Spotlight Comments not found

I added "backup" as a Spotlight Comment to a variety of files and folders using an automator action. When I search using the query Spotlight Comment contains "backup" only a few of my files and folders with that comment are found. I have tried re-indexing but still Spotlight misses some files and folders. Spotlight in Tiger would find all of them. I believe in Leopard Spotlight Comments are now written in extended attributes. Can someone please try adding a Spotlight Comment to some files/folders and see if they are all found in a spotlight search. Thanks.

biovizier wrote:
..."I will say that Leopard seems a lot better at keeping track of comments than Tiger was but it probably wouldn't hurt to be mindful of how files are transferred to make sure the .DS_Store file goes with it. I personally would not rely on "Comments" for anything important.
Hmmm. It says in Leopard Help: +To make items easier to find when you search for them, you can use the Spotlight Comments field in the Get Info dialog. For example, use the field to mark all the files for a project with the project name or tag all your urgent files with the word “urgent".+
So, Apple are saying that it certainly should work - it is called 'Spotlight Comments' after all! What I've found though is that it's unreliable. I'm trying to reorganise all my filing around metadata - having just a few 'physical' folders and using a metadata+ Smart Folder combination to do the rest. To do this requires using the Spotlight Comments field (which can be accessed via a Finder search by using 'Other ...' from the Finder's searching popup menu. So, I having been using my own 'keywords' in the Comments field, but the problem is that sometimes Spotlight finds them and sometimes not. I can have the keyword in 6 files and spotlight will find 4 of them, sometimes all of them. I've re-edited and rearranged but cannot get consistent results.
Has anyone had a similar experience and found any pattern to what works and what doesn't?

Similar Messages

Spotlight comments not found - possible fix

I'm having problems with spotlight comments not being indexed on some files.
The tip from djhartman http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1215039&tstart=0 fixed this:-
To remove ALL ACLs from your homedir, use:
chmod -R -N ~
Thanks a lot. The missing files soon after running the command appeared in the smart folder. I migrated from Tiger to Leopard and I have had various issues which I've only recently discovered is due to changes in how Mac OS X now handles access. Hopefully this command has done the job.
I also had some folders and files which were either missing the staff group or had permission problems. I used the following commands to fix this. 755 gives the current user read, write and execute access and gives the group the current user belongs to (probably staff or admin) read and execute access and everyone gets read and execute access. I only used these commands in folders containing my documents not in my ~Library or anywhere else that contains system files.
How to change folders or files to default user, group and permissions
Open terminal:
for folders use
chmod -R 755 (drag and drop folder here) [press enter]
(-R switch = recursively applies to all sub-folders and sub-files)
for files use
chmod 755 (drag and drop file here) [press enter]

Running the password reset actually recreated the problem but that's ok because it helped lead me to the true cause and answer. Being a member of the wrong group can cause all sorts of annoying problems e.g. asking for authentication when deleting files, spotlight not indexing some files etc. Luckily this post http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=200711291134001 had the answer. I'll sum it up here:
I had a problem with spotlight not indexing some files especially spotlight comments. I'd tried deleting spotlight-V100 to re-index and many other things which did not work when all along it was a group membership problem.
I had upgraded from Tiger to Leopard. The GUI tools in Leopard showed my primary group was staff and nothing looked wrong until I discovered the Unix commands thanks to your great script. I didn't run the script but it was very well commented so I knew what the commands did if I ran them in terminal.
dscl . read /Groups/staff
showed I wasn't in the group staff. (even though system preferences>accounts>advanced options said i was!)
sudo dscl . append /Groups/staff GroupMembership $USER
added me to group staff.
sudo chgrp -R staff $HOME
changes group ownership on all files in home to staff.
sudo diskutil repairPermissions /
repair disk permissions.
Reboot.

Spotlight/Finder only searching "new" spotlight comments not old ones

I have a bunch of files on my external hard drive that I had taken several hours to "tag" with spotlight comments a few months back. I tagged them so I could quickly find them in Finder or Spotlight by different key words and not just file names or their contents (folders wouldn't work because the keywords overlapped many of the files. Plus folders are slow). It worked beautifully. Until I stopped adding tags for those 4 months until now.
I hadn't been using my comments at all in the past couple of months, but i had some files that I hadn't tagged so I decided to take the time to tag all the new ones. While testing to see if the comments worked, I noticed an extreme shortage of results, compared to the results i had for the same key words 4 months ago. I noticed that only the newly tagged files were showing up. I immediately checked the old files to see if the comments were still there and there they were. I restarted my MacBook Pro, thinking that maybe it was because I hadn't done so in the past few days. I noticed the little dot in the lens of they eyeglass and thought "oh boy! it'll reindex everything!" but it only indexed "new" files of course.
So my question is: "*How did this happen?*" But more importantly: "*+How can I fix it?+*"
I've thought that forcing spotlight to reindex my entire external hard drive would do the trick, but I cannot find any means to achieve that goal. Plus, I would rather just be able to index the files within one folder as I wouldn't have to wait an entire day of sluggish performance for that. Any ideas?

Let me start with the "easy" question first: the .DS_Store files are where "Finder information" is stored. Windows users find these things a pain in neck, and usually insist they be deleted. Most of time this isn't a problem, the Mac users just get annoyed when their folder doesn't open the way it was when last closed--the principle information stored there is the view the folder was told to keep, the size of the icons and their arrangement, and so on. Every time you open a folder a .DS_Store file created if one does not already exist, and if one does the file will be updated if you change your settings for the folder, for instance switch it to List view, tell it to always open in List view, with columns for Date Modified, Size, but not Kind or Date Created. And it also keeps the information entered in Spotlight Comments. Just how Finder preserves this information if a file is moved, in Mac OS, to another folder, I don't know. But it does.
What we REALLY need is a nice little program to write to the metadata of the file. For instance, Spotlight will index keywords, which are stored in the file itself, as part of the file's metadata. I mainly work with graphics, and Photoshop allows you to add keywords to the file's metadata. Apple's iPhoto and Aperture will also add keywords, but they are not written to a file's metadata until you export them. PDFs can also have keywords assigned, you can even do it with Preview. Text documents can also have keywords added using some (most?) text editors, including TextEdit (provided the file is in RTF format). The nice thing about keyword metadata is that it goes with the file, and be accessed in any OS that allows a metadata search.
Unfortunately I don't know of any program that would allow you to select a batch of miscellaneous files and add the same keyword to all of them. It would certainly be handy though.
Francine
Francine
Schwieder

Spotlight comments not available?

I've developed an internal website at work that uses PHP, MySQL, Applescript and PDF files to manage the workflow for print projects.
The basic setup is that a user "publishes" a PDF from InDesign using an Applescript (which ensures the PDF is created with standard settings and file security) and the PDF is copied to the webserver into a folder for review. The applescript then puts the designer's name into the PDF's Spotlight comments.
Someone reviews the project from a web-page, which looks in the folder and displays thumbnails of its contents. PHP runs an exec() to get the Spotlight comments, and displays the designer's name below the thumbnail, along with the date and time the PDF was "published".
$PDFcomment = exec("osascript -e 'tell app \"Finder\" to get comment of POSIX file \"$projectsFile/$shortID/$dirShort.pdf\"'");
The problem I'm running into is that this command is not consistently returning the Spotlight comment. Often the PHP webpage says it's empty, but when I go to the networked volume where these PDFs are stored and Get Info, I can see the correct comment.
The comment will only appear if I use the Finder on the machine that houses the PDF and Get Info. Subsequent viewings of the PHP webpage then return the correct comment.
How can I force the Finder to get the current Spotlight comment without having to manually check the file first?
PowerMac G4 Mac OS X (10.4.5)

Running the password reset actually recreated the problem but that's ok because it helped lead me to the true cause and answer. Being a member of the wrong group can cause all sorts of annoying problems e.g. asking for authentication when deleting files, spotlight not indexing some files etc. Luckily this post http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=200711291134001 had the answer. I'll sum it up here:
I had a problem with spotlight not indexing some files especially spotlight comments. I'd tried deleting spotlight-V100 to re-index and many other things which did not work when all along it was a group membership problem.
I had upgraded from Tiger to Leopard. The GUI tools in Leopard showed my primary group was staff and nothing looked wrong until I discovered the Unix commands thanks to your great script. I didn't run the script but it was very well commented so I knew what the commands did if I ran them in terminal.
dscl . read /Groups/staff
showed I wasn't in the group staff. (even though system preferences>accounts>advanced options said i was!)
sudo dscl . append /Groups/staff GroupMembership $USER
added me to group staff.
sudo chgrp -R staff $HOME
changes group ownership on all files in home to staff.
sudo diskutil repairPermissions /
repair disk permissions.
Reboot.

Spotlight Comments not editable for App Store Apps

I'm liking the app store and the ability to download apps quickly and efficiently. However, I'm not able to edit spotlight comments for downloaded apps. I've tested editing spotlight comments for my regular assortment of apps that were not downloaded from the App store and didn't have a problem. Nor did I have a problem editing spotlight comments for regular files. I've just been locked out of editing app store apps. The permissions for App Store Apps appear to be set identically to other apps I have. I'm wondering if this has something to do with the built in update process for these apps, and now they are locked out for any modification by end users? Anyone else have this problem, or know of a workaround?

Good:
Unlocking the application and adding the privilege allowed me to edit the spotlight comment.
Bad:
After updating the application (Sparrow Mail for my example), I'm in a worse spot.
I changed the privileges again, and unlocked the application.
I can not edit the comment.
Spotlight is not finding the comment.
Reindexing Spotlight
Still not finding it.
Anyone have suggestions on this one?

My spotlight does not seem to be working correctly

This is the 3rd time spotlight has not found a document I knew was in my documents folder.
How do I go about fixing this.
thanks,
Laura

Hi L,
Yes, that is usual, I had the same issue.
Use the Finder's search for a while, Spotlight is constantly indexing and will collect metadata to perform better search in sometime.
Do this kind of search:
Give focus to Finder and hit COMMAND+F > from the drop down box where KIND is select choose OTHER > from the next window select NAME, CONTENTS, SYSTEM FILES, FILE VISIBILITY and others that you find useful > back to the drop down select NAME and CONTAINS or ENDS WITH if you know some part of the name or extension or then select CONTENTS if you wish > enter what to search > choose the place to look at right after "Search:" above the drop down combo. If this do not return results hit the + sign on the right and add System Files as included, hit + again to add File Visibility as Visible or Invisible.
If search brings too much internet browsing history or other files you do not want to see hold OPTION and hit the "..." that were shown in the + sign to exclude or make other associations as you wish.
Good luck.

IPhoto frustrating error..The volume for "Df23.JPG" cannot be found. It prompts for all photos with this issue rather than offering an option to ignore. I can find the images in spotlight but not in Find Photo. Does anyone have a solution

iPhoto frustrating error..The volume for "Df23.JPG" cannot be found. It prompts for all photos with this issue rather than offering an option to ignore. I can find the images in spotlight but not in Find Photo. Does anyone have a solution?

Unless you have the source files that were on the TC or Windows machine you will have to start over with a new library as follows:
Start over from scratch with new library
Start over with a new library and import the Originals (iPhoto 09 and earlier) or the Masters (iPhoto 11) folder from your original library as follows:
1. Move the existing library folder to the desktop.
2. Open the library package like this.
Click to view full size
3. Launch iPhoto and, when asked, select the option to create a new library.
4. Drag the Masters (iPhoto 11) folder from the iPhoto Library on the desktop into the open iPhoto window.
Click to view full size
This will create a new library with the same Events as the original library but will not keep the metadata, albums, books slideshows and other projects. Your original library will remain intact for further attempts at fixes is so desired.
OT

Spotlight does not find Spotlight Comments

i've made a script on our server that makes use use of the Spotlight Comments. But when I give some files these comments and I run the script it doesn't find the documents. Also when I type it manualy in the Spotlight bar it doesn't find the files. I've tried it on serveral other macs and there it does work.
Can anybody help me? Thanks!

Leopold:
Welcome to the Apple Discussions. Are you sure the external HD has been indexed by Spotlight? If you're not sure you can use Spotlightindexer to force Spotlight to index that volume. You can find the app thru VersionTracker.com.

Spotlight Comments do not appear in Spotlight search results

I have a .png file on my desktop.
Right click >> Get Info
Spotlight Comments has the string 'Fruit' saved.
If I search for 'Fruit' in Spotlight I get no results, why?

Hi TD
Yes and no.
Yes it worked the way you mentioned but if I change the Spotlight Comment: on the same file to something else I can still find it via 'Fruit'. I much prefer command-space bar to call Spotlight.
How long does it take a change to a Spotlight Comment: to filter into Spotlight?
Its not the end of the world its just I was finding Spotlight really useful until I came up against this.

Property or collection #comment was not found in the component interface

Hi All,
I am a Java developer trying to connect my java application to a peoplesoft webservice.
I have been able to connect to the PS webservice and access "GET","FIND" methods successfully.
But when i am trying to connect to the CREATE(insert) method, i get the following message text.
<faultcode>SOAP-ENV:Client</faultcode>
<faultstring>Component Interface API.</faultstring>
<detail>
<messages>
<type>Error</type>
<messagesetnumber>91</messagesetnumber>
<messagenumber>74</messagenumber>
<messagetext>Property or collection #comment was not found in the component interface at the given level.</messagetext>
</messages>
</detail>
I dont have any access to peoplesoft or db logs, i started using SOAP UI to get the detail messages.
Can anyone tell me what this message could be??
Basically its an insert method which takes around 40 parameters out of which 2 are mandatory.
The input that i send from my soap ui looks as follows
+*<kcm:CASE_ID></kcm:CASE_ID>*+
<kcm:DISP_TMPL_ID>CRM_GOV</kcm:DISP_TMPL_ID>

<kcm:QUICK_CD>?</kcm:QUICK_CD>

<kcm:PROVIDER_GRP_NAME>City Manager Action</kcm:PROVIDER_GRP_NAME>
<kcm:BUSINESS_UNIT>KCM01</kcm:BUSINESS_UNIT>

<kcm:PRODUCT_ID>?</kcm:PRODUCT_ID>
When i dont send any parameter in case_id i get the above error and when i send +*<kcm:CASE_ID>?</kcm:CASE_ID>*+
i get a sql error
<messages>
<type>Error</type>
<messagesetnumber>200</messagesetnumber>
<messagenumber>0</messagenumber>
<messagetext>SQL error. Stmt #: 650 Error Position: 123 Return: 1722 - ORA-01722: invalid number</messagetext>
<explaintext/>
</messages>
<messages>
<type>Error</type>
<messagesetnumber>200</messagesetnumber>
<messagenumber>0</messagenumber>
<messagetext>SELECT /*+ FIRST_ROWS */ CASE_ID, DISP_TMPL_ID, BUSINESS_UNIT, RC_STATUS, RC_SUMMARY FROM PS_RC_ADD_CASE_VW WHERE CASE_ID=:1 AND DISP_TMPL_ID=:2 ORDER BY CASE_ID, DISP_TMPL_ID</messagetext>
<explaintext/>
</messages>
<messages>
<type>Error</type>
<messagesetnumber>91</messagesetnumber>
<messagenumber>48</messagenumber>
<messagetext>Error accessing search record. {KCM_WEB_CASE_CI} (91,48)</messagetext>
<explaintext>An error occurred while accessing the search record.</explaintext>
</messages>
<messages>
<type>Error</type>
<messagesetnumber>91</messagesetnumber>
<messagenumber>61</messagenumber>
<messagetext>Failed to create the Component Interface</messagetext>
</messages>
I am not understanding how do i debug this further as its very difficult for me to get any peoplesoft logs or db logs.
Any help will be appreciated.
Thanks
Ash
Edited by: ash81 on Jun 14, 2010 1:24 PM

This will be very hard to troubleshoot without access to PeopleSoft.
Ideally, the best way to test it would be replicate the steps you are performing in your code through the component interface/web service, and then on the actual PeopleSoft component to see if you get the same error.
The second case where you haven't put in the parameters, make sure you clear out the ? marks and leave the value empty if you don't need to specify it.
E.g.
Instead of <kcm:QUICK_CD>?</kcm:QUICK_CD>
Use: <kcm:QUICK_CD></kcm:QUICK_CD>
I generally work backwards from soapUI -- look at the soapUI error, then test through the component interface tester in PeopleSoft application designer, then if required test in PeopleSoft.

I want to disable 'Spotlight' for repairing my disk "Macintosh HD" , but somehow the command 'sudo mdutil -a -i off' does not work in 'Terminal'. I get result as ' bash: sudo: command not found' .I am using OS 10.10. Please help.

I want to disable 'Spotlight' for repairing my disk "Macintosh HD" , but somehow the command 'sudo mdutil -a -i off' does not work in 'Terminal'. I get result as ' bash: sudo: command not found' .I am using OS 10.10. Please help.

It appears that you may not have a properly installed OS X system.
You must be connected to the Internet to reinstall OS X.
In the menu bar, choose Apple menu > Restart. Once your Mac restarts (and the gray screen appears), hold down the Command (⌘) and R keys.
Select “Disk Utility,” and then click Continue.
Select your startup disk from the list on the left, and then Repair Disk.
After disk is repaired, select Reinstall OS X, then click Continue.
Follow the onscreen instructions. In the pane where you select a disk, select your current OS X disk

TS1436 i keep getting the comment disc burner or software not found?

keep getting the comment disc burner or software not found?

Microsoft Windows 7 Business Edition Service Pack 1 (Build 7601)
Hewlett-Packard MCP67
iTunes 11.1.3.8
QuickTime not available
FairPlay 2.5.16
Apple Application Support 2.3.6
iPod Updater Library 11.1f5
CD Driver 2.2.3.0
CD Driver DLL 2.1.3.1
Apple Mobile Device 7.0.0.117
Apple Mobile Device Driver 1.64.0.0
Bonjour 3.0.0.10 (333.10)
Gracenote SDK 1.9.6.502
Gracenote MusicID 1.9.6.115
Gracenote Submit 1.9.6.143
Gracenote DSP 1.9.6.45
iTunes Serial Number 0014B9500B3C63C0
Current user is not an administrator.
The current local date and time is 2013-12-15 08:09:14.
iTunes is not running in safe mode.
WebKit accelerated compositing is enabled.
HDCP is not supported.
Core Media is supported.
Video Display Information
NVIDIA, NVIDIA GeForce 7150M / nForce 630M
**** External Plug-ins Information ****
No external plug-ins installed.
iPodService 11.1.3.8 is currently running.
iTunesHelper 11.1.3.8 is currently running.
Apple Mobile Device service 3.3.0.0 is currently running.

Shell Commands not found error when running application

Hello,
Im using MonoDevelop IDE in my Mac, before it used to work fine but after few days, now when I'm opening the application nothing happens., i checked the Console for the log and it says this
May 9 21:29:39 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x52052].com.ximian.monodevelop[1510]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS/monodevelop: line 17: dirname: command not found
May 9 21:29:39 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x52052].com.ximian.monodevelop[1510]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS/monodevelop: line 31: //mono-version-check: No such file or directory
May 9 21:29:39 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro com.apple.launchd.peruser.501[599] ([0x0-0x52052].com.ximian.monodevelop[1510]): Exited with code: 1
I thought may be some error with the "dirname" command, so i commented it in the code and gave the path of directory myself and then the console shows up like this.
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS//mono-version-check: line 19: grep: command not found
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS//mono-version-check: line 19: cut: command not found
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS//mono-version-check: line 20: cut: command not found
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS//mono-version-check: line 21: cut: command not found
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS//mono-version-check: line 22: cut: command not found
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: /Applications/MonoDevelop.app/Contents/MacOS//mono-version-check: line 31: osascript: command not found
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: Cannot launch MonoDevelop
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro [0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]: MonoDevelop requires the Mono Framework version 2.10.4 or later.
May 9 21:34:12 Sri-Vishnu-Totakuras-MacBook-Pro com.apple.launchd.peruser.501[599] ([0x0-0x56056].com.ximian.monodevelop[1532]): Exited with code: 1
I opened the contents of the application and run the shell script for opening aplication there it worked very fine and application started working.. But if i open application directly through launchpad or finder it doesnt show up and console
I tried running those commands in the terminal directly there they work.. But dunno whats wrong in here. and even if try to open the application through the terminal it all opens fine.. what could be the possible problem, is it with my mac..?

i finally figured out the problem.. it is with the environmental variables. the path for all those commands like "grep" is not being set for the GUI applications. that is why i got that error.
for those GUI applications which require path, we have to set path in the file /etc/launchd.conf the environmental variables set in here are used by the gui applications and those which are launched through spotlight.
that file may bot be present in most of the macs. No problem even if not present,we can create one and use.
so type in terminal
$ sudo vi /etc/launchd.conf
and in the editor add these lines
setenv PATH = /new/path
and save. Note: replace /new/path with the path which you need to have for the commands used in the script.
remeber that you need to restart your mac for applications to use these environmental variables.

Raw Search Terms for "Spotlight Comment" and "Locked" Status

Is it possible to do a raw search for a specific Spotlight Comment. I know the option exists in the Other… dialog box, but I need to find files that do not contain comments which is not choice.
Also, is there any way to find only files that are unlocked?

If you go to Others and select Raw Query you can use it find items with a specific comment, and items without any comment. For example, if you have the comment "testme" in the Spotlight field you would paste this into the Raw Query field:
kMDItemFinderComment == "testme"
and all files with that comment would be found. To find files in a folder that contain NO comment at all, you would use this:
kMDItemFinderComment != "*"
Be warned though: when I tried this on a folder with only 5 items in it, 4 with comments and one without. it worked, returning the lone uncommented file, but it took an amazingly long time to do so (perhaps a minute, while the search for "testme" was instantaneous).
The "File readable" and "File writeable" functions shown in Others, which presumably are what one would use to find locked files, simply do not work. This is not surprising since the information about whether a file is locked or not does not in fact appear in a file's metadata. I guess that will be a future addition. You can use find in Terminal to search for files that are locked/unlocked. Let me know if you really want to do this.
Francine
Francine
Schwieder

Spotlight comments backed up to external drive

I am using spotlight comments on JPGs to record information about the photo, such as the person who took it, their email, etc. I do not want those comments to be visible in the photo itself.
I know that these spotlight comments are not in the photo file itself, but in the .DS_store file.
1) How do I back these comments up on an external drive?
2) How do I insure that these comments are not lost when I use programs OnyX to clean up my drive?

I found I was able to backup my Spotlight comments to an external drive without using carbon copy cloner.
I used OnyX and under the Finder options, I made the invisible files visible. I then manually selected the .ds_store files from the internal hard drive to the backup drive. Now the Spotlight comments appear on the external drive.
The disadvantages to this technique is that I must do this for every folder that contains files with Spotlight comments. For me, that is only five folders. The other disadvantage is that once the .ds_store file appears on the backup drive, it appears that I am not able to delete, replace or update that file on the backup drive. I would guess that I could trash that folder and replace it with the folder on the internal drive.
When I was finished, I used OnyX to once again make those files invisible.

Spotlight Comments not found

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