The search function on iPhone 4S hardly ever works

From the home page, when I flick left to get to the search page, this feature almost never works. I usually have to turn the phone off, back on again, and then I get to do ONE or TWO searches before it stops working again. Since this appears to be the only way I can search my contacts by "company" rather than contact name, it is a real problem.
Any solutions?

I have tried this. I have the iPhone 4, with the most recent os. Nothing works permanently . Issue comes and goes. Apple really needs to address this. I called support, they wanted me to pay $60! I told them I'm not paying for a mistake that they made.
Any other possibilities for a fix?

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The search function in App Store, is not working in my iPhone 4, after upgrading to ios6

The search function in App Store, is not working in my iPhone 4, after upgrading to ios6. Does anyone have a solution for this problem?

Having the same problem. No response from Apple as I tried all the suggestions. Had to perform a system restore. Currently iy's working. Make sure you backup everything to your computer. IOS6 is still glitchy in other areas.

The search function in mail has virtually stopped working

What's going on???? I can no longer find anything using the search function in Apple Mail Version 5.2 (running on OS 10.7.4).
If I put in the name of someone I have exchenged maybe 500 emails with, it only finds one or two, or maybe none. The same with key words. And I can suddenly no longer search for partial email addresses (like @bankofamerica.com).
I tried rebuilding some of my bigger mail boxes, and a) it took a LONG time and b) it didn't help.
I have not made any chenges in my software, and a week ago I seemed to be searching just fine.
Any idea what might have happened and how to fix it?
Thank you!

Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.
The title of the Console window should be All Messages. If it isn't, select
SYSTEM LOG QUERIES ▹ All Messages
from the log list on the left. If you don't see that list, select
View ▹ Show Log List
from the menu bar at the top of the screen.
Click the Clear Display icon in the toolbar. Then try again to re-index Spotlight. Select any messages that appear in the Console window. Copy them to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-V.
The log contains a vast amount of information, almost all of which is irrelevant to solving any particular problem. When posting a log extract, be selective. A few dozen lines are almost always more than enough.
Please don't indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.
Please don't post screenshots of log messages—post the text.
Some private information, such as your name or email address, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.

I updated to Lion and now the Search function in Apple Mail is not working properly

Even though the "All" option is selected, when I type a string in the Mail spotlight search box, the string is not found. But I know for a fact the string is in an email and I've manually found the email (in a folder) and copied and pasted it into the search box. Mail is still not able to find it.
I have also checked to make sure that "Message contains" is the option in the search box. I've noticed that in some previous searches there has been a little arrow dropdown option next to the magnifying glass icon. But that arrow is not showing up consistently...and is not showing up now.
What am I doing wrong?

Ok...here's the steps to fix this as efficiently as possible. I have a whole bunch of mailboxes under "On My Mac" and they have a bunch of mailboxes nested in them. I get my messages into Apple Mail via IMAP. (I don't know if this matters.) The steps below assume you have a similar setup.
1. Hold the Option key down and click the dropdown arrow next to each mailbox that has one. This will cause all nested mailboxes below it to appear.
2. Go to the top of the list of mailboxes under "On My Mac" and highlight the first mailbox. Then hold the Shift key down and highlight the last mailbox in the list. This will cause all of the mailboxes and nested mailboxes to be highlighted.
3. From the menu, select "Mailbox --> Rebuild" and the rebuild process will start.
4. Watch the top of the mail screen to see the message count change as the mailboxes are being rebuilt. Wait until the activity stops before doing the next step.
5. As the mailboxes were rebuilt, many messages were reset as "Unread" even though every message was previously "Read." Make sure the mailboxes you want to affect are still highlighted. Right-click and select "Mark All Messages Read."
That fixed the problem for me.

In OS Yosemite the search function in Mail, Finder, Spotlight- does not work

MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013)
2,6 GHz Intel Core i7
16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2048 MB
OS Yosemite,
Finder versión 10.10.1
Mail Versión 8.1 (1993)
In OS Yosemite the search function in Mail, Finder, Spotlight… does not work. Messages or documents with the search criteria are there and one could find them manually, but the search function fails to find them. Following advice from Apple Support (728965377):
1. I applied an Apple protocol for adware removal (Remove unwanted adware that displays pop-up ads and graphics on your Mac); I had none, because I had formally utilized a similar protocol that I had found in Internet, actually an app that implemented automatically Apple's adware removal protocol.
2. I rebuild the post boxes in Mail (Mail (Yosemite): Reconstruir buzones); It took a while but it functioned properly
3. I re-install the System (OS X Yosemite: Reinstalar OS X); It took about 4 hours but there was no problem whatsoever with the installation.
Afterwards I searched for messages in Mail, and documents in Finder and Spotlight, without any difficulty. The search function in all of them was working properly. But the next time that I needed to search messages or documents, an hour later or so, the problem reappear and a couple of new issues occurred:
1. in app RagTime 6.5.2 (Build 1821), www.ragtime.de, the menu bar disappears (it is invisible), when one performs certain operations, e. g., calculating a value with a formula, whether it is in a spreadsheet or some other component (text, drawing, etc.). After touching with the cursor the menu bar is visible again.
2. after reading an e-mail in Mail or copying an address, this is seeing as a floating object in the finder and over every application. There is no logical way to get rid of the floating object and neither copying or deleting or cutting it. It is not a big issue but nonetheless bothersome.
3. In Mail, messages with Flag or in VIP contacts cannot be seen in the appropriate folders, only in the Incoming mail folder, together with other messages. It seems to me, this issue is part of same search function problem.
4. The preview function within Mail does not show the attached documents to a message, whether it is in the IN, OUT or Draft boxes.

Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.
The title of the Console window should be All Messages. If it isn't, select
SYSTEM LOG QUERIES ▹ All Messages
from the log list on the left. If you don't see that list, select
View ▹ Show Log List
from the menu bar at the top of the screen.
Click the Clear Display icon in the toolbar. Then try again to re-index Spotlight. Select any messages that appear in the Console window. Copy them to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-V.
The log contains a vast amount of information, almost all of which is irrelevant to solving any particular problem. When posting a log extract, be selective. A few dozen lines are almost always more than enough.
Please don't indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.
Please don't post screenshots of log messages—post the text.
Some private information, such as your name or email address, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.

The search function on my apple mail is not working.

The search function in Apple mail is not working. When I type in something to search by, the results are not showing up.
I've clicked on "All" on the search requirements to include all of my mailboxes.
I've also tried rebuilding the mailboxes with no results.
Has anyone else had this issue?

Is Spotlight working?

The searching function can't work in my itune app, but why? And how can I fix it?

The searching function of iTune store doesn't work? How can I fix it??

Hi,
Try resetting your iPod: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1430.
Hope this helps!
---likeabird---

Is there a way to use the 'search' function outside the search menu

Is it possible, to activate the 'search function' outside the 'search menu' on the iPod classic ? With 30000 songs and more on an iPod, it would be great, if I could use this option i.e. in cover flow, display songs, or display albums. This way, I won't get any blisters on my fingers, from scrolling from "A hard day's night" to "You can't do that".
Thanks for your help !

A couple of suggestions:
1. If you just have a few items you don't want included when you shuffle then find them in your library or playlist, pull up the info on the song/book/etc (File menu, Get info option), go to the "Options" tab and click the box that says "Skip when shuffling"
2. If there are a lot of items, then you may want to create a smart playlist (File menu, New Smart Playlist option) and set it up so that it excludes all the items you don't want. Then you can play that playlist on shuffle.
Hope that helps!
MacBook 2.0 GHz white Mac OS X (10.4.7) 30GB 5G iPod (with video)

HT1338 On macbook MAIL the search function doesn't work?

On my macbook retina pro with latest updated softwares the search function in "MAIL" doesnt work. It is supposed to be pretty simple fucntion and on my iphone and othe rmail programs it works fine. However once i type anything in "Search bar" at top right then inbox goes empty and nothing appears. Whereas the search bar gives options of sveral email names etc, even if i select one. It doesn't work.
Pls help. best regards. NA

Which search function do you mean?
*searching via the location bar (pref: keyword.URL)
*search bar on the Navigation Toolbar
*search bar on the about:home page (pref: browser.search.defaultenginename)
*other search bar (e.g. added by extension)
Is this about the about:home page?
If there is a problem with searching via the default about:home page then try to reset the search engine used on the about:home page.
Reset the browser.startup.homepage_override.mstone pref via the right-click context menu to the default on the about:config page and close and restart Firefox to restore the about:home page to its default.
*http://kb.mozillazine.org/about:config
#Open the about:config page via the location bar
#Type in the Filter bar: mstone
#Right-click the browser.startup.homepage_override.mstone line and select: Reset
#Close and restart Firefox
If this didn't help then delete the delete the chromeappsstore.sqlite file in the Firefox Profile Folder and repeat the above.
You can use the SearchReset extension to reset some preferences to the default values.
*https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/searchreset/
Note that the SearchReset extension only runs once and then uninstalls automatically, so it won't show on the "Firefox > Add-ons" page (about:addons).

NOT MACBOOK - I don't see the search function on this discussion page...

tried to use the one on the main/top menu... not it... is it just me? where did the search box go???

The search function has been temporarily turned off. This has been done in order to improve performance after a huge number of people started posting in the iPhone forums. There is an announcement on the main page that goes here:
http://discussions.apple.com/ann.jspa?annID=382
In the future, if you have questions about the functionality of the Discussions themselves, you should check or post in the Feedback About Discussions forum.
-Doug

When I 'Tab Groups,' the search function immediately pops up (and it won't go away) every time, preventing me from accessing my grouped tabs. How can I prevent this from happening?

Using Firefox 5.0 with Windows 7 on a laptop, whenever I click the 'Group Tabs' icon to the right of my tabs, the search function immediately comes up over my grouped tabs, preventing me from using any of them. When the search function comes up, the screen goes semi-dark and the search bar appears - any text I type at this time is entered into the search bar (the search function works normally). If I click any section of the screen at this time the search function disappears and the screen regains color - but only for a fraction of a second, and then the search function comes up again, along with the darkened screen. Hitting 'escape' or 'backspace' produces the same effect. Is there any way to disable this unceasing search function?

This is something you need to report via the Feedback button (or use the link on the Help menu).
Firefox 5.0 is still in BETA and not slated for release until June 21.
Reinstall the full version of the current release which is v4.0.1, download link at the top of this forum.

When an album has multiple artist how can you make them show up on an iPod Touch 4G? I can find an artist using the search function but they don't show up in the artist view on my iPod. iTunes shows them OK when you sort by artist.

Tech support seemed to understand the question but had no answer. Why would an album with only one artist show the artist but an album with multiple artist not show any of them. The album art show various in iTunes. That makes sense but on my iPod I would expect to see all artists.

Wish I did. I tried the group function but that didn't help in iTunes. The search function is the best I came up with. I can answer the question do you have susch and such artist. But I can't browse for an artist I don't remember exactly or have misspelled. Fortunately I don't think I've bought anything from iTunes that i already had. If you can't see an artist it's possible you think you don't have something you actually do have. Sorry, still hoping for a better work around or better yet a fix.

The "Search" function box doesn't find things that are there! Why?!

The "Search" function box doesn't find things that are there! Why? Eg: It doesnt show all my Sent and Received emails, but it will find an email that I half wrote and deleted. Unsure why or how to explain more fully.
I also don't understand if I type in "James email" or "J" into the search box and all the J / James stuff appears but it doesn't show the emails I know have been sent and I know are somewhere because I rang "James" up to check, but the search box shows random thing I am NOT looking for, even if I type in fully what I am looking for and test it by typing in full titles of things.
It also doesn't store all my sent emails in "Sent" box. Confused! I'm not sure if the "Search" box just isn't up to the job or if it is broken / i'm doing something wrong? Maybe the email address I use isn't set up properly?

This can happen sometimes if the cache is not cleared correctly when items are not deleted from your device.
The only solution to this is to do a restore to clean out the cache file.

The search function in the itunes store does not work. It will accept a request and suggest searches but then it locks up and will not search. Clicking on the magnifying glass or a suggested search does nothing. Re-installing itunes has not helped.

The search function in the itunes store does not work. It will accept a request and suggest searches but then it locks up and will not search. Clicking on the magnifying glass or a suggested search does nothing. Re-installing itunes has not helped.

everything you stated here is exactly what i have done and have got nowhere. i have windows 7 64 bit on a hp 8 g of ram desktop. im also looking for help

I recently downloaded 6.1.2 and am regretting it...for one reason...the search function no longer works correctly. !!

I personally and professionally rely on text messaging extensively. Since upgrade, the search function doesn't work correctly. It only returns partial results. This has never happened with previous upgrades. All the old texts are there but it does not search the entire history. If i compose new text and duplicate the recipients from an old text, it will bring up string...just cant search for it. PLEASE HELP SOMEONE.

HarryAustralia wrote:
I recently updated my ipad wifi only to the new ios 6.1.2 and initially I had the auto cover lock option which can be seen in the Generals tab, but then it stoped working!! Before the update, the auto cover lock worked fine. So after trying all the options, I then did a complete reset on the ipad and now its gone all together from the General tab!! I can no longer see the "auto cover lock" option.
The iPad cover lock is for when you use a cover with magnets in it to lock and unlock the iPad when you close the cover or open it. Try running a refrigerator magnet along the sides of the iPad and see if that trips the iPad Cover Lock back into the settings.
That is not the same thing as the iPad Auto Lock setting which allows you to set an allotted time before the iPad goes to sleep.
You can try resetting all settings to see if the Auto Lock feature retinrs to the iPad.
Settings>General>Reset>Reset All Settings. You will have to enter all of your device settings again.... All of the settings in the settings app will have to be re-entered. This can be a little time consuming re-entering all of the device settings again.

The search function on iPhone 4S hardly ever works

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