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Doug VanFlag for Canada

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Smart and fast search tool

I regularly need to search for programs or specific text over several volumes (nearly a terabyte of data). I have asked this question in the past but received negative results.

In the past I grudgingly used the barely adequate search tool that Windows 2K provides. I could search multiple volumes by separating them with a semicolon (;) in the "LOOK IN" box. To my utter dismay, I just found out that Windows XP DOESN'T allow this!

My question is: I am looking for a better search tool with the following criteria.

- Search multiple volumes (they never change so this could be set) in a single search;
- Use Boolean logic (AND, OR, NOT, etc);
- Use smart caching to speed up searching;
- Find similar names in a search (so that exact spelling is not required);
- Not only search for file names but also look inside text files for names;
- Search for multiple names simultaneously (e.g. search for files with the names cat OR dog - see Boolean logic);
- Have all the similar features of Microsoft's search tool such as date and size restrictions.

As a bonus (it doesn't have to be the same program) 100 additional points for a good DUPLICATE FILE CHECKER that doesn't crash when checking 100000 files. I have tried a few but they are obviously designed for home users. Please, answer this question ONLY if you have real experience with such a program and a large number of files. Just searching Google will reveal many of these programs. I am currently testing one from ABC-view.com.

Thank you,
SDC

I also have a few other high value questions:
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/21418476/Rotate-a-2D-photo-2D-to-quasi-3D-conversion.html  - 250pts
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/21418424/Connecting-to-Exchange-5-5-server-over-802-11.html  - 250pts
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/21411451/Looking-for-a-SATA-to-USB-2-0-external-enclosure.html  - 300pts
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/21406038/Setting-corporate-standard-to-Firefox-how-can-I-prevent-IE-from-being-used.html  - 125pts
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/21379033/How-do-I-make-Windows-2000-recognise-a-USB-keyboard-that-AFTER-boot-up.html - 125pts
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
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Duncan Meyers
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http://www.copernic.com/en/products/desktop-search/features.html

" Supports advanced Boolean operators (AND/+, OR, NOT/-), quotes (exact phrase or whole word) and parentheses."
" Automatically indexes on-the-fly new and updated files in the background (Windows NT/2000/XP required), including new emails sent or received with Microsoft Outlook."
" Offers specific sorting and grouping fields for each search category in order to ease result viewing."

And so on..
Avatar of Doug Van

ASKER

Thank you Myersd. I'll research this product and respond back next week.
I'm back finally!

meyersd: I cannot believe that this company gives away Copernic for FREE! I had previously paid a lot for dtsearch and this free Copernic is superior in almost every way!

I have indexed email and documents (about 490 gigabytes!) and a fairly complex search requires less than 15 seconds to complete. The index file size is only 1.79Gb which might seem like a lot until you consider that it is also indexing the contents of any document (word, text, pdf) up to 100k in size.

Amazing!

But I did email the company with a few suggestions for improvements:

1. Provide a right click option, "Open to folder" in file explorer containing the resulting document;
2. Allow the resulting search item to be renamed (you do currently allow copy/move/delete - thank you!);
3. Allow user to mark multiple search results (it is frustrating that I can only move one document at a time);
4. (related to 3) Copernic should keep track of minor changes make such as when I remove a dozen documents from within the search results and allow for a "quick re-indexing";
5. Copernic is ripe to be made into a fantastic duplicate document finder.
6. More flexibility in instructing Copernic which documents to index and index within document. A whitelist and/or blacklist would be a very useful addition. E.g. there are a number of files that I wish Copernic to ignore;
7. Ability to highlight certain documents based upon extension or file location (folder);
8. Another nice feature is for Copernic to offer a web interface so that a desktop index may be searched from anywhere on my network.
9. (related to 8) A network ready version of Copernic where clients can share the same networked index;

Thank you again!
SDC
Glad to be of assistance!