How to stop spotlight indexing?
When I start working in the morning the iMac is slow due to spotlight indexing.
How do I stop this until later that day?
When you see a beachball cursor or the slowness is especially bad, note the exact time: hour, minute, second.
These instructions must be carried out as an administrator. If you have only one user account, you are the administrator.
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.
Each message in the log begins with the date and time when it was entered. Scroll back to the time you noted above.
Select the messages entered from then until the end of the episode, or until they start to repeat, whichever comes first.
Copy the messages 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 it useless for 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, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.
Similar Messages
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Confirmation on How to Stop Spotlight Indexing an External Hard Drive
Hello everyone,
I know there are a number of posts on this but I just want to confirm: Can I stop Spotlight from indexing my external FireWire hard drive by adding its name to the Privacy pane in Spotlight's preferences when the drive is mounted? (I'm a little low on internal hard disk space on my iBook so I want to keep the index as lean as possible.)Georgy
Keep in mind that the index is stored on the drive that is being indexed. As such, indexing an external volume does not affect your main drive.
Remember also, that when you do update your external drive, the indexing only updates the changes made to the drive on the fly, provided of course if it is mounted and allowed to do so.
My suggestion, let Spotlight index the drive. Particularly if you are using it as a backup. Once in place, updating the index and searching is extremely fast.
Be careful however, of using third-party solutions. Some will affect Spotlight's normal indexing process and their preferences have to be changed for Spotlight to work. -
How to stop Spotlight from indexing backup drives
Is there any way to stop Spotlight from indexing backup drives?
ThanksYes, in Spotlight preferences there is an option to do this. I'm not on my Mac now, so I forget exactly where in Spotlight preferences it is. I believe there is a second tab that you have to click on, then click the "+" sign to add items to Exclude. Just add your backup drive.
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How to stop securuty/indexing breach for privacy?
How do you stop Leopard from indexing and cataloguing all your activities / opened docs /viewed pics etc.? You can hide the tabs or viewing option but if it is turned on again all the data and activity is still there. It seems this is a major security/privacy breach and a step backwards.Time machine is not turned on. The icons are called today, yesterday and past week and are found under "search for" on the bottom left of every opened folder.Is there a way to turn off the recordings or to delete them.Creating another user account is not a solution I'm looking for.
CheersGeorgy
Keep in mind that the index is stored on the drive that is being indexed. As such, indexing an external volume does not affect your main drive.
Remember also, that when you do update your external drive, the indexing only updates the changes made to the drive on the fly, provided of course if it is mounted and allowed to do so.
My suggestion, let Spotlight index the drive. Particularly if you are using it as a backup. Once in place, updating the index and searching is extremely fast.
Be careful however, of using third-party solutions. Some will affect Spotlight's normal indexing process and their preferences have to be changed for Spotlight to work. -
Hi,
This seems like a fairly simple thing to do but I can't figure out how to do it. I would like to stop spotlight from indexing all my mail. How do I do it?
cheers
Mattin system preferences, there is a spotlight preference pane. in it, you can tell spotlight what to index and what to ignore.
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I was, until today, in OS X 10.5.xx, but as Spotlight had quit working, I upgraded to OS X 10.6.8, but without any luck with regard to the indexing funct
Have tried adding Folders etc to the "Privacy" Window & then removing them, as instructed elsewhere, but to no avail.
(Admittedly, at one point, the thing did start indexing, but ... shortly thereafter stopped, and has not resumed that activity since...
How to get my iMac (Intel) with OS X 10.6.8 to run Spotlight and do the indexing job it is supposed to.
It used to work fine, but has now gone dead.
Lifeless.
Bang! Bang!
Can anybody help, please?
bob whitener / south francebaltwo, thanks for the information
it seemed about to work, your suggestionelll
but then after about 3-5 seconds of indexing
it just quit!
bloody ****
what's keeping the thing from indexing?-
Any/all help/advice muchly appreciated
- Bob / south France
[email protected] -
I turned off spotlight using a sudo launchctl unload ... script in the Terminal. I think that the system is still indexing, and I just can't search. Spotlight is still taking up memory according to the activity monitor. Is that the case? If so how do I turn off the indexing and erase current indexes?
I got it to stop indexing forever by moving these folders to the privacy list in Spotlights System Settings.
• Library
• System/Library
• Users/MyUserName/Library
• Also dragged my whole partition for Windows XP there
I assume the constant indexing was being caused by new files being created from viewing websites to applications writing cache files etc. I can surely live without the Libraries being indexed...just wish I didn't have to waist my time figuring this out. -
Can't stop Spotlight indexing, even with "Privacy"
I keep dragging an external disk into the Privacy section of the Spotlight prefs panel, but the prefs panel refuses to show the drive or to STOP indexing it.
HELP!
(10.4.4)Aha!
You have to be logged in as a System Administrator to change any of the Spotlight Privacy settings.
No, Apple does NOT give you a chance to Authenticate; you Must log out and re-log in as an admin to fix this. WHAT A PAIN ! -
Several of us new iPod users on my office LAN have been plagued by iTunes' unasked decision to locate its index files (I.e. iTunes Library.itl and itunes Music Library.xml) at
\My Documents\My Music\iTunes.
Why is this annoying? Because, for example, when I
a) dock my notebook at work, to be my desktop or
b) log on to the work server from home via broadband
I have to wait while Windows synchronises those files with the copies on the server, (at \\bsecfs\users\bjc18\My Documents\My Documents\My Music\iTunes\.
This
1) wastes server space, 2) wastes my time and broadband costs by extending the synchronisation and 3) adds no functionality to my life - it is personal data and I want it all on my C: drive.
Another colleague found the library got placed on her Desktop and therefore the entire Library was synchronised into the server copy of her user profile. The LAN Manager was aghast!
I consider it impertinent of iTunes to choose where these files shall be placed.
QUERY: How can I instruct iTunes to place (or to move) those two files onto my notebooks C; drive where all the music lives?
Cyclone Windows XP
Cyclone Windows XPI consider it impertinent of iTunes to choose where
these files shall be placed.
It's not impertinent, it's the Microsoft recommended practice. User specific files go into the My Documents folders. In iTunes case, the My Music folder is the logical place to put them.
QUERY: How can I instruct iTunes to place (or to
move) those two files onto my notebooks C; drive
where all the music lives?
You can't. iTunes always puts the library files into the "My Music/iTunes" folder.
You can, however, change the location of the My Music folder. This is a folder specified in the registry. If you use TweakUI for Windows XP (google for it, it's on Microsoft's site), and change the location of the "My Music" special folder, then the library will be put there instead. -
How do you stop Spotlight from indexing other OSX partition?
I have my harddrive partioned, on one partition is osx 10.8, on the other is osx 10.9. I'd like to stop Spotlight on 10.8 from indexing 10.9's partition. If 10.8 is booted and I set Spotlight to not index 10.9's "macintosh HD" via systemprefs/spotlight it has the unfortunate consequence of carring over, so when I boot into my 10.9 partition Spotlight won't be indexing - which is not what I want.
Anyone able to shed some light on this one?Unfortunately, when you add a drive in the Privacy field, a small file is created on that drive which tells Spotlight not to index it. So both 10.8 and 10.9 see that file and won't index, no matter which OS you did the Privacy change from. Also then, of course, if you remove the drive from Privacy, both will index it.
At least that's how it's worked for me. I haven't been able to get the same drive to behave differently for multiple startup partitions. -
How do I stop spotlight from indexing files?
I only have 2GB of RAM and Indexing files really slows down my computer, so much that i can hardly operate the computer. Is there any way that i can stop Spotlight from indexing my files automatically or have it index every week instead of every day?
It shouldn't be running so much that it slows down the computer. It will run for a while, initially, but after that it should index files on the fly as they are added. I suppose if you dumped a ton of files onto the hard drive, it would spend a while indexing them.
You might try restarting the index as it might be corrupt. To do so, go to the Privacy tab in Spotlight. Add your hard drive to the list. Wait about 10 seconds, then remove your hard drive. Don't do that while you're working, though. -
How do I stop the indexing on my MacBook Pro? It's been indexing for 2 days.
How do I stop the indexing on my MacBook Pro? It's been indexing for 2 days.
Step 1
These instructions must be carried out as an administrator. If you have only one user account, you are the administrator.
Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:
syslog -F '$Time $Message' -k Sender mdworker -o -k Message Rne Norm -k Sender mds | tail | pbcopy
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C.
Launch the built-in Terminal application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.
Paste into the Terminal window by pressing the key combination command-V. I've tested these instructions only with the Safari web browser. If you use another browser, you may have to press the return key after pasting.
The command may take a noticeable amount of time to run. Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear.
The output of the command will be automatically copied to the Clipboard. If the command produced no output, the Clipboard will be empty. Paste into a reply to this message.
The Terminal window doesn't show the output. Please don't copy anything from there.
If any personal information appears in the output, anonymize before posting, but don’t remove the context.
Step 2
Enter the following command as in Step 1 and post the output:
mdutil -as 2>&- | pbcopy
You can then quit Terminal.
Step 3
Launch the Console application in the same way you launched Terminal. In the Console window, look under the heading DIAGNOSTIC AND USAGE INFORMATION on the left for crash reports related to Spotlight. If you don't see that heading, select
View ▹ Show Log List
from the menu bar. A Spotlight crash report has a name beginning in "mds" or "mdworker" and ending in ".crash". Select the most recent such report, if any, from the System and User subcategories and post the entire contents—the text, please, not a screenshot. In the interest of privacy, I suggest that, before posting, you edit out the “Anonymous UUID,” a long string of letters, numbers, and dashes in the header of the report, if it’s present (it may not be.)
Please don’t post any other kind of diagnostic report, such as hang logs—they're very long and not helpful. -
Stop Spotlight from indexing new drives
I know how to block a drive in Spotlight's privacy settings.
What I'm looking for is a way to stop Spotlight from indexing a drive every time I plug one in. I'm often connecting external drives for work & spotlight immediatley starts to index & I go in and add it to the blocked list in Spotlight> Privacy.
Is there a way to just have Spotlight NOT try to index a new drive?Sorry, I missed that part.
Try this, add this file to the external drive.
touch /Volumes/name of the external drive/.metadata_never_index
This will add a file called .metadata_never_index to the root of that drive.
You can also disable spotlight
sudo mdutil -a -i off
To re-enable Spotlight:
sudo mdutil -a -i on -
How to stop Index Optimization in Ultraseach?
Portal Version: 9.0.2.2.14
RDBMS Versjion: 9.0.1.3
OS/Vers. Where Portal is Installed:: SPARC Solaris 8 64bit
How to stop process of optimization of indexes in Ultraseach?First, back up all data immediately, as your boot drive may be failing.
If you have more than ten or so files or folders on your Desktop, move them, temporarily at least, somewhere else in your home folder.
If iCloud is enabled, disable it.
Disconnect all wired peripherals except keyboard, mouse, and monitor, if applicable. Launch the usual set of applications you use when you notice the problem.
Step 1
Launch the Activity Monitor 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.
☞ If you’re running Mac OS X 10.7 or later, open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Activity Monitor in the page that opens.
Select the CPU tab.
Select All Processes from the menu in the toolbar, if not already selected.
Click the heading of the % CPU column in the process table to sort the entries by CPU usage. You may have to click it twice to get the highest value at the top. What is it, and what is the process? Also post the values for % User, % System, and % Idle at the bottom of the window.
Select the System Memory tab. What values are shown in the bottom part of the window for Page outs and Swap used?
Step 2
You must be logged in as an administrator to carry out this step.
Launch the Console application in the same way as above. Make sure the title of the Console window is All Messages. If it isn't, select All Messages from the SYSTEM LOG QUERIES menu on the left.
Post the 50 or so most recent messages in the log — the text, please, not a screenshot.
Important: Some personal information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Edit it out before posting. -
How to temporarily turn OFF Spotlight Indexing?
It was suggested to me that it is best to turn off spotlight indexing for the duration of an initial clone backup of your system drive. How can this be done? Thanks.
The advice you have been given is incorrect. There is no need whatsoever to turn Spotlight off even temporarily. Just prior to the cloning you should check that indexing of your boot volume is not occurring - simply because the competition for CPU will slow the cloning down. Just click on the Spotlight symbol at the right hand end of your menubar to see that you only have the text entry box.
Also, there is usually no need to have a clone indexed, and so you should put the target volume into the Privacy tab of System Preference / Spotlight -- that will ensure that your target does not start to be indexed during the cloning and that the target volume does not become indexed later. Should you ever need to work on the clone and want it to be indexed, just remove that volume from 'Privacy'.
Ignoring any references to Carbon Copy Cloner, see http://forums.bombich.com/viewtopic.php?t=14531.
Andreas
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