OS X :: How To Do Something Using Spotlight
Dec 12, 2009
I am trying to figure out how to do something using Spotlight and am not having any luck. Can you give me a hand? I would like to search my hard disks for all files that end in a certain file type (example: .jpg), and show the total size of them. If I type in jpg in Spotlight, it shows all the files. At the bottom, I can see where it says "more than 10,000 found" However, if I want to look at the file size of a single file, I have to right click it, and select Get Info. If I select View, Show View Options, Size is grayed out to where I cannot select it. So I cant sort the files by the largest files. How can I do all of this in Spotlight? I saw a few apps (Houdahspot, PathFinder) that seem to fit the bill, but I would prefer to do this natively in OSX, or at least find a free app. I shudder to think of spending $30-$40 just to sort files.
View 8 Replies
ADVERTISEMENT
Sep 27, 2010
This is old news maybe by couple of months BUT still. I've just experienced this on my Core i7... Fast CPU still hog by the dam MDS spotlight process due to Firefox "Profile" folder.
View 1 Replies
View Related
Jun 8, 2007
It's not finding anything, not even files on the desktop. It's not indexing the drive. It's doing sweet eff-all, it's doing squat. I've restarted. Twice. MBP 17" C2D, 10.4.9 Spotlight is crucial to me for searching emails and PDFs.
View 20 Replies
View Related
Dec 16, 2008
I installed 10.5.6 yesterday, and now Spotlight keeps freezing / crashing (just Spotlight, everything else is fine). I can't see if it's related to 10.5.6 or not (I'm not techie enough).
View 6 Replies
View Related
Jan 12, 2009
I tried to re index my spotlight index, and after doing so, it will not index any files unless I manually re open them.
View 4 Replies
View Related
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?
View 2 Replies
View Related
Aug 22, 2009
I installed SL 10a432. Transferred a lot of files to the share/dropbox. In swedish this is called:
~/Delad/Brevl�demapp/ which in English would translate to "~/Shared/Mailbox folder/" or something similar, it not related to emails, just the literal translation....
what should I write in spotlight to reach this folder? i have tried loads of combination but I cannot find this folder in spotlight but I can find the items in it...
if I write "dela" as in "Delad" it suggest "delat" like it would suggest share insted of shared when it in fact was called shared....
View 2 Replies
View Related
Sep 14, 2009
I have my spotlight set so only applications come up... but when I search for any program all these .jar files come up as applications. They are not applications and filed in the wrong folder. How do I make it so they do not show up? I've tried hiding my entire harddrive except for the App folder to show up but that means not being able to search anything.
View 1 Replies
View Related
Mar 7, 2010
Does the iMacs come with spotlight. I saw the mentioning of it and wanted to see if I have it... looks like I don't. I just bought my iMac last month.
View 4 Replies
View Related
Jul 19, 2010
Not sure whats changed, but now when I plug in my external drives. Spotlight (mds) spins for a good while then eventually hangs. I can't figure out what the problem is.
View 3 Replies
View Related
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.
View 1 Replies
View Related
Dec 20, 2010
i recently read that disabling Spot will make a minor boost to game performance. my question is: how do i disable it?
View 5 Replies
View Related
Oct 25, 2010
I've been having issues with spotlight index in SL 10.6.4. The issue is that I'm not able to use spotlight on any accounts. they are all admins and still same results when trying to search from anywhere (finder, top right corner of mac, or applications). now this install comes from an image use by the company I work for and it has been deployed on many macs successfully.
I've already tried rebuilding spotlight database by
System Preferences---Spotlight----Privacy---Adding Macintosh HD/deleting (also tried re booting in between the process)
Terminal---sudo mdutil -E /
Terminal----sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds.plist
Already performed Disk Repair in Leopard and Single User Mode.
The last thing I would want to do is backup the users data and re install the OS but before I do I would like to something else.
View 4 Replies
View Related
Oct 27, 2007
How can I tell if it is still indexing and how long does it take ona clean and jerk install that wipes the HD ? I was experiencing VERY choppy genie efects and dock animations for about 2 hours after the install of Leopard.... oddly seems to come and go WTF
MBP BRAND NEW 2.2
View 3 Replies
View Related
Nov 5, 2007
How can I force my Leopard to reindex my drives? My External drives seem to be indexed, but not my Internal Drive.
I checked spotlight preferances, and its not set up to be that way. I tried doing it the tiger way and that didnt work... is there like a command I can run in the terminal or something?
View 5 Replies
View Related
Oct 8, 2008
I went to search for "ColorSync" in Spotlight but it wasn't able to pull up the folder. It exists though @ Macintosh HD > Users > Chris > Library > ColorSync
View 10 Replies
View Related
Nov 9, 2008
Am I alone in having difficulties with this application? I cannot seem to locate any file when I use it. I type in part of the file name and rarely find what I want. If I try to use some part of a document's text, it is just the same. I am also finding difficulties in compressing files but have put this on another thread to avoid confusion I am using Tiger 10.5.5
View 3 Replies
View Related
Dec 14, 2008
Is there any Terminal commands that will do this? I use Spotlight all the time - to load documents to loading applications. However, I hate how it makes any DVD's in my drive spin up. I never search DVD's, so turning this off wouldn't be an issue.
View 1 Replies
View Related
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?
View 9 Replies
View Related
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.
View 8 Replies
View Related
Mar 17, 2009
Does anybody know what happened to my icons in Spotlight? This recently started occurring and seems to pop out every once in a while for arbitrary searches (restart fixes it temporarily).
View 1 Replies
View Related
May 12, 2009
I'm searching for a file in Finder. When I select "Preferences", which is the directory I'm in, it finds the file but when I select "This Mac" it doesn't.
View 2 Replies
View Related
May 19, 2009
It seems whenever I click on spotlight, my whole UI slows down. Most noticeable in dock. Maximize/minimize becomes choppy, dock magnification becomes jumpy. Only a restart fixes this. Anyone have a fix or experiencing the same thing?
View 2 Replies
View Related
Aug 14, 2009
My dictionary is synced to my spotlight, so when I type in a word, it defines it. But now it doesn't. It also loads only a few icons of the files I'm searching. I have MacBook. (2008)
View 1 Replies
View Related
Aug 15, 2009
I've looked at what others have done to find it, and I cannot find my terminal. I've used it before and now it's just gone....
View 11 Replies
View Related
Aug 21, 2009
If I had to pick one thing that is a fundamental feature of the OS, not just Mac OS but any OS, it's the ability to find files - and that functionality is all but completely broken in Leopard. Spotlight in Leopard absolutely sucks. It doesn't find files, it's slow, and there are few options for how to sort found files.
I can't count the number of times that I have tried using it to quickly locate a file, but it can't find it, even thought it's right there on my hard drive. I manually navigate to the file, and yep, I spelled it right...there it is. But it just doesn't appear in the Spotlight results list.
View 24 Replies
View Related
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.
View 8 Replies
View Related
Sep 15, 2009
Since upgrading to Snow Leopard I have an issue with spotlight. When I search for something and I select it, spotlight seems to continue on searching and I have to click the spotlight button again and press ESC to stop it from continuing searching. I want it to stop searching after I've used it, as it spins the hard drive quite fast, which generates noise.
View 13 Replies
View Related
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?
View 15 Replies
View Related
Nov 10, 2009
Has the 10.6.2 update fixed Spotlight searching of Exchange contacts? It's still broken for me. I've readded the exchange account, rebuild the spotlight index, and repaired permissions to no avail.
View 2 Replies
View Related
