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#91
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 2020-06-22 7:15 a.m., Ken Blake wrote:
On 6/21/2020 10:04 AM, philo wrote: On 6/21/20 11:01 AM, Paul wrote: philo wrote: Thanks for the info. As one who recently did a search that found close to nothing, I am happy with the much improved results using the free version of Agent Ransack. Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes Â*From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete I just did a file search with Search Everything. It found all the matching files on three physical drives in less than one second. Then it builds an index, or there weren't very many files in the directory to have to run through. I use Agent Ransack only for finding text within files. For file name searches, Search Everything is *much* faster. |
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#92
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
Alan Baker wrote:
On 2020-06-21 12:48 p.m., Frank Slootweg wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-20 9:19 p.m., Paul wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-20 8:01 p.m., VanguardLH wrote: Alan Baker wrote: Mayayana wrote: But can Spotlight find it all on Windows? I use Agent Ransack. It finds text in files, file name segments, etc, at an amazing speed, and I don't need indexing. Anything can quickly look up stored data in a database, but the trouble is that such a program has to run regularly to update its record. That's not necessary with Agent Ransack. And best of all, AR can find the files on Windows. I don't have any files on a Mac. Ah, but the database is updated continuously. Ah, you also have a reading comprehension defect, too. In what particular? Well, anything that "indexes", generally hooks the NTFS journal. Except for other OSes that don't use NTFS. *There*'s your "reading comprehension defect" for you! Nope. Try again. Wrong. Read on. Mac OS uses a hook into the file system calls to trigger the metadata server that file needs to be re-indexed. What's more, developers can add specific importers for the files their software creates so that Spotlight can index them seamlessly And it all happens continuously And guess what the NTFS file system has and does? It's above, in plain sight. You only have to read and comprehend it. (FYI, NTFS was not the first to have this functionality and neither was Apple.) Apple's functionality is not based on having a journal. It *is*. You yourself wrote (rewinding_to/repeating_from above): [Rewind/repeat:] Mac OS uses a hook into the file system calls to trigger the metadata server that file needs to be re-indexed. That's journaling. Whether the file system *keeps* the journaled events - for *other* purposes, such as recovery - is another matter. Both NTFS and MacOS' file system are ... file systems. No, I'm not going to repeat the '...' bit. Paul explained that, but your needing to brag about Apple (why?) made your brain lockup and 'miss' what was explained. Next. The MythicSoftware tools, there are two of them. Agent Ransack is free and brute force (it's intended as a teaser, to get you to buy the other one). File Locator Pro is their for-sale product, and as far as I know, it indexes. And because it indexes, it's going to hook the journal (this doesn't seem that hard to do, seeing as many have succeeded at it). Oops! There's the 'secret' again! I hope you'll miss it this time again Again. I didn't miss anyting. On the contrary, I picked up the erroneous claim that: "because it indexes, it's going to hook the journal" That's simply not true. You use quotes, but you seem to refer to this - differently worded - sentence: [Rewind:] Well, anything that "indexes", generally hooks the NTFS journal. For the NTFS case (on Windows), it *is* true. Everything.exe was the one with a lot of hopes riding on it. Initially, it could index C: in about 2 seconds (having never seen C: before). It could do this, because it read the $MFT directly. They're not the first, nor the last, to try that. [Agent Ransack doesn't read the $MFT, not that I can see. It uses FindNextFile (brute force).] However, after a few releases, Everything.exe got the usual complaints about "why can't we see the file size in the listing?". That is a more expensive option, requiring a directory level scan. And it still does that today, so the time to index all of C: rises from 2 seconds to maybe 20 seconds. Just so you can have file sizes. Once the initial index is generated, individual journal events like file-adds or file-deletes, cause the index to be updated accordingly by the Everything service. Oops! There it was *again*! Shut the fsck (hint! hint!) up, Paul! I haven't tried out too many of these things, and those are some of the popular ones here. There are still people trying to write them, for some reason. Still not seeing how I failed of reading comprehension. That's really *your* problem, isn't it!? You *could* be less pompous and some kind soul might explain it to you, but there's little chance of that, isn't there? Certainly asking you to provide a real explanation isn't going to work... So the consequences of your pompousity are my fault!? Yes: if you hook up a Windows formatted disk to a Mac, you can get spotlight to index it and it will perform its usual continuous indexing process. Unlikely, but theoretically possible, and totally irrelevant. Unlikely, perhaps, but not possible in theory. It works. I meant in the way it's done on Windows, i.e. using the NTFS journal. You presented your 'Yes: ...' as a scenario in which MacOS could index a Windows formatted disk (i.e. NTFS) in a way which would not be possible on Windows itself. *That* scenario would be unlikely, because 1) it *is* of course possible on Windows and 2) it would need NTFS-journal support in the foreign filesystem support part of MacOS. If you think MacOS has this support, then give a URL of a document which supports that. In hindsight, I think some of the aggro is a result of the fact that your response was to Paul's post - while Paul had no quarrel with you - but was also and even mainly about VanguardLH's "Ah, you also have a reading comprehension defect, too.". |
#93
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 6/22/2020 9:42 AM, philo wrote:
On 6/22/20 9:15 AM, Ken Blake wrote: On 6/21/2020 10:04 AM, philo wrote: On 6/21/20 11:01 AM, Paul wrote: philo wrote: Thanks for the info. As one who recently did a search that found close to nothing, I am happy with the much improved results using the free version of Agent Ransack. Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes Â*From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete I just did a file search with Search Everything. It found all the matching files on three physical drives in less than one second. I use Agent Ransack only for finding text within files. For file name searches, Search Everything is *much* faster. WOW. Going to try is ASAP Thanks! You're welcome. Glad to help. -- Ken |
#94
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 6/20/2020 3:54 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote:
I'm referring mainly to Windows search, but this applies to a lot of other search algorithms all over the place and on the Internet too. In the olden days, search was very efficient and somewhat intuitive. For example, let's say you try to do a search for "virtual" and expect you might find something like VirtualBox, VirtualPC, whatever. But for some reason, the current Windows search cannot find these. If you do a search for the full name, then it may find them (hit and miss). In the old days, these searches would find all instances where the string would occur, even as part of a substring. It was very easy to do searches, and you could even do multiple words to narrow down the searches. What has gone wrong with search algorithms now? Yousuf Khan I suggest that NO ONE reply to Alan Baker or anyone else touting Apple products. Such posts are OFF TOPIC in this newsgroup. -- David E. Ross http://www.rossde.com/ Trump claims he is the "law and order" President. Then, he breaks the law by using copyrighted music at his rallies without permission from the copyright owners. |
#95
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 6/22/20 12:49 PM, Ken Blake wrote:
On 6/22/2020 9:42 AM, philo wrote: On 6/22/20 9:15 AM, Ken Blake wrote: On 6/21/2020 10:04 AM, philo wrote: On 6/21/20 11:01 AM, Paul wrote: philo wrote: Thanks for the info. As one who recently did a search that found close to nothing, I am happy with the much improved results using the free version of Agent Ransack. Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes Â*From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete I just did a file search with Search Everything. It found all the matching files on three physical drives in less than one second. I use Agent Ransack only for finding text within files. For file name searches, Search Everything is *much* faster. WOW. Going to try is ASAP Thanks! You're welcome. Glad to help. I am very happy! |
#96
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 6/21/20 12:36 PM, David E. Ross wrote:
On 6/21/2020 9:01 AM, Paul wrote: philo wrote: Thanks for the info. As one who recently did a search that found close to nothing, I am happy with the much improved results using the free version of Agent Ransack. Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete I had to use a registry setting on a *clean* 2004 install, to get the search to Index properly! Behavior like that has apparently been around since the year 2015. Paul In the Programs and Features window, I selected "Turn Windowsfeatures on or off". In the Windows Features window, I then uncheck the checkboxes for Indexing Service and Windows Search. I also removed Search from Start. I only use Everything and Agent Ransack. I found that only disabling the Indexing Service still resulted in some indexing as I opened some folders. This would delay responing when I selected an item in such folders. Glad there are 3rd party utilities. Amazing how Windows screwed this up |
#97
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 2020-06-22 10:48 a.m., Frank Slootweg wrote:
Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-21 12:48 p.m., Frank Slootweg wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-20 9:19 p.m., Paul wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-20 8:01 p.m., VanguardLH wrote: Alan Baker wrote: Mayayana wrote: But can Spotlight find it all on Windows? I use Agent Ransack. It finds text in files, file name segments, etc, at an amazing speed, and I don't need indexing. Anything can quickly look up stored data in a database, but the trouble is that such a program has to run regularly to update its record. That's not necessary with Agent Ransack. And best of all, AR can find the files on Windows. I don't have any files on a Mac. Ah, but the database is updated continuously. Ah, you also have a reading comprehension defect, too. In what particular? Well, anything that "indexes", generally hooks the NTFS journal. Except for other OSes that don't use NTFS. *There*'s your "reading comprehension defect" for you! Nope. Try again. Wrong. Read on. Mac OS uses a hook into the file system calls to trigger the metadata server that file needs to be re-indexed. What's more, developers can add specific importers for the files their software creates so that Spotlight can index them seamlessly And it all happens continuously And guess what the NTFS file system has and does? It's above, in plain sight. You only have to read and comprehend it. (FYI, NTFS was not the first to have this functionality and neither was Apple.) Apple's functionality is not based on having a journal. It *is*. You yourself wrote (rewinding_to/repeating_from above): [Rewind/repeat:] Mac OS uses a hook into the file system calls to trigger the metadata server that file needs to be re-indexed. That's journaling. Whether the file system *keeps* the journaled events - for *other* purposes, such as recovery - is another matter. No. It is NOT a journal if the events aren't kept. You need to learn what "journal" means in this context: 'A journaling file system is a file system that keeps track of changes not yet committed to the file system's main part by recording the intentions of such changes in a data structure known as a "journal", which is usually a circular log.' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journaling_file_system Both NTFS and MacOS' file system are ... file systems. No, I'm not going to repeat the '...' bit. Paul explained that, but your needing to brag about Apple (why?) made your brain lockup and 'miss' what was explained. Next. The MythicSoftware tools, there are two of them. Agent Ransack is free and brute force (it's intended as a teaser, to get you to buy the other one). File Locator Pro is their for-sale product, and as far as I know, it indexes. And because it indexes, it's going to hook the journal (this doesn't seem that hard to do, seeing as many have succeeded at it). Oops! There's the 'secret' again! I hope you'll miss it this time again Again. I didn't miss anyting. On the contrary, I picked up the erroneous claim that: "because it indexes, it's going to hook the journal" That's simply not true. You use quotes, but you seem to refer to this - differently worded - sentence: [Rewind:] Well, anything that "indexes", generally hooks the NTFS journal. For the NTFS case (on Windows), it *is* true. Nope. Indexing need not pay the slightest attention to the journal. Doing so may not be as efficient, but there is no NECESSITY to use the journal to create an index. |
#98
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 2020-06-22 11:29 a.m., David E. Ross wrote:
On 6/20/2020 3:54 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote: I'm referring mainly to Windows search, but this applies to a lot of other search algorithms all over the place and on the Internet too. In the olden days, search was very efficient and somewhat intuitive. For example, let's say you try to do a search for "virtual" and expect you might find something like VirtualBox, VirtualPC, whatever. But for some reason, the current Windows search cannot find these. If you do a search for the full name, then it may find them (hit and miss). In the old days, these searches would find all instances where the string would occur, even as part of a substring. It was very easy to do searches, and you could even do multiple words to narrow down the searches. What has gone wrong with search algorithms now? Yousuf Khan I suggest that NO ONE reply to Alan Baker or anyone else touting Apple products. Such posts are OFF TOPIC in this newsgroup. You are certainly free to as you please. :-) |
#99
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 6/21/20 3:08 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote:
On 6/21/2020 10:42 AM, philo wrote: Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes Â*From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete LOL! What exactly did you get it to search for? Â*Â*Â*Â*Yousuf Khan I just put in my daughter's name , got some photos and text documents |
#100
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 2020-06-22 12:30 p.m., philo wrote:
On 6/21/20 3:08 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote: On 6/21/2020 10:42 AM, philo wrote: Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes Â*From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete LOL! What exactly did you get it to search for? Â*Â*Â*Â*Â*Yousuf Khan I just put in my daughter's name , got some photos and text documents All the hits on my sister-in-law's name on the Mac: 3 seconds for 1405 hits. Just sayin' :-) |
#101
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
Alan Baker wrote:
On 2020-06-22 7:15 a.m., Ken Blake wrote: On 6/21/2020 10:04 AM, philo wrote: On 6/21/20 11:01 AM, Paul wrote: philo wrote: Thanks for the info. As one who recently did a search that found close to nothing, I am happy with the much improved results using the free version of Agent Ransack. Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes *From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete I just did a file search with Search Everything. It found all the matching files on three physical drives in less than one second. Then it builds an index, or there weren't very many files in the directory to have to run through. Of course it builds an index. The point is, when, how and how often it builds/updates the index(es). As Paul explained [1], Search Everything uses the MFT of the NTFS file system. It doesn't have to traverse directories by the brute force FindNextFile method. So building the index from scratch is very fast. Paul mentioned 2 seconds for C:. philo said 1 second for 3 drives (which might not contain C:, hence be faster). They did not specifically mention if that was building the index from scratch or for indexing the changes since the last build, i.e. the previous run of Search Everyhing. And it of course depends on which properties are indexed, whether or not the USN journal is used, etc.. For me, indexing changes on C: and D: - i.e. when invoking Search Everyhing - is so fast, I cannot time it, so well under a second. And that was after weeks of non-use, i.e. non-(re)indexing. [I index on Name, Path, Size, Date Modified and Date Recently Changed, which I think are the defaults.] I use Agent Ransack only for finding text within files. For file name searches, Search Everything is *much* faster. [1] In, amongst others; Message-ID: |
#102
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
Alan Baker wrote:
On 2020-06-22 10:48 a.m., Frank Slootweg wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-21 12:48 p.m., Frank Slootweg wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-20 9:19 p.m., Paul wrote: [...] Again. I didn't miss anyting. On the contrary, I picked up the erroneous claim that: "because it indexes, it's going to hook the journal" That's simply not true. You use quotes, but you seem to refer to this - differently worded - sentence: [Rewind:] Well, anything that "indexes", generally hooks the NTFS journal. For the NTFS case (on Windows), it *is* true. Nope. Indexing need not pay the slightest attention to the journal. Doing so may not be as efficient, but there is no NECESSITY to use the journal to create an index. Sigh! Of course there is no *necessity*, otherwise one could not - for example - index a FAT file system. But Paul said *"generally"* and I said "For the NTFS case (on Windows), it *is* true.", i.e. I confirmed what Paul said. However in your made-up quote you removed both "generally" and "NTFS". So you misrepresented the context and argued based on that misrepresentation. Are you sure you aren't one of nospam's socks!? :-( (AFAIC,) EOD. |
#103
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 2020-06-22 1:07 p.m., Frank Slootweg wrote:
Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-22 10:48 a.m., Frank Slootweg wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-21 12:48 p.m., Frank Slootweg wrote: Alan Baker wrote: On 2020-06-20 9:19 p.m., Paul wrote: [...] Again. I didn't miss anyting. On the contrary, I picked up the erroneous claim that: "because it indexes, it's going to hook the journal" That's simply not true. You use quotes, but you seem to refer to this - differently worded - sentence: [Rewind:] Well, anything that "indexes", generally hooks the NTFS journal. For the NTFS case (on Windows), it *is* true. Nope. Indexing need not pay the slightest attention to the journal. Doing so may not be as efficient, but there is no NECESSITY to use the journal to create an index. Sigh! Of course there is no *necessity*, otherwise one could not - for example - index a FAT file system. But Paul said *"generally"* and I said "For the NTFS case (on Windows), it *is* true.", i.e. I confirmed what Paul said. But it isn't always true... ....or at least there is no reasonable way you can know if it is true in every case of search applications for Windows. However in your made-up quote you removed both "generally" and "NTFS". So you misrepresented the context and argued based on that misrepresentation. Are you sure you aren't one of nospam's socks!? :-( Sorry, but I didn't make up that quote. I did snip it for brevity and clarity, but the sentence didn't include "generally" or "NTFS": 'And because it indexes, it's going to hook the journal (this doesn't seem that hard to do, seeing as many have succeeded at it). ' That insists on a correlation between indexing and the journal that doesn't exist. Read it as many times as you need until you understand that there is no "because". You can have an index without hooking into the journal. That's just a fact. |
#104
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 6/22/2020 3:03 PM, philo wrote:
Glad there are 3rd party utilities. Amazing how Windows screwed this up They employ hamsters to write code for them. The base API functions were obviously written by macaques, but the secondary coding was definitely done by hamsters. But not just experienced graduate hamsters, but first-year comp-sci hampsters. Yousuf Khan |
#105
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Why is search so brain dead these days?
On 6/22/2020 3:30 PM, philo wrote:
On 6/21/20 3:08 PM, Yousuf Khan wrote: On 6/21/2020 10:42 AM, philo wrote: Ransack : 52 hits in ten minutes Â*From Explorer, after one hour , four hits...search nowhere near complete LOL! What exactly did you get it to search for? Â*Â*Â*Â*Â*Yousuf Khan I just put in my daughter's name , got some photos and text documents So now that you've tried Search Everything too, how many of the files did each one find and how fast? Talking about WSrc vs. Ransack vs. SE? Did they all find everything but at different speeds? Yousuf Khan |
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