File search problem

P

Peter

I need to be able to search the contents of Word files in a set of folders
to find files containing a certain word.

However currently when I search a folder to find a file containing (say)
"golf" (I know a t least one file contains the word 'golf'), it does not
find any files. Even selecting contain contents.

However if I save the file in text format, thesearch finds the file.

Why - am I doing something wrong?

Thanks
Peter
 
B

Brian

Please tell us a little more.

Which Vista feature are you using to search? (Starting from where?)
Does your search method work search for other words besides golf?
Where is this folder containing document(s) that contained the word golf?
What file format are the documents that contain golf that aren't being
found? (Word 97-2003, 2007?)
Were those documents ever converted from other file formats?
Have they been in their folder long enough to have been indexed?

That's all I can think of now, but it might help us.
In the meantime, try creating a brand new document in Word and typing golf
in the body. Save it to more than one location, such as in Documents, AND in
that folder where the search is not finding it. Does Vista search find the
brand new document?

Brian

Peter said:
I need to be able to search the contents of Word files in a set of folders
to find files containing a certain word.

However currently when I search a folder to find a file containing (say)
"golf" (I know a t least one file contains the word 'golf'), it does not
find any files. Even selecting contain contents.

However if I save the file in text format, thesearch finds the file.

Why - am I doing something wrong?

Thanks
Peter



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P

Peter

Brian,
Sorry for the delay answering your questions - I've been away.
a) Using search from Start or from within Explorer
b) Does not find any word in the document (golf was just an example)
c) file is in a folder imediately of a drive partition.
d) Word 2003
e) the documents are scanned and through OCR (ABBYY) to Word 2003 then
saved.
f) Not sure what you mean by in long enough?

Thanks
Peter
 
B

Brian Bradley

Sorry for MY delay. I replied a couple days ago, but it didn't seem to make
it to the server.

I was hoping and thinking that others would jump in, but since they haven't,
either they think I've got this one under control or they're stumped, too.

But what I would do if this were happening to me is:

Create a new document in Word 2003 and include the word golf in the text of
the new document.
Save the document with a memorable filename that does NOT have the
characters g-o-l-f in the filename.
Save the document, as a Word 2003 document, in your Documents folder AND on
that drive "off a drive partition."
Heck, save it and/or copy it to a few places on your system, just for good
measure.

Optional but recommended step: Rebuild your system index. If you are not
comfortable doing that, that's okay. (I'm just not sure how long it might be
before the document you created will get indexed. Immediately upon saving?
Within a few minutes after user inactivity begins? (My Word documents seem
to be available for indexed searching immediately.)

Click Start and type golf in the simple search box. Results?

Here's where the discovery/elimination tree will begin branching. I won't
provide a flow chart because I'm not that kind of logical, chess-playing
style of troubleshooter. I perform what-ifs in what order seems logical and
watch the results until I get a feel for, say, what order to do them in and
such.

But you'll want to invoke the various ways to use Vista's search features,
including simple search from the Start button and from within the Search
dialog that you call up by clicking on Search in the menu. Once you're using
the Search dialog opened from the Search link on the menu, you'll want to
choose various cobinations of ways to search. Frankly, I'm only beginning to
get a feel for the difference between entering a term in the
upper-right-hand search box (does it have a real name?) and in the "Name"
text box right below it. What's the difference between those two, anyway?
And is part of a filename considered a "tag?"

But of course you'll want to search without ticking the "Inclue Non-Indexed,
Hidden and System Files," and then search with it ticked.

The point is, before we can know why you can't find that original (sample)
document, we have to know if you can indeed find a document that we know you
should be able to find, meaning the new document that you created and typed
golf into.

Because I have been suspecting all along that the problem might be in the
fact that the documents that you noticed you cound't find by content/text
had undergone one or more filetype conversions. Sure that SHOULDN"T make a
difference, but . . .

Well, that's all I've got. I'm just putting in my two cents' worth because I
spent weeks trying to untangle the "can't find WordPerfect files by
text/context" predicament, without success, I'm afraid. But people here
tried to be helpful, but I don't think it can be done, and I eventually
switched to Word. WordPerfect X3 didn't behave well for me on Vista, anyway,
blah, blah, blah.

Hope this helps a little. And I sure hope I'm not wasting your time. I also
hope someone else will jump in. I don't care if they tell us that I'm full
of it, either, because I come here to learn, too.

All right, then. Let us know what you are finding.

Brian



----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter" <[email protected]>
Newsgroups: microsoft.public.windows.vista.file_management
Sent: Thursday, December 06, 2007 1:30 PM
Subject: Re: File search problem
 
C

corradolab

Sorry for the delay answering your questions - I've been away.
a) Usingsearchfrom Start or from within Explorer
b) Does not find any word in the document (golf was just an example)
c) file is in a folder imediately of a drive partition.
d) Word 2003
e) the documents are scanned and through OCR (ABBYY) to Word 2003 then
saved.
f) Not sure what you mean by in long enough?

Peter,

by default Vista index only the Users folder, which means it will find
only the documents you save, in example, in your Desktop or your
Documents folder.
You need to add by yourself the "folder immediatly of a drive
partition".
One quick way to do it: open Explorer, go to your folder, start a
search. A bar should appear reading "Search could be slow on non
indexed paths. Click here to add path to the index" (or something like
that, I'm translating from my Italian Vista).

Happy new year,
Corrado
 
O

On Request

I don't expect this will be helpful, but I just did a Vista search for the
word 'golf' and I get 74 documents, most of which are Word documents, and
where the word 'golf' is in the file text and not in the title, and about a
third of which are 'Microsoft Office Word 97-2003 Documents'.

One thing I do every few months is to rebuild the search index 'whether it
needs it or not'; often clears up problems.
 
R

R. C. White

Hi, Colin.

Have you set Indexing Options to include the folders where those documents
are? And have you given yourself permission to see files in those folders?

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
(Running Windows Live Mail 2008 in Vista Ultimate x64 SP1)
 

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