Re: desktop search recommendations

Subject: Re: desktop search recommendations
From: Ned Bedinger <doc -at- edwordsmith -dot- com>
To: Gordon McLean <Gordon -dot- McLean -at- GrahamTechnology -dot- com>
Date: Thu, 12 Jul 2007 23:49:19 -0700

Gordon McLean wrote:
> AhAH!!!
>
> You failed to mention "text content" in your previous email, hence my
> confusion...

Oh no. I'm stunned by the idea that a desktop indexer would do anything
more than index text. Is it true? Your comment throws open the
floodgates--I'm now picturing desktop indexers that gather a relatively
dazzling array of deep information about disk files, URLs, and so on.

Thinking back to Jim Pinkham's description of WDS, it now dawns on me
that if the desktop indexer uses 'filter' modules to add awareness of
file types, then it has a library of file types about which it has
knowledge, and the point of having an indexer that can use intimate
knowledge about file types is, of course, to collect intimate knowledge
about files. It could collect metadata. It could probe the file's object
model. For example, an indexer that is aware of Word documents could
collect a sea of detailed information, per document: date created,
author, template, version, and last saved by info, available styles
(with detailed descriptions), styles in use, fonts used, macros,
formulas, inserted objects, headings, captions, tables, ... Whew, it
could capture a pretty thorough run down of any type of document it has
a filter for.

So, is this where desktop indexers like WDS are going? Can you actually
root around in extensive information (not just the contained text) about
the documents and files you've run the indexer on?

With bated breath,

Ned Bedinger
doc -at- edwordsmith -dot- com



>
> And how dare you call me a hardworking person of business... ;-)
>
> Gordon
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ned Bedinger [mailto:doc -at- edwordsmith -dot- com]
> Sent: 11 July 2007 20:14
> To: Gordon McLean
> Cc: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> Subject: Re: desktop search recommendations
>
> Gordon McLean wrote:
>
>> There are hundreds of different file types, I doubt any single tool
>> could index them all.
>
> The last time I looked, most file types stored text content as unmodified
> text.
>
> To see this, make a copy of a Word file that has some text in it.
> Then, in a DOS Window (aka, "Command Window"), execute this command:
>
> type <your Word filename> | more
>
> Scroll thru a few screenfuls by pressing the spacebar once to scroll once.
> You should start to see the text scrolling by after the Word header has gone
> past.
>
> Do this with a copy of any file you want. If it has text in it, it is
> probably viewable this way.
>
>
>> No offence Ned, but I doubt your homemade indexer could either.
>
> Heck, Gordo. It is just a matter of opening disk files and looking for
> text in them. Machine indexing does not need to know what application
> created the file.
>
>> Or maybe the documentation says that because legal said to put it in?? ;-)
>>
>
> Now we're talking like hardworking people of business. Say hello to the
> family for me :-)
>
>
> All standard disclaimers etc.
>
> Ned Bedinger
> doc -at- edwordsmith -dot- com
>
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>>> "Searchable file types
>>> Microsoft Windows Desktop Search indexes more than 200 of the most
>>> common file types, all of which are listed below.
>>>
>>> However, Windows Desktop Search cannot index every type of file.
>>
>> So if my homemade indexer could do that, and it was just stock VB that I
>> used to do it, I wonder what's with WDS in this regard?
>
>
>
>
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Follow-Ups:

References:
RE: desktop search recommendations: From: Gordon McLean

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