Search tool does not work

[Russell Campbell]

Microsoft - anybody moderators listening? - your search tool does not work
and this astounds me. How can you put out such junk?! I open a text file,
then I select a bit of text (17722619830) and copy it to the clipboard, then
I search all files in that same folder for that text and it says it didn't
find anything. Basically, your search tool is beyond worthless. I don't
even know why I bothered. I knew this already from encountering this same
problem awhile back. But I gave it another chance. I did a search to find
that text and your worthless software said it wasn't in any of the files.
Then I figured out what file it was in via a more lengthy and time-consuming
process, then, just to verify, I did the steps above and it still did not
find it. How can you put this on the market and never even bother to fix
it?

 

[Mike H]

My search tool works well.. if you want help on this issue, I would suggest
that you change your attitude.. it is not easy to help people that are so
sure they have the answers already..

 

[Ramesh [MVP]]

Windows® XP - Search Problems - Containing Text:
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/tips/xp_bad_search.htm

--
Ramesh, MS-MVP XP Shell/UI
http://www.mvps.org/sramesh2k


Microsoft - anybody moderators listening? - your search tool does not work
and this astounds me. How can you put out such junk?! I open a text file,
then I select a bit of text (17722619830) and copy it to the clipboard, then
I search all files in that same folder for that text and it says it didn't
find anything. Basically, your search tool is beyond worthless. I don't
even know why I bothered. I knew this already from encountering this same
problem awhile back. But I gave it another chance. I did a search to find
that text and your worthless software said it wasn't in any of the files.
Then I figured out what file it was in via a more lengthy and time-consuming
process, then, just to verify, I did the steps above and it still did not
find it. How can you put this on the market and never even bother to fix
it?

 

[R. C. White]

Feel better now, Russell?

There are no "moderators" here. And this is not "our" search tool because
this is not Microsoft.

This is a newsgroup. Microsoft hosts it, but posters here are just users -
like you. Some of us spend more time here than others, trying to help our
peers having Windows problems. Some of us have been doing this so long and
with enough success that Microsoft has awarded us MVP status, but that does
not make us programmers (who write search tools) or MS employees (who sell
and support them). We get a few perks, but we don't get paid and we don't
officially speak for MS; in fact, we are some of the company's most vocal
critics. Mostly, we're just users like you who try to help other users who
ask for help.

RC

 

[Russell Campbell]

Yes, I do feel better. And I am aware of everything you state. Based on an
article I saw awhile back, MS put a policy into place within the last couple
of years or so that says their people (product support specialists, I guess)
will "haunt" the NGs on their servers. This is to help get all the
questions answered (though it's probably impossible to answer them all in
the busy NGs, regardless of who's paying attention), to correct any really
bad info, to weed out the truly obnioxious stuff, etc. (all within reason of
what just one or two MS people can do). So my irritation with their search
tool was directed at what I hoped was a "moderator" from MS (hey I have no
idea exactly what they call these people, that's just the term I chose at
the time).

I'm not sure why you think I said this is "our" search tool. As I
mentioned, I was hoping a "moderator" would read the post, so when I said
"your", I meant MS.

MVPs do get "perks" and those perks are significant and if you are too vocal
you will not be an MVP anymore, that's a fact.

 

[Russell Campbell]

Oh, thank you for the lecture, Mike. If MS puts out a search tool that is
this crappy, they deserve to have people tell them that. Will anyone from
MS see this. Maybe, maybe not. I was just quite irritated that such a
simple thing can't be done correctly. Ramesh says it's a registry problem.
Well, that's another sore point. The registry was a poor idea and MS
admitted as much when .NET came out. As a programmer, I never store
anything there and my users are much better off. But I haven't changed the
settings involved, so perhaps MS did not install it correctly via their own
Windows installation program. And I'm not going to change my attitude. If
they can't get such a simple thing right, I'm going to be just as irritated
at them today as I was previously, despite your lecture.

 

[Russell Campbell]

Thank you for your response. You acknowledge the problem exists and provide
a solution (full or partial). Perhaps by your lack of other response, you
are also acknowledging that people can get quite frustrated when simply
searching a text file for a text string does not work. I'm not sure how
they (MS) can let this out the door.

This is just poor design. To let people indicate that files with a certain
mask should be searched (*PRI2.ASC, for instance) and then to not search
those files is lame. This is exactly what this article says is going on:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q309173

It was changed from 2000 to XP, but they should have offered a way to use
the old style, since there are tons of file extensions out there. To only
search the ones they register is stupid and overlooks the fact that not
everyone's machine is the same. So now I've finished my bitching . . .

 

[Andrew Ofthesong]

Russell:

First, calm out... you're going to get old before time... Microsoft products
are full of annoyances that are really unbealiveable... You better live with
that...

Second, you're right, it's no abuse of language to say that the search tool
is crap, beacuse it doesn't do what is supposed.

A time ago I asked the same that you, and the answer was "Most users will
not want to search text inside of files that are not .txt, .rtf, or
..doc".... Wow!

I recommend you the excellent program "Total Commander"
http://www.ghisler.com/

Also, FixWin (http://www.delcanto.net/RDZ/Progs.htm) can help ypu with
another annoyances...