MacBook Air :: Won't Work With Spotlight Index Drive
May 8, 2008
When and how often does Spotlight index a drive? After 1-1/2 months of owning my MBA, Spotlight is indexing my drive today. I don't know if it is doing it for the first time. But it is the first time I noticed it, as it is slowing down everything, and is taking forever (~ 1-2 min for every 1%).
I would have thought my drive would be all indexed by now -- 90+ days of owning it.
I wonder if it has anything to do with what I am doing on my computer today, that may have trigger this. I copied 3 dvd movie files over and was ripping them with Handbrake today to get ready for a trip next week. I also connected an external drive to have it re-formated. However, after all the ripping was done, and external drive removed. It is still indexing at the moment (2 more hours to go according to the progress bar).
I am tempted to restart the computer, and stop the indexing. But then I shouldn't, if it's a part of the normal routine.
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Jan 6, 2008
I notice that Spotlight only says "indexing" after I restart the computer, which isn't that often.
But that's not the only time it indexes, right? Does it index a file whenever it's created or moved?
And what about Time Machine? Again, after restarting the computer, my external backup drive that I use with Time Machine is indexed. But I never notice it being indexed when I don't restart.
Does Spotlight have to index it, or does TM handle that somehow? I mean, can I put my backup disk on Spotlight's ignore list, and still have Spotlight in Time Machine work fine?
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Jan 12, 2009
I noticed the other day that mds was taking up all my cpu power, and spotlight was trying to index my drive, with 876489 hours remaining. Did a bit of googling and found and got a terminal command to reset the whole of spotlight, left it over night next morning it was stuck at 90%. I then tried the application spotless to reset spotlight...left it over night now stuck on 89% with 157859 hours remaining. IMac G5 2.1Gz, 350GB of a 500GB drive used.
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Jan 29, 2010
I would simply like to use cmd+spacebar to be able to search files that are located on my Time Capsule.
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May 17, 2012
It's actually one of five partions on the external drive, and the only one with a problem. Two of the other four are nicely on the Privacy List, and the other two are both indexed and kept nicely up to date. But the Fifth cannot be indexed, although it once was partially. I have run Spotless, which lists all other drives just as I expect but for this one it reports: "The Metadata Server is reporting that content indexing is DISABLED for the volume Fifth but the volume itself is reporting that the content indexing status is set to ENABLED." It is possible to find an 8Kb index on the volume, then Trash and delete it; Spotlight immediately re-creates another index-in-waiting but does not actually do the indexing or add anything in the folder. An added frustration is that the 'folder' is both invisible, locked and seems to be without 'ownership' or other conventional attributes.
1) I have done the primitive Add to Privacy and Remove Dance nothing has changed.
2) I have used Terminal, deleted all .Spotlight-V100 indexes, disabled Spotlight rebooted, renabled it and rebooted—nothing has changed. This included carefully following steps in other posters' accounts (some failed, some succeeded) and a site that gave a particularly thorough version.
3) I have used Spotless although it offers to do such things as Delete the empty index and re-start Indxing, it then reports it couldn't due to an unexpected error.
4) Some folks have pointed to another faulty invisible file variously naming it '.metadate_never_index' and '.metadataneverindex', to be found in '.hostconfig' or eleswhere at the root and destroyed, but I never didscovered anything like it. I did perhaps succeed in adding the line: SPOTLIGHT=-YES- to that file, based on another bit of advice, but it seems to have had no effect.
The terrible irony is that I use FindAnyFile and good ol' FileBuddy for all my searching. All I want is to 'Show Item Info' in Finder's View Options. Wouldn't you know that needs the Spotlight 'app'.Assuming the Spotless message is accurate, I need to convince the MetadataServer that indexing for that partition is enabled. How do I do that
Info:
McBk w/10.6.8, QkSlvrG4 w/10.3,10.4
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Jun 15, 2008
One of my important external hard drives recently died and I was wondering of there was a way to see a list of files that were on the drive before it crashed, maybe the spotlight index?
Before sending the drive in for recovery (and not attempting to change the logic board myself) I would like to see if there is any private data on the drive that I wouldn't want to fall into the wrong hands.
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Jun 21, 2012
New mac user here. Running latest Lion (10.7.4) on a Macbook pro. I have Paragon NTFS installed, and reading/writing to NTFS volumes has worked fine. However, I am having an issue with spotlight on my external hard drive (500 gb, NTFS formatted). It simply does not work. Searching my internal main hd works fine.
I have tried several suggested solutions to this problem already. This includes adding and removing the hard drive from the privacy tab of spotlight. I also tried several terminal commands that I found online such as "sudo mdutil -E" and "sudo mdutil -i on". These all indicate that indexing on my external drive is in fact on. Spotlight does not seem to be indexing the drive. HOWEVER it does return results for folders that I have opened. Seems kind of strange. Doesn't help me much, as I am not about to open 1000's of folders and files just so they can be found through spotlight.
Info:
MacBook
Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.4)
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Mar 16, 2009
I have gone to the "Private" tab under Spotlight preferences and dragged in my hard drive. The green "plus" sign lights up, but once I let go nothing ever gets added to the list. I've tried it with everything and nothing gets added.
I've gone to Terminal and typed "sudo mdutil -E /" plus my password. It returns: "Error, no index found for volume."
I've tried "sudo open /.Spotlight-V100" and it says the folder cannot be opened because I do not have sufficient access privileges. Does anyone know where to find this folder on my hard drive so I can get to it manually? I am hoping it might ask for my password once I'm there. As the administrator, does anyone know how to make the OS know that I do have sufficient privileges?
The things I have not done are use disk repair because I do not have a boot disk. I have not reinstalled because the OS came on my computer and I have no disks. I would think re-installing would do the trick, but there has to be something else going on that can be tweeked, wouldn't you think?
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Oct 13, 2009
I noticed that even while browsing the spotlight service continuosly index something.
Is it trying to index even the browser cache?
Shouldn't it start indexing only if I download something or create/modify some document?
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Sep 4, 2010
I've read several threads on this, but I cannot find any solution. I tried doing a delete and rebuild of the Spotlight index because it was recommended to do every now and then to improve performance. Ever since then, Spotlight won't index applications. I have Applications checked, I've even unchecked it, restarted and then rechecked it. I've rebuilt the Spotlight index three times and they don't show up. If I use Finder to edit Spotlight comments on an Application, all of a sudden it will show up, but not unless I do that. So, it seems like Spotlight ignores Applications until I do something that triggers Spotlight to see a comment and then all of a sudden the application appears in Spotlight.
All the solutions I have seen online are to check the privacy settings (I have nothing marked private) and to rebuild the index. Neither solution has worked. Does anything have any ideas what is causing most applications to not be picked up by Spotlight unless I add a comment and then erase it updating Spotlight?
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Dec 1, 2010
I am still fairly new to the Mac, had mine just over a month now. What has struck me is how slow spotlight is. I come from Windows 7, which has a fantastic instant search. I am not sure if my expectations of spotlight are off or if I have some issue I am unfamiliar with. I've researched this quite a bit. There do seem to be random complaints about spotlight. Usually people recommend getting more ram, rebuilding the index, or repairing permissions. I have tried repairing permissions, that is about it. I am not sure how the index is rebuilt, or I would be willing to try that.
What seems to happen is sometimes I just do not get the results I want. I will type in a query, and wait for 10 - 20 seconds for the document I want to show up. It usually never does. If I delete the query, then try again immediately afterwards, the document I want shows up. Is this behavior expected? This is snow leopard fully updated on a Macbook Pro 2.53Ghz i5 and 4GB Ram with the 500GB 7200 RPM hard drive. While the query is running, I have Word, Outlook, Safari, and sometimes Xcode and the terminal open. Should I just leave it be, that is how it is, deal with it? Or is rebuilding the index something I have to do regularly, or maybe some other voodoo magic trick?
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Apr 19, 2008
method of telling Spotlight to index network volumes. I can't locate it now, but noticed that the last posts about it were 1.5 years old.
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Jul 6, 2009
New to Mac, I like having a clean dock with only a minimum amount of shortcuts to applications and to then use Spotlight to find others when I need them.
It seems though that not all applications appear in a spotlight search. For example I tried searching for iMovie but all I got was a dictionary definition. So I opened it up through the applications folder, and then after that spotlight found it ok.
The same is true for other applications that I haven't yet opened, such as iDVD.
Instead of going through and finding all the apps that are not indexed and opening them, is there a universal way to reindex spotlight?
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May 15, 2010
Earlier I posted a problem about the get info pane has something wrong in it, that the "more info" only shows the headline, while other things, like dimensions for the pictures, the bitrate of MP3 songs, etc.
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Mar 27, 2012
I've gone through some of the threads on here about this issue. I have tried adding my volume to privacy tab in spotlights preferences and removing it, but it wont even let me add it due to an error.
So I then tried command line indexing using sudo mdutil -E /, this just brings up the message in terminal no index.
Info:
MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.3)
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Jun 28, 2014
I just noticed that Spotlight does not seem to index the content of .txt files. It will pick up search strings in the names of text files, but not in the contents. Is there any way to get Spotlight to index the content of .txt files?
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Jun 2, 2012
Three days ago I was browsing the web when my cursor evidently brushed over an ad for MacKeeper. In a few seconds MacKeeper had downloaded itself without asking and taken over Safari. Since I don't like thuggish behavior in people or in software, as soon as I regained control of Safari I moved MacKeeper to the trash and did a "Secure Empty Trash." I then aimed Intego's Virus Barrier at the Downloads folder and it found nothing questionable. I checked out various webpages where people describe how to rid your computer of MacKeeper if you've installed it - - I didn't install it, but I checked in all the recommended places and found nothing visible. However whether it is a coincidence or there is a causal relation immediately after this incident, Spotlight began to re-index my two internal hard drives - - estimating first that it would take 3 days, then 7 days to index them. I wrote about this on another thread and received the following advice:
"Spotlight's probably in a wobble. A few things you could do:
1. Tell Spotlight to start again. Open Terminal (Applications > Utilities > Terminal.app) and copy/paste this command: sudo mdutil -E /
Press 'return'. You'll be asked for your password, which will not echo when you type it, so type carefully.
Give Spotlight a few minutes then check on its progress, does it look like it's going to complete in a reasonable amount of time? If the problem persists
2. Restart your Mac in Safe mode and log in to your account.
This'll take a while. When it's finished, immediately restart and log in normally and check on Spotlight again."
I performed the first step. After a few minutes Spotlight estimated that it would complete indexing in 20 minutes. Over the next few hours it continued to increase its estimates to an ever larger number of hours.
Then I performed the second step. After completing it Spotlight's estimate was that it would take several days.
Eventually I performed the first step again and the same sequence of increasing estimates occurred.
I left the computer on overnight and by morning Spotlight estimated it would take 35 hours to complete indexing of my drives.
Later on I turned the computer off. When I started it up again Spotlight had started once again to re-index my drives and now estimates it will take 5 days.
None of this behavior had occurred before the mishap with MacKeeper. Since I have a recent clone of the startup drive that was made before this incident it seems possible that I could zero out my internal startup drive after saving any files that have changed to a DVD, use Virus Barrier to check if there is anything questionable present in the folder in which they are located and then clone the data from the backup drive back to the newly formatted internal hard drive. However I would rather not have to do this, so I would be most grateful for any less extreme suggestions.
Info:
Mac Pro (Early 2009), Mac OS X (10.7.4), 24GB RAM/MOTU 2408 mk3 audio interface
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Oct 7, 2010
I usually had spotlight search disabled, cause I don't really use the search at all .. well that was until yesterday I was looking for a file on the backup drive. Needless to say it took quite a while to find it, so I went back to considering spotlight again.
Long story short I switched on indexing for both the local disk (160GB) and the USB Backup Disk (1.5TB) and left spotlight running over night .. it is not quite there yet .. but the index is already almost 40Gb in total .. that is 20GB locally and then another 19GB on the USB disk.
So my question .. is that normal? Does spotlight store the index of the external disk locally again? I can't imagine the index of the ~100GB I have stored locally to be that big ..
Is it something normal while indexing and will reduce itself when it is done?
People usually report their indexes well below 1GB for larger disk than I use here at least that was what I found googling.
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Dec 12, 2009
I searched around on how to do this in 10.6, but the only things I could find were references to mdimport -f, which from what I understand is now obsolete.
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Jun 23, 2009
right, i have a HFS formatted 500gb external drive which i use everyday, but today spotlight just keeps indexing it, it has a lot of media on it which i access daily so spotlight is needed to search it.
i mean its been indexing for a good 2 hours.
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Nov 22, 2008
I have an iomega network drive on which I store my itunes library. However spotlight does not find any files on this drive.
I have tried mdutil -i on /Volumes/Network drive and mdutil -E
It says it has turned on indexing, but it still will not find any files. Does anyone know how to make spotlight index this network drive, or recommend an app that will allow me to search network drives
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Apr 2, 2009
I upgraded my harddrive this weekend. Here is how I did it:
1.) replaced the hard drive in my laptop
2.) Loaded Leopard onto the new hard drive
3.) Connected my old drive in an enclosure as an external drive
4.) Used the migration assistant to migrate my profile and files from the old drive.
Everything is good, but spotlight doesn't work well. It misses tons of stuff that IS there. I think the drive needs to be re-indexed?
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Mar 23, 2012
Successfully moved mail to another partition ~ however not getting Spotlight (or Mail) to index or search email since the move.Tried adding the folder to Spotlight privacy settings ~ then removing but no luck.Tried contacting Apple however moving mail from Libraries is not 'supported' so no love there. how to get Spotlight to search mail residing on another partition?
Info:
Mac OS X (10.7.3)
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Aug 30, 2014
My Lacie external Thunderbolt drive won't index. I've tried adding/deleting it to the privacy tab in Spotlight prefs. No luck.
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Apr 20, 2010
MacBooks: 4 / 5 (In the pic you see some powerbooks too) will start for a couple seconds, and then shut off, the longer you leave them, the longer they stay on. Battery in or out does not matter. Same thing. Reinstalled Leopard still same thing. Pram reset same thing. We probably won't spend the money to fix these and will throw them out, unless I am missing something? Space bar doesn't work, unless you do spotlight, or hold shift.
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Jun 13, 2012
When I connect a USB drive, it shows up on my desktop, but Finder won't find anything on it because it doesn't get indexed. I'm running OS X 10.5.8 (9L31a) on an iMac G5 with a PowerPC G5 (3.0) processor. The drive in question is NTFS, but it also seems like the Mac doesn't index FAT-formatted USB drives if they were formatted on a PC. Is there any way that automatic indexing could have been turned off? I think the department that had this system before we got it would have turned that off if possible, and I'd like to find out how to turn it back on?
Info:
iMac, Mac OS X (10.5.8)
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Nov 9, 2009
I have a MBP and I recently did a clean install up to Snow Leopard, and then added all of my movies and files about 150GBs onto my mac. And it was all working perfectly, but now for the past two days I have not been able to use Spotlight as it says it is indexing.
Any ideas why or how this might of happened? I have recently brought iDeFrag and did a quick online DeFrag after I installed windows 7 in boot camp.
I use spotlight alot for finding files and not having it is.
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Dec 25, 2008
How can I get the dictionary within Spotlight to work
I remember this feature when i first got Leopard but hasn't worked since then, how can I get it to do so?
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Feb 14, 2009
'm new here and quite new to mac as well.
Until now I've used the shortcut for spotlight (ctrl-spacebar) a lot. But suddenly it doesn't function any more. When I go to the preferences and hint the spotlight-icon, nothing happens. If I click it again, it opens, but with the shortcut selections in the bottom erased.
I have a Intel Leopard 10.5.6 MacBook.
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Aug 25, 2009
Is there any way to use Quicklook from within Spotlight search results? I'd like to be able to do a Spotlight search and hit the space bar for a quick Quicklook look before actually launching the program.
I'm guessing this isn't possible, since hitting the space bar only inserts a space in the Spotlight search box, but thought I'd ask.
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