How do I search entire message contents?

I'm looking for a mail I sent containing a word, but I only get suggestions to search people, subjects and mailboxes - not entire messages.
In Mail Help it says:
Refine your search, if you want.
To change the criteria, click the arrow and choose From, To, or Entire Message from the pop-up menu. The choices in the menu depend on the category you selected from the list of suggestions.
What arrow?
I can't find an arrow which brings up a pop-up menu from which to choose "Entire Message". In particular, there is no arrow in or around the search input field or in the search bar.
Any ideas?
Thanks,
doug

I believe I discovered the cause of the problem. Lion is re-indexing everything for Spotlight.
doug

Similar Messages

Mail will no longer search "Entire Message". That option is grayed out. Why?

How do I get Mail to search "Entire Message". That option suddenly is grayed out.

A SMTP is a server for sending messages, and not as an Incoming server. Do you mean an IMAP server?
I did not mean it was for a single message, but the fact that you had a single message in local storage turned the option on, but it could only have search the messages that were in local storage.
Check again in Mail Preferences/Accounts/Advanced what is selected regarding Keep copies of Messages?
Ernie

"search entire message" button in mail is sometimes grayed out

Hi, Recently I've noticed that sometimes when I do a search in mail the button to search entire message is grayed out and unclickable. This started happening in the last few days. Just a minute ago I tried to do a search and the button was gray, then I went to Safari and logged into Apple support, went back to mail and typed a new search, and all of sudden the button is clickable again. Any ideas? Running 10.6.7 on a 15" Macbook Pro. Thanks...

Ernie,
I collected the info you require - see below. Along the way I deduced that the problem may be a corrupted Spotlight index. As you'll see below attempting to remove Library or Mail from the index failed. I am currently rebuilding the entire volume index...
Repair permissions - log shows no fixes. Search still fails...
POP-<email> varies from 14.7MB down to 120kb.
Typically the root level of POP-<email> is
Deleted Messages.mbox
Sent Messages.mbox
Drafts.mbox
INBOX.mbox
Junk.mbox
Some account also have "MessageUidsAlreadyDownloaded2"
The root level of INBOX.mbox is typically:
Info.plist [not always]
Messages
POP-steve%[email protected]
has top level
Deleted Messages.mbox
Drafts.mbox
INBOX.mbox
Junk.mbox
MessageUidsAlreadyDownloaded
MessageUidsAlreadyDownloaded2
Sent Messages.mbox
with INBOX.mbox top level of
content_index
Info.plist
mbox
mbox.SKindex
mbox.SKindex.isValid
Messages
tableofcontents
I deleted the out of date indexes, etc.
Spotlight prefs, Privacy, add ~/Library/Mail
"Privacy List Error
The item couldn't be added or removed because of an unknown error."
Same Mail operation worked on MBP -- also on MBP Library folder.
Try MacPro Library - same error.
Delete entire MacPro index. More to follow on whether this is the fix...

Mail search won't search Entire Message

When I type anything into the search bar in mail, and have it select to search Entire Message, it won't find anything. Even if I only type 2 characters, it won't find it.
In the SpotLight System Preference, I tried adding the whole drive to the privacy pane and then removing it.

I had this problem too - I can't believe that now at 10.5.8, Apple STILL haven't sorted this out.
I have eventually managed to get search back again (don't want to speak too soon though). Among other things, I did mdimport ~/Library/Mail following the advice in http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=5934412#5934412. However, I don't know if this actually had any particular effect, as Spotlight seemed to start a new index run after I had done this (which presumably would override the effects of the specific import).
I have tried most things mentioned - rebuild mailbox, delete Envelope Index after quitting Mail, all sorts of variants of turning Spotlight or different volumes to be indexed or not on or off.
I have not tried (because I don't think they are likely to have any effect) deleting the preferences, switching off and on again, resetting PRAM etc.
I have tried searching for duplicate Mail copies, and searching for .metadataneverindex and disk utility checking permissions on the volumes and manually on the mail folders, and checking by looking that the mail folders are not packages, but come on, I don't think any of these are likely.
Personally, I think it was the virgin sacrifice that fixed it.

Spotlight / search entire message stopped working!?

Hi, whenever I type anything into the search bar, and I have 'entire message' selected, it ALWAYS returns 0 results.
Even when it blatantly should.
Any ideas folks?
thanks in advance
Gwyn
xxxxxxxx

Telling Spotlight to re-index the disk might have solved your problem:
Re: Search Entire Message Not Working After Fresh OS Install
Deleting anything shouldn't have to be necessary. If it "fixed" your problem it could be just because that caused Spotlight to update the index accordingly.
What is weird about the other thread Ernie was referring to is that Mail couldn't find messages that Spotlight could, which I still don't know whether was also your case or not. I troubleshooted a similar case a few weeks ago, which I believe was caused by permissions issues. Unfortunately, the OP didn't provide feedback as to whether what I suggested there fixed anything or not:
Spotlight non-functional

Search 'Entire Message' in Mail on network account.

Hello -
Recently an issue has come up where my users are unable to choose the "Entire Message" option when performing a search in Mail. "From", "To" and "Subject" all work fine.
All of my users are running latest updates of 10.6 and 10.7 and all are on network accounts. This is not a new problem, but it's a new question that came up a few months ago and I've been scraping for an answer since then.
-I understand that for the "From, To and Subject" search options, Mail handles them separately in the Envelope Index file.
-Spotlight is responsible for the Entire Message option.
-I had to force spot light to index the user folder through terminal using mdutil and specifying "~/". The user folders are not on local storage so Spotlight ignores them.
After forcing mdutil to index - a spotlight search will return results as I would expect - searching entire message but, Mail still does not allow for the Entire Message search option.
Please let me know if more information would help. Thank you in advance.

Maybe I just needed to talk it out, but I think I've sorted it out on my own.
I went to the Account Prefs > Offending Mailbox and under the heading:
"Keep copies of messages offline for viewing" from "Dont Keep Any..." to "All..."
Then I went to Mailbox>Rebuild in the menubar and Bang!
Results!
Now I'm just waiting for the rebuild to finish to see what kind of hit my HD is going to take.

10.6.7 apple mail - search 'entire message' is greyed out

10.6.7 apple mail - search 'entire message' is greyed out
can't use it - other choices ok
was working yesterday...
hw do I get it back?

See the discussions at:
https://discussions.apple.com/message/15146088#15146088
Can be temporary with POP perhaps, but should work. With IMAP, it is required that copies of messages be kept for local searching.
More info, please.
Ernie

How to display search results in content area

Hi
How can I display search results in the content area as seen in sdn.
Thanks in advance.

Hi,
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw70/helpdata/en/cc/f4e77ddef1244380b06fee5f8b892a/frameset.htm you find the relevant guidelines.
You can filter the PCD object setting the Search Layout Set of your Searc Iview.
In System Admin > System Configuration > Content Management > User Interface > Settings > Layout Set and duplicate the "SearchResultLayoutSet" layout set.
Then you have to duplicate its Collection Renderer "StandardSearchResultRenderer".
In its property "Resource Types to be Filtered" set as value "-http://sap.com/xmlns/pcd/app/iview".
Then assign the new Collection Renderer to the new Layout Set and that's it!
Now if yuor Search Iview uses this new Layout Set, when you search a PCD object the iviews will not be shown!
(or)
In the entry "Predefined Properties" of the search options set, you will need to enter "resourcetype(value=http://sap.com/xmlns/pcd/app/page/default)" if you want the search to be limited to resources defined as pages. Leave out /default if you dont want the end user to be able to change the filter.
If you want the parameter reflected in the URL, you can find information about how to do it here: /message/280371#280371 [original link is broken]
Check and try either ways.
Regards,
Ponneswari A.

Cannot search mail message content

In Snow Leopard, I used to be able to choose "from", "to" "entire message", "subject". I can't seem to do this with mail in Lion.
Afyter typing in a search term, I get a drop down as I'm typing which shows "people". I presume that is from or to, but no way to find a word that is in the content of a message or a subject.
Can anyone help please?

Followup...
I had previously had WideMail installed. It should just be disabled in Mail under Snow Leopard. However, I downloaded it again and used the Installer Dmg to Uninstall the program.
"Entire Message" is now selectable again.
However, the performance is horrible. Searching through my Gmail Inbox which only has around 200 messages takes several minutes. The other searches seem to have reasonable performance.
Now honestly... this makes no sense to me. There doesn't seem to be a logical connection between the two. However, those were the steps and that was the result. It seems more likely that something else changed in the background while Mail was down.
Message was edited by: ashealey

Search entire message not working in Mail, but Spotlight works.

I am having a problem where my mail App is not searching the entire body of the message any more. I installed Lion soon after it was released, and I believe that it has been working up until recently.
If I do a search, it won't search the message body, and gives me no option to search for "Message contains" (just "People" and "Subjects"). If search for subject "foo" and then click on the "Subject" pull down menu, it shows "Subject" and "Entire Message", but "Entire Message" is greyed out.
I've done a lot of web searching and most people with similar problems had problems with Spotlight.
If I do a Spotlight search, it does find all of the mail messages correctly. Its just the Mail app that won't let me search.
I haven't tried re-indexing spotlight yet because spotlight seems to be working okay.
Note that all of my mail accounts are "POP" accounts with the mail stored locally on my machine.
Has anyone else encountered this?
Thanks,
Ron

I should have tried this before posting, but a reboot fixed my problem.

Apple Removed Mail Search by Message Content in Lion 10.7.2

Just got off the phone with Apple Support. As usual, they are very helpful. However, I was disappointed to learn that Apple silently removed the ability to search mail by content in the latest update to OSX.
I have OSX Lion 10.7.2, and when I type anything into the search field in Mac Mail (or, interestingly, onwww.me.com), there are options to search only by subject or sender or recipient, not by message content as there used to be.
According to Emily at Apple Support, Apple intentionally removed the search by content feature because "it wasn't working right". They are or MAY be working to add it back in to the next update. No commitments.
Sadly, there was no mention of this DOWNGRADE at the time I installed 10.7.2. And, the knowledge base article herehttp://support.apple.com/kb/DL1458 makes no mention of Mail changes either.
Sad. Confused. And a little bit angry. Apple can and should do better.

Sad. Confused. And a little bit angry. Apple can and should do better.
Well, I agree with #2 out of 4.
I have no problems searching by content in OS 10.7.2. As Barney says, it's the default search state now.

Mail won't search entire message

my mail program will only search using title, sender or receiver, not the entire message. any idea why?
thanks...

So today, for no particular reason, I attempted to perform a search using the Entire Message option, which—for as long as I can remember—produced no results. Now, it simply works.
While I haven't tested it is some time, and have applied both the Mac OS X 10.4.5 Update weeks ago and a Security Update early last week, I have made no other changes to my configuration. Suddenly, it works: and, for no apparent reason. Wish I could tell you just what I might have done to 'fix' this…

Can't search "entire message" in Leopard mail

Since installing Leopard last night, I can't search my mailboxes by "entire message"!!! The "Entire Message" filter text is greyed out. Anyone else have this issue? Any ideas?

You realize that you are in the Tiger forum area. Leopard has its own forum:
http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=235

Option to search "entire message" is greyed out

When performing a search in mail, the option to search the entire message is greyed out. Searching from, to and subject all work fine.
Any ideas?

You can try using Rebuild on the Inbox, but I think I would remove the account, then add it back, and wait until Mail rebuilds its cache of messages kept for Offline viewing. Then test again.
Ernie

How do you search for file content in Mountain Lion?

I recently upgrade my MacBook Pro to Mountain Lion. I used to use spotlight to search for specific content within files before the upgrade. Now spotlight is only giving me file names and won't allow me to search for content within the files, even if I used quotations in my search. Is this just a glich on my computer or is there something I need to reset? Thanks!

Try rebuilding the Spotlight index. Go into the Spotlight privacy pane, and then add your hard drive to the "privacy" section. This will erase its index. Then remove your hard drive from the index and Spotlight will rebuild the index. It will take an hour or two.

How do I search entire message contents?

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