Solved Searching with windows explorer Kind:=SUCKS!

Searching with windows explorer Kind(of):=SUCKS!

Hello everyone. Sorry for the disparaging title but I cannot figure out how this works, so I can here .

I have a folder that has subfolders, each titled from a movie. Within the subfolder is a file for that movie ( .avi, .mkv, .mp4, etc.) and other files (.nfo, .svt, .jpg, etc.). When I select the top movie folder and do a search for a work in the movie title ("star trek") I get all the things that have star trek (the subfolder, the files within the folder and the movie file too). I though well I really only want to select the movie file and there is this thing called "kind" where I can "limit" my search. Cool! So I type in
star trek and select kind:=movie....Nothing.
star trek kind:=video....Nothing.
kind:=movie star trek...Nothing.
kind:=video star trek....Finally a hit!

So is this really how this search box is suppose to behave. I have to type in the kind first then my search term? do I need to do this with all the windows limiters (size? Other properties?)

Also what type of files are windows looking for when I put in "Movie" or "Video"? Could there be a type that is missing say I have some old .ogg container files will windows find this under "Video"?

Thanks
-S

I agree I hate the Windows 8 Search box - Actually I finally managed to rig it to find any item on my system by name or partial name. I think what I had to do was add the whole drive into the search index, and I did that for all of the drives installed. Sometimes when I am searching a folder it will tell me I need to add it to the indexer, I have kept doing this until practically the whole system has been indexed. I think this slows down the system, but at least I can find stuff now.

On thing I have noticed, you cannot search "Computer" you HAVE to choose a drive - Searching "Computer" yields no results. No, I take that back - I just did a search for "Star Trek" and it's showing me stuff from all of the hard drives:



So I think if you add all of the drives into the Indexer, eventually you can search them all, you can do this by doing a search on each drive and when it asks you if you wanna add any locations to the index, always say Yes.


Also, set up your search parameters so that it's exactly like how I have them set in my Search bar in the image.

Hi nzdreamer,

Indeed, the "movie" filter is useless, because for some reason it's not linked to file types. "Kind" filters are related to file kinds. Basically, certain file types (extensions, for simplicity) are mapped to specific file kinds. You can see the mapping in the registry:
And there's no single file type mapped to "movie", that's why Windows Search won't find any movies



So your best bet is to search for videos when you look for movies

You can add/modify entries. OGG is not listed, but you can create a new parameter for it by analogy. Reboot for the changes to take effect.

As for the order in which you type or select your queries from the Search tab, it doesn't matter. In other words, the queries below should work equally well.


I hope it clears the confusion.

Vadim

I didn't realize he was adding the word "Movie" into his search, I never do that, I just search for the name of what I'm looking for and it usually eventually shows up.

nzdreamer55 said:

star trek and select kind:=movie....Nothing.
star trek kind:=video....Nothing.
kind:=movie star trek...Nothing.
kind:=video star trek....Finally a hit!

Click to expand...

Are you using
kind:=movie
or
kind:movie

There's a very useful tutorial here with lots of info on how to do searches like this:
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/21310-search-find-more-filters-operators.html

David, the syntax of nzdreamer's queries is correct, and so is yours. But it's not the issue here, in my opinion. Can you find any movies with your examples?

Vadikan said:

David, the syntax of nzdreamer's queries is correct, and so is yours. But it's not the issue here, in my opinion. Can you find any movies with your examples?

Click to expand...

Ah thanks for that. You're right - I don't get any results when searching for "kind:movie".

Curiously, on this PC, when I look at Search Tools in File Explorer, I don't even get the "kind" drop down which is visible on XweAponX's screenshot and in Kari's tutorial.

The dropdown I get at that place in my screen (see screenshot) says "type" instead of "kind" and doesn't have "movie" as an option in the list.

I'm not sure what I'm doing differently? Have I changed a setting somewhere? (Using 32 bit Windows 8 if that makes a difference?)

I'm not sure why UI labels are different. Could be a localization issue of some sort (in Russian Windows 8 the translation is messed up exactly here). But it's just a UI label, so it doesn't matter, because as soon as you choose an item from the list, "kind" is inserted in the search box.

Hi there
Isn't the standard search screen the SAME in W7 except the explorer program is called Windows explorer rather than File explorer.

From the (W7) MENU though the standard search searches for FILES and Programs -- at least doing it from the file browser (either W7 or W8) you can restrict the search easy enough to specific volumes or directories -- I suppose it depends on your preferences for searching -- I have to admit I prefer using the browser (File / Windows explorer) but of course YMMV.

I don't have any issues with searching COMPUTER in either W7 / W8 / W8.1 so I'm not sure what that problem is --works on my systems.

Incidentally (more of a USER issue than a technical one --suggestion - when creating files / directories / folders try and use meaningful and logical names --then it makes searching a whole lot easier !!).

Cheers
jimbo

jimbo45 said:

so I'm not sure what that problem is

Click to expand...

The problem is stated in post #1 and the culprit is dissected in post #3. The problem is solved.

Yah it's a good solution, thanks Vadikan!

I have been using the "kind:xxxx" search argument successfully for quite some time; however it now seems that an update has changed matters.
Now when I enter kind:video in the search box I get nothing, but if I enter video I get what I used to get with kind:video.
WTF is Microsoft playing at?