to make the interface look
like what everyone else offers, you pay a price for the resources.
Filling in file sizes on the fly (when the search happens),
would be clunky.

https://www.voidtools.com/support/everything/options/

"Everything service

Install the Everything service. The Everything service will allow
the Everything search window to read and monitor the USN Journal
on all NTFS volumes.
"

"To include extra file information in the Everything index:

*In "Everything", from the Tools menu, click Options
*Click the Indexes tab.
*Check the desired options:
*Index file size
*Index folder size
*Index date created
*Index date modified
*Index date accessed
*Index attributes

[Adjusting those options might reduce scan/rescan time.]
"

For all these tools, FAT32 is an outlier, as it doesn't have
a change journal, and it requires some other mechanism to trigger
a rescan. A scan/index once a day, isn't going to be good for keeping
track of downloads (which could be showing up during the day).
Whereas with the USN journal, NTFS users have a possibility of
keeping the state information up to date.

Paul

On Sun, 8 Apr 2018 22:21:57 -0400, Jason wrote:

In article ,
says...
There are much better choices available.

I'm willing to change to something better :-)

My understanding is that Everything monitors the MFT so
its searches are always up to date.

"Always up to date" refers to NTFS volumes because they have a USN
journal. FAT volumes and network shares periodically get scanned and an
index gets built. When you attempt to do a search, the index is
consulted.

Either way, the results should appear instantaneously.

Does Agent Ransack indexing do that too or does one have to goose it to
update the index?

Agent Ransack doesn't create an index. That approach has pros and cons.

On Mon, 09 Apr 2018 00:31:14 -0400, Paul wrote:

Jason wrote:
In article ,
lid says...
There are much better choices available.

I'm willing to change to something better :-)

My understanding is that Everything monitors the MFT so
its searches are always up to date. Does Agent Ransack
indexing do that too or does one have to goose it to
update the index?

The USN is a change journal available on NTFS. But not
on FAT32. Everything.exe could listen to that journal,
to keep the file list it keeps up to date. Everything.exe
doesn't index content or look inside files that I know of.

Correct.

Agent Ransack is the free version of Mythic Software search.
It does both filename search as well as content search, but
with no preparation in advance. If it takes 2 hours to read
the hard drive from end to end, then a search scope involving
the entire drive and all of its contents, will also take 2 hours.

I realize that "2 hours" was just a figure of speech, but just now it
took 1 minute 4 seconds to search my 38TB volume. Most people are
probably searching a volume 1/10th that size, so I'd expect the results
to arrive even faster for most people.

It doesn't make an index in advance. I can't find one.

Same as above. Still correct.

Everything.exe is fast on its first file listing run, because
it attempts to read the $MFT directly. However, all the $MFT
gives you for your trouble, is the filename. There is other metadata
that Everything also wants to include in the file list. This changes
a 2 second operation into a 15 second operation. This is one of the
inevitable tradeoffs - if you want to make the interface look
like what everyone else offers, you pay a price for the resources.
Filling in file sizes on the fly (when the search happens),
would be clunky.

You might be using an older version of Everything. There have been
reports of older versions taking a number of seconds to produce search
results. If you use a more recent version, you should see search results
that are indistinguishable from instantaneous. Version 1.4.1.895 appears
to be the most recent. http://www.voidtools.com/downloads/

Bottom line, if Everything is taking from 2 to 15 seconds to produce
search results, something is very wrong.

https://www.voidtools.com/support/everything/options/

"Everything service

Install the Everything service. The Everything service will allow
the Everything search window to read and monitor the USN Journal
on all NTFS volumes.
"

"To include extra file information in the Everything index:

*In "Everything", from the Tools menu, click Options
*Click the Indexes tab.
*Check the desired options:
*Index file size
*Index folder size
*Index date created
*Index date modified
*Index date accessed
*Index attributes

[Adjusting those options might reduce scan/rescan time.]
"

Note that 'scan/rescan time' doesn't refer to search time. The scan or
rescan is done out of band. Performing a search doesn't trigger a
scan/rescan.

Char Jackson wrote:


Note that 'scan/rescan time' doesn't refer to search time. The scan or
rescan is done out of band. Performing a search doesn't trigger a
scan/rescan.

Everything.exe will prepare a file for you, listing all the files on
a partition. If this is done using only information which it obtains
from the $MFT, it finishes in a couple seconds. If it's expected
to add file size and creation date to that, then the time increases
to make the file list, because the folder tree must
be traversed to collect the information.

Preparing the database of all partitions, takes n*(time_for_single_partition).
I haven't timed that, because I haven't bothered to actually install
and use Everything.exe as intended (I have some FAT32 partitions
here, and they would leave gaps in my coverage). I've been using it
primarily for creating a text file listing a single partition.
(I was testing this, in the hope that a $MFT approach would
give a more complete file list than other methods.) I still
don't think any method on Windows, gives a complete file list.
There's always a few missing.

This has nothing to do with the search time, since once the blah.db
is prepared for all the partitions, all that Everything.exe has to
do is consult that database. I haven't characterized that, because
with really no solution covering my mixed NTFS/FAT32 here (the
FAT32 from old disks), it's not worth wasting time on fancy setups.
"Any old laborious search" is good enough on this machine, until
the FAT32 problem can be solved. The setup on my other machine
doesn't have this problem, as it's pure NTFS over there. But
I don't stand in front of that machine all day - that machine
isn't my surf machine.

Paul

On Mon, 09 Apr 2018 03:51:14 -0400, Paul wrote:

Char Jackson wrote:


Note that 'scan/rescan time' doesn't refer to search time. The scan or
rescan is done out of band. Performing a search doesn't trigger a
scan/rescan.

Everything.exe will prepare a file for you, listing all the files on
a partition.

Right, but that's one of its minor capabilities, somewhere way down the
list. That's not what most people would do with Everything.

If this is done using only information which it obtains
from the $MFT, it finishes in a couple seconds. If it's expected
to add file size and creation date to that, then the time increases
to make the file list, because the folder tree must
be traversed to collect the information.

Irrelevant to getting search results, right? You wouldn't go to the
trouble of creating a file list, then as a separate step, search that
file list. That wouldn't make sense.

Preparing the database of all partitions, takes n*(time_for_single_partition).
I haven't timed that, because I haven't bothered to actually install
and use Everything.exe as intended (I have some FAT32 partitions
here, and they would leave gaps in my coverage).

Why do you think your FAT32 partitions would leave gaps?

This has nothing to do with the search time, since once the blah.db
is prepared for all the partitions, all that Everything.exe has to
do is consult that database. I haven't characterized that, because
with really no solution covering my mixed NTFS/FAT32 here (the
FAT32 from old disks), it's not worth wasting time on fancy setups.

Everything works fine with a mix of NTFS and FAT32 volumes. That's also
how I use it.

"Any old laborious search" is good enough on this machine, until
the FAT32 problem can be solved.

I'm curious about your FAT32 problem.