Windows Desktop Search 2.6.5 Final

[Brandon Live Veteran]

Just thought I'd give you guys a heads-up that we just pushed out the bits for the final WDS 2.6.5 release.

Details and changelist on my blog here.

Download link here.

[jmc777]

:bounce:

[libertas83]

Great job! I have found WDS to be very useful even though I have a very organzied file system.

[zentradi]

Installed, checked out for about 20 minutes, uninstalled. Still a clunky mess, still adds itself to the startup folder when told not to, still a resource hog. I'd still pay for something like approcket rather than use this thing for free.

Keep trying.

[Brandon Live Veteran]

Installed, checked out for about 20 minutes, uninstalled. Still a clunky mess, still adds itself to the startup folder when told not to, still a resource hog. I'd still pay for something like approcket rather than use this thing for free.

Keep trying.

What do you consider to be "clunky" about WDS?

As for the start-up folder, WDS creates an entry on installation. However, it will not start up if you had selected "Do not run automatically at Windows startup" during the First Run Wizard, despite that entry being there.

On what basis are you calling WDS a resource hog? We've done extensive work and testing to ensure that WDS is a good desktop citizen. Compared to our competitors we have vastly reduced I/O and memory usage, and the most robust back-off engine as well.

[zentradi]

What do you consider to be "clunky" about WDS?

As for the start-up folder, WDS creates an entry on installation. However, it will not start up if you had selected "Do not run automatically at Windows startup" during the First Run Wizard, despite that entry being there.

On what basis are you calling WDS a resource hog? We've done extensive work and testing to ensure that WDS is a good desktop citizen. Compared to our competitors we have vastly reduced I/O and memory usage, and the most robust back-off engine as well.

Let me ask you a question, and I'm being 100% serious here. What is the damn point of leaving the startup item in the start menu if the user doesn't want it starting? Wouldn't it be a LOT easier just to delete the stupid shortcut if the user unchecks the option to have it start with the system? Here's a news flash; reguardless of it starting or not, when someone installs something, unchecks a box to have said something start at system startup, then they scroll the start menu and see the little icon still there in the startup folder, it ****es them off. It's annoying, and unless you can give me a real good reason why it can't be deleted, especially after I can simply go and delete the thing myself with no negative results whatsoever.

I consider it clunky in the same way that I consider all these little microsoft craplets clunky. It feels like a addon, and not part of the OS. Like something is botched or shoe-horned in there as an afterthought. It's hard to describe really, but it just doesn't seem like it belongs.

I really apologize for being harsh...I know it must feel sorta like I called your baby ugly. But I'm being honest.

[Slimy]

I'll pass, I don't really need a searching app; the windows one is fine. If this is built into vista i'll use it, otherwise I really don't need it.

[fishrman]

^^ My thoughts exactly. Its still a novelty to me, and in my mind, the greater majority of computer users. But nevertheless, I'll give you props for a good program that in actual fact is better than all of the other crap out there.

[drshdw]

WDS isn't bad, beats google desktop search by far. If they can get it to have more options, like QuickSilver for OSX, that'd be f'ing awesome.

[kirupa]

Just installed it, and as always, works great. WDS is one of the more useful programs I've used - it actually saves me time in finding files, and that offsets the small (compared to other similar programs) RAM footprint :)

[Nexus-]

Thanks I find WDS great on xp, helps me find things in a fraction of the time it takes for the normal xp search. I also find it to be much better than the google desktop search

[none_needed]

brandon is letting us know the final build is out. if u think WDS is crap, then dont bother dloading it and save the fuss. simple as that. :rolleyes:

[em_te]

Can someone show some screenshots?

Is this the same as the MSN thing?

I tried Google Desktop Search once, but uninstalled it after it distorted my taskbar: Usually it makes the taskbar taller when running XP in classic mode and I cannot resize it to be as small as I want (50px), which is a pain since I have to run in 600x800 mode and don't want it to waste so much space. And I hope there's no MSN branding with the butterfly background which makes it look cheesy.

[Guol]

Great program.

I use it mainly for it's shortcut function.

For example, to open MS Word:

Instead of having to navigate to Start Menu > Microsoft Office > Microsoft Word

I just press ctrl + alt + m, then type !word ;)

Looking forward to seeing this integrated into vista :)

[none_needed]

this build seems faster in searches. my only problem is the deskbar search box doesnt go well with my desktop theme. overall.. 9/10. good one (Y)

[Smigit]

thanks I'll see how it goes. I've had to uninstall every release thus far because it wasnt shutting down cleanly on windows shutdown. I'll see how this one goes

thanks for the news

[StevenNT]

Can someone show some screenshots?

Is this the same as the MSN thing?

I tried Google Desktop Search once, but uninstalled it after it distorted my taskbar: Usually it makes the taskbar taller when running XP in classic mode and I cannot resize it to be as small as I want (50px), which is a pain since I have to run in 600x800 mode and don't want it to waste so much space. And I hope there's no MSN branding with the butterfly background which makes it look cheesy.

It's the business version of desktop search. It does not have MSN branding and does not come with the MSN Toolbar, allows admins to configure it centrally. Apart from that it's just the same.

[Ji@nBing]

Thanks for the heads up. Great little app and it's very well done. You guys did a great job on it.

[drshdw]

holy ****..my index file size is 1gb -.- screwy 150,000 files. :whistle:

[drshdw]

double post.

[Brandon Live Veteran]

Let me ask you a question, and I'm being 100% serious here. What is the damn point of leaving the startup item in the start menu if the user doesn't want it starting? Wouldn't it be a LOT easier just to delete the stupid shortcut if the user unchecks the option to have it start with the system? Here's a news flash; reguardless of it starting or not, when someone installs something, unchecks a box to have said something start at system startup, then they scroll the start menu and see the little icon still there in the startup folder, it ****es them off. It's annoying, and unless you can give me a real good reason why it can't be deleted, especially after I can simply go and delete the thing myself with no negative results whatsoever.

I consider it clunky in the same way that I consider all these little microsoft craplets clunky. It feels like a addon, and not part of the OS. Like something is botched or shoe-horned in there as an afterthought. It's hard to describe really, but it just doesn't seem like it belongs.

I really apologize for being harsh...I know it must feel sorta like I called your baby ugly. But I'm being honest.

I sympathize with your concerns, as I too was confused by this last year when I saw the first beta of WDS do this. The only reason I can think of right now is that we need it in order for administrators to be able to adjust the run-at-startup option via Group Policy. However I'm not certain if that's the only reason and have sent a mail to someone who would know.

Anyway, it doesn't worry me too much since this particular problem will be moot in the next major version of WDS (including Vista) where the indexer is a system service.

holy ****..my index file size is 1gb -.- screwy 150,000 files. :whistle:

Well when you have that many files/emails indexed it's going to get big. Although 1GB is definitely on the very high side.

But it's worth noting that the WDS index takes up significantly less space than our main competitor's offering :)

WDS isn't bad, beats google desktop search by far. If they can get it to have more options, like QuickSilver for OSX, that'd be f'ing awesome.

What kind of options would you like to see? :)

Edited April 14, 2006 by Brandon Live

[User6060]

its a good product but i hardly ever search for anything so I'm gonna stay away from desktop search.

[JustGeorge]

Why do you have to download separate add-ons to get it to index certain file types? The user should have the option of manually adding what file extensions they want indexed.

[drshdw]

I sympathize with your concerns, as I too was confused by this last year when I saw the first beta of WDS do this. The only reason I can think of right now is that we need it in order for administrators to be able to adjust the run-at-startup option via Group Policy. However I'm not certain if that's the only reason and have sent a mail to someone who would know.

Anyway, it doesn't worry me too much since this particular problem will be moot in the next major version of WDS (including Vista) where the indexer is a system service.

Well when you have that many files/emails indexed it's going to get big. Although 1GB is definitely on the very high side.

But it's worth noting that the WDS index takes up significantly less space than our main competitor's offering :)

What kind of options would you like to see? :)

Instant indexing. I know Quicksilver is built off Spotlight in a way, but new installs/files/etc get indexed right away.

When I was using WDS, I'd have to reindex the whole thing right? Or did I miss something. =P

Why do you have to download separate add-ons to get it to index certain file types? The user should have the option of manually adding what file extensions they want indexed.

You can, look in the options. You can tell it what to index and what not to index.

[Brandon Live Veteran]

Why do you have to download separate add-ons to get it to index certain file types? The user should have the option of manually adding what file extensions they want indexed.

WDS will index every file it comes across unless it is:

A) Hidden, or

B) On the "exclude" list in the WDS control panel.

However, it will not be able to index the content of some filetypes without the necessary add-ins. The biggest one being PDF. However, even without that you'll be able to search for PDF files by name or by other generic metadata (date, author, etc).

Instant indexing. I know Quicksilver is built off Spotlight in a way, but new installs/files/etc get indexed right away.

When I was using WDS, I'd have to reindex the whole thing right? Or did I miss something. =P

You definitely don't have to reindex!

Whenever a file is added, changed, moved, or deleted - WDS gets a notification from the filesystem - assuming it's an NTFS system. It also gets similar notifications from Outlook for e-mails. The only exception is for changes that are made while WDS isn't running. When you start-up WDS, it will perform an "incremental check" to see what has changed while it wasn't running, and automatically update the index in the background.

Those notifications aren't processed immediately. They will get queued up until your system is idle so that WDS never interferes with your normal computer usage.

In the Desktop Search Options panel, under "advanced", there is an option called "Prioritize Indexing." This will cause WDS to always process notifications immediately as they come in. This is how I run all of my systems except my laptop. For most modern machines, this will have no noticeable impact on performance once your initial index is built. With this option, your index will always be instantly up-to-date. Same as Spotlight/Quicksilvr on the Mac. You should give that a shot and see if that's what you wanted :)