Using Windows Vista Enterprise
I've created a 'Saved Search' in Windows Explorer. How do I a) SEE the
search criteria without physically running the search and opening the Search
Pane, and b) modify the criteria?
Joe,
Searches are saved in files with .search-ms extensions. These look like folders in
Explorer but are really XML files. By default, your search criteria are saved in the
file name of the file. The file name appears in the Explorer title bar after clicking
on a saved search.
You can view the contents of a .search-ms file by right-clicking on it in Explorer
and choosing Send To > Notepad or by sending it to an XML editor like XML Notepad.
However, a search query in XML has very different syntax than a query in the search
window. You would have to learn this syntax to able to edit it, and I don't know if
Microsoft has published it.
What I do is to copy the text of complex queries from the search window and then
paste them into a Notepad file named Searches.txt. I keep that file on my desktop
for easy reference.
That way, I don't have to show long queries in the search-ms file names. If I edit a
query in Notepad, I then paste it into the search window, hit the Save Search button,
and overwrite the previous *.search-ms file.
Doug M. in NJ
