Why doesn't Spotlight actually find stuff

Unless there is something I am doing wrong, I am giving up on Spotlight. It rarely finds what I am looking for whenever I do a search. I can know the exact name of a document I am searching for, do a search and have it not show up in the search results. Then I spend 10 minutes manually looking for it and when I find it, it has the exact same name I used in the search string. I can try searching on file name mode and contents mode and it rarely finds stuff on my computer with the name or content I am looking for. Why is that?

Start with http://www.pinkmutant.com/articles/Leopard/leospot.html and my mod to Finder's Find at http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=6725932 for what you can change so you can find stuff excluded by the default structure.

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Why doesn't Spotlight reveal searched item if it is inside a Desktop folder

Scvenario:
I created a folder on Desktop called Test into which I placed two Word documents and one pdf document.
Then I went to Spotlight and had it search for these documents.
Spotlight listed every occurrence of these items EXCEPT their presence in the Desktop folder.
In seven years of Mac ownership, I never knew this.
So if I have several folders on the Desktop into which I have put a number of items, there appears no way to locate a specific item via Spotlight but only by opening each folder separately and looking into it.
Surely this can't be right.
Thanks

I have some new information:
I created a folder on the Desktop called XXXXXXXX
Into this I dropped a Word document and gave it a name that is not present anywhere in the computer.
Then I went to Spotlight. It finds the document in Word but makes no mention of the XXXXXXXX file.
HOWEVER, when I click "Get Info", it shows the document to be in folder XXXXXXXX
I have a friend whom I am trying to get to clean up his Desktop on which resides perhaps sixty files/folders. I want him to put these items into a couple of folders. He maintains he will not be able to find the files. He knows very little about computers, and I am trying to make this as easy as possible.
But Spotlight will not pinpoint a file inside a Desktop folder unless we click Get Info.
Why???

Why doesn't reply arrow find my reply?

When I click the curly arrow which should take me to the reply that I typed to an email, it tells me what it can't find the reply and that I may have deleted it.
However, when I check in the Sent mail folder, there is my reply. Why can't Mail find it?
I have rebuilt both the InBox and Sent Mail folder, but it still doesn't find it.

Hi Ernie
Thanks for your replies. I meant to say yesterday too Thanks for the Welcome - I've been here before too, but when I came yesterday I was required to re-register - some change in the forums I guess?
Yes, I did run under Panther, and for some of my mailboxes under Jaguar too.
I've looked in all the various folders in the ~/Library/Mail/ folder and frankly have been puzzled by what I find.
Yes there are other files in some of them, that obviously aren't being used now as the modification dates are not recent, so I'd assumed that the various updates to Mail along the way have made some files redundant. Can these files that aren't either info.plist or the Messages folder be safely deleted?
I also can't see a consistent way that the various folders are setup and named. There are folders outside the Mailboxes folder that seem to be being keptup and current, but they don't seem to match all the accounts, nor the folders in the Mailboxes folder.
For example I have 3 AOL accounts handled by IMAP. In the Mail folder two of them are identified as "[email protected]" and "[email protected]" but there isn't a folder named for my primary AOL name RogerKIWI.
In Mail.app all three IMAP boxes have the same grey world icon, and are similarly named [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] so why aren't the folders in Library/Mail similarly named? Yet apart from the oddities of not always being able to open Replies it does all seem to work.
I've put a screen shot showing the two folders contents here
http://LisaAndRoger.com/Mailboxes.png
I'm wondering if "starting over" might be the way to go - if I make a duplicate of my Mail folder so everything is saved, what would I need to keep in order to not have to set up my Accounts, Rules and mailbox hierarchy in place, then import the messages into them in the hope that from now on this "show me the reply" button will always work.
Is the information about the Replies kept with each message, or is it kept in a central data file somewhere? What does the "Envelope Index" file keep track of?
Thanks
Roger
PowerMac G4 Dual 1.25 GHz Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Why doesn't duplicate photo finder work in Prem El 12?

Premier Elements 12, new HP PC, Win 8.1, lots of storage/memory. ~14K pictures and I'd like to start to trim out the duplicates. While in Premier Elements 10 the Organizer's Duplicate photo feature under Find seemed to work pretty well, the one in PremEl 12 does not work; brings up stacks of photos that are not even similar, much less duplicates. What gives?

Dave0518
Photoshop Elements 12 (photo editor) and Premiere Elements 12 (video editor) are standalone program, each with the Elements Organizer 12. When these programs are on the same computer, they share the same Elements Organizer catalog. All that being said, since your issue is with Elements Organizer and it identification "Duplicate Photos" not videos,
I would suggest that you might repost your thread in the Adobe Photoshop Elements Forum for a boarder perspective on your situation.from people such as Barbara Brundage, MichelBParis, et al.
The following is an example of what I mean about the Adobe Photoshop Elements Forum and this type of question.
Elements Organizer 12 duplicates files when Getting Photos and Videos
Please let us know the outcome when you get a chance.
Thank you.
ATR

Why doesn't iTunes always find my iPhone or iPad?

Using iTunes 10.7 and OS 10.8.2. I have Airport wifi and good signal. Many times I will start iTunes and either or both my iPhone and iPad will not show up as devices even though they are sitting right next to me (not using the cord). Both devices are on my network and active when this happens. Sometimes both will show up, sometimes one, sometimes neither.
I can't figure out a way to have iTunes "re-scan" for devices, and closing and re-opening iTunes usually doesn't help.

@ sealandia, - What type of printer and Apple device do you have? Have you changed routers or some other part of your set up? If not and the same Apple device, router, and printer are still in use, I would start by making sure that the printer and the device are on the same network. After you have checked to make sure that they are on the same network, I would power cycle the printer, router and device to make sure that they are all synced up as they can get out of sync and then not be able to "see" each other.
To do that power cycle:
1. Unplug the router (most do not have an on/off button)
2. While waiting for at least 30 seconds on the router, completely power down the Apple device, and printer. Make sure that the Apple device
is off and not just in sleep mode. Power the printer down using the power button.
3. Plug router back in, wait for it to be fully back on and working, then turn printer and phone back on, check network settings.
4. Attempt to print again after all devices are back on and running.
I am a former employee of HP...
How do I give Kudos?| How do I mark a post as Solved?

Spotlight not finding files in folders that have been extracted from ZIPs

I've got a folder, say 'test', with some images in it. It is located in ~/Pictures.
I have just downloaded another folder as a ZIP file, which Safari put in /tmp and unzipped automatically. It contains some more images. Let's call it 'exif'. I have moved 'exif' into 'test'.
Now, when I do a Spotlight search of images in the folder 'test', Spotlight does not list the images in 'exif'!
(I do the search with CMD-F, 'test' folder only, Kind = Images.)
However, when I create a different folder in 'test' and move the images from 'exif' to the new one, then a Spotlight search for images in 'test' does list those, too.
Also, when I copy the originial unzipped folder 'exif' to 'test' (Alt + mouse drag), then the images in the new 'exif' folder show up in the Spotlight search.
So it seems a folder that has been extracted from a ZIP archive does not get indexed by Spotlight -- only if its contents have been copied first.
Is this a bug in Spotlight?
Am I missing something?
It's pretty bad, because I would always have to remember to copy unzipped folders to a new one, in order to make sure that Spotlight does find the stuff!
Regards,
Gabriel.

Yeah the new search leaves something to be desired (actually the old search wasn't so great either). You get better results using Google's advanced search and restricting the search domain to discussions.apple.com.
Here's what the search in Google looks like:
Anyway the old post is why doesn't spotlight search inside aperture library? it explains why spotlight
doesn't search the library and how to work around it.

Spotlight not finding files in Aperture

I am building Aperture libraries from photos I had on a PC. I've been able to successfully import the photos. For various reasons, I have additional files on several memory sticks. Rather than just drag them into Aperture I wanted to see if I had already gotten the photo into Aperture.
I've encountered a problem is that Spotlight searches don't "see" the photos I've already placed into Aperture.
I thought Spotlight was supposed to see all files on the iMac.
Can someone shed some light on this dilemma?
Thank you.
dcwarner
wilmington, de
(If this duplicates a relatively new posting, I'm sorry, but I also haven't figured out how the new discussion group format allows refined searches of archives.)

Yeah the new search leaves something to be desired (actually the old search wasn't so great either). You get better results using Google's advanced search and restricting the search domain to discussions.apple.com.
Here's what the search in Google looks like:
Anyway the old post is why doesn't spotlight search inside aperture library? it explains why spotlight
doesn't search the library and how to work around it.

Why doesn't my iPhone 4 have an 'Internet tethering' options? Is it carrier related or iOs related? Please help me find the solution for this. thanx

Why doesn't my iPhone 4 have an 'Internet tethering' options? Is it carrier related or iOs related? Please help me find the solution for this. thanx

Personal Hot spot
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3574
Understanding
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4517
Trouble Shooting
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2756

I'm downloading my dvd:s to iTunes but some of them doesn't show in finder, I can view them in the dvd-player but I can't access them in Handbrake. Why?

I'm downloading my dvd:s to iTunes but some of them doesn't show in finder, I can view them in the dvd-player but I can't access them in Handbrake. Why?

from the Apple Support Communities -Terms of Use:
Do not submit software or descriptions of processes that break or otherwise 'work around' digital rights management software or hardware. This includes conversations about 'ripping' DVDs or working around FairPlay software used on the iTunes Store.
https://discussions.apple.com/static/apple/tutorial/tou.html

Why doesn't Maven find jfxrt.jar, although it is included in the JDK?

Hi,
Why doesn't Maven find jfxrt.jar, although it is included in the JDK?
My solution to build JavaFX apps with Maven is:
<dependency>
            <groupId>com.oracle</groupId>
            <artifactId>javafx</artifactId>
            <version>2.2</version>
            <scope>system</scope>
            <systemPath>${java.home}/lib/jfxrt.jar</systemPath>
</dependency>It works, but I wonder why the Maven build process can't find it automatically, as any other Java dependency, too.
If I build without the dependency, it can't find javafx imports.
Since Java 7 Update 6 it is included in the JDK.

There is a long drawn-out thread on this (you don't need to read it):
Error initializing OC4J server (JDev 10.1.3 EA1) "JDK 7u6 JavaFX integration - Is jfxrt.jar supposed to be on the classpath?"
Short summary is that jfxrt.jar is in the jdk/jre as of 7u6, but not on the default classpath for the jdk/jre (as of 7u13).
This will change in a future release (e.g. I believe the latest early access builds of jdk8 do have jfxrt.jar on the default runtime classpath).
So for now, you will need to explicitly add jfxrt.jar to the classpath. There are various ways to do this, one is to use a system dependency and then use the maven ant run plugin to package your app as is done in this example: http://code.google.com/p/willow-browser/source/browse/pom.xml
<dependency>
<groupId>javafx</groupId>
<artifactId>jfxrt</artifactId>
<version>${javafx.min.version}</version>
<scope>system</scope>
<systemPath>${javafx.runtime.lib.jar}</systemPath>
</dependency>
<plugin>
<artifactId>maven-antrun-plugin</artifactId>
<version>1.6</version>
<executions>
    <execution>
      <id>create-launcher-jar</id>
      <phase>package</phase>
      <goals>
        <goal>run</goal>
      </goals>
      <configuration>
        <target xmlns:fx="javafx:com.sun.javafx.tools.ant">
          <taskdef
              uri="javafx:com.sun.javafx.tools.ant"
              resource="com/sun/javafx/tools/ant/antlib.xml"
              classpath="${javafx.tools.ant.jar}"/>
            <fx:application id="fxApp"
                name="${project.name}"
                mainClass="${exec.mainClass}"/>
            <fx:jar destfile="${project.build.directory}/${project.build.finalName}-launcher">
              <fx:application refid="fxApp"/>
              <fx:fileset dir="${project.build.directory}/classes"/>
            </fx:jar>
            <attachartifact
                file="${project.build.directory}/${project.build.finalName}-launcher.jar"
                classifier="launcher"/>
        </target>
      </configuration>
    </execution>
</executions>
</plugin>Another way would be to make use of the zenjava javafx maven plugin:
http://www.zenjava.com/2012/11/24/from-zero-to-javafx-in-5-minutes/

HT201365 why doesn't a mac have the find my iPhone app?

why doesn't a mac have the find my iPhone app?

It does.
System Preferences>iCloud or www.icloud.com>findmyphone (if you have an old Mac running 10.6.8 or lower)

Lost my iPhone and why doesn't find my iPhone work

Lost my iPhone and why doesn't find my iPhone work

A friendly reminder: In order to use Find My IPhone Successfully, you need to 1. Turn on Location Services, 2. Lock Location Services (Using Restrictions in Settings, General, Restrictions) so that if some one else finds your IPhone, they can NOT turn off Find My IPhone And/Or Location Services itself! 3. Add your Mobile Me and/Or ICloud Account to your IPhone. 4. Lock Accounts (Again in Restrictions) from being changed or Deleted so that your Mobile Me And/OR ICloud Account can NOT be Deleted! 5. Look Up the Location of your IPhone Before Suspending Service to the IPhone, NOT after Suspending Service (simple common since applies here as well).

Why is spotlight not finding files in a folder (I know the files are there)

I've been having trouble with spotlight. I've done all the possible means of resetting spotlight folders via pref pane and via command line. Either way I go about it spotlight is not working properly.
My test for this is to search in folder for a file I know is in there. But, spotlight in finder isn't finding the file. Why? What prevents SPotlight in FInder from seeing files that are there? None of my drives are in the privacy section of the spotlight preferences.
Leopard 10.5.6 Mac Pro

this is certainly not normal. it looks like spotlight indexing is choking on something. if this continues you should probably stop it. look in the console log. there may be a record of what it's choking on. you can try deleting the hidden spotlight folder at the top of the drive. this will restart indexing and delete all the current spotlight data. if it keeps doing this I don't really know what to suggest. you can try excluding various folders on the drive from spotlight to see if you can isolate where the problem is.

Why is Spotlight not finding files in Applications Support

Why is Spotlight not finding files in Users/UserName/Library/Applications Support ?
What needs to be configured to do that?
Thanks.

CMD+F, click on Kind, select Other, and enable additional criteria. See http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/stopspotlightindex.html and http://homepage.mac.com/francines/articles/Leopard/leospot.html for starters.

HT1343 Why doesn't Command-X cut a file in finder?

Why doesn't Command-X cut a file in finder?
According to this article it must to! http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1343?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US
What is way to cut the a file WITH OUT using a mouse/trackpad - with keyboard only?

http://lifehacker.com/5812127/how-to-copy-and-paste-in-the-mac-os-x-finder
http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/74507/cut-paste-files-or-folders-on-mac -os-x
http://dailymactips.com/2012/09/18/how-to-cut-paste-files-and-folders-in-mac-os- x-mountain-lion/
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=201107211337186
Command-C
Command-Option-V

Why doesn't Spotlight actually find stuff

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