Windows 7 (advanced) search pane?

Anonymous
2010-01-27T14:40:15+00:00

I've been using Windows 7 for some time now, and loving it!

However, when I was preaching to my family and friends, they asked me if the Advanced Search pane (that we used to have in XP) is back in Windows 7.

Of course, with the Windows Search Advanced Query Syntax (let's call this AQS), we are able to achieve what the advanced search pane could and more. But then they brought up a pretty good point:

Why should I (they) have to learn/memorize a special syntax in order to perform a complex search, when the advanced search pane in XP was so much more straightforward? And I kinda agree with them.

E.g, without looking at the AQS documentation, how many of you can immediately come up with the single search criteria for:

  1. all jpg and png files (only)
  2. that are in e:\images and d:\images and f:\dir\images
  3. without recursing into any subdirectories
  4. that are larger than 10KB
  5. and was created between 25th of December and 1st of January?

Anyone got an answer for that?

Or is there some sort of advanced search pane like in Outlook? Pick from a list of filters the field to search/filter by, and you get a nice label/textbox for you to type in?

I've done some digging, and it seems like there's only partial (restricted) support for this. E.g, in the Music library, you can only add filters for Album, Artist, Genre, Length; Documents: Authors, Type, Date modified, Size; etc.

And when you're not in a library, e.g, folder on an external disk, the only filters you can add are Date modified and Size.

Are there any ways to add more filters? Or are we limited to either: 1) relying on the filters that Windows 7 *THINKS* we need, or 2) buckle down and memorize the AQS?

[Edit]

Here's another story: I was explaining to my mom how you could build an AQS search criteria, and she remarked (paraphrased), "Why is it trying to search when you're not even done typing? Why not have a search button that begins searching only when you are ready to?"

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Files, folders, and storage

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@CmdrKeene 90,631 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2011-11-13T16:56:45+00:00

By default, Windows only searches inside files if the location is indexed (so it can return instant results). You can tell Windows to do an intensive search (just like XP would have done).

  1. Open Folder Options (type 'folder' into the Start menu to find it).
  2. On the Search tab, click the 2nd option ("Always search file names and contents"), then click OK.

After that, using quotes to phrase-search inside files should work, even in un-indexed locations.  Searches may take a while if the location isn't indexed (just like XP), but they'll be complete and should return the results you want.

____________

One more note:  If the location is indexed, but your phrase isn't being found.... do this to make sure the file type is getting indexed.  Do this, for example, if you are trying to find a phrase inside a non-standard file like a JavaScript or PHP file:

  1. Type 'index' into your Start menu to find the Indexing Options, then click the Advanced button.
  2. On the File Types tab, find the file type you want to be indexed (tip: click in the list, then type the file type letters like JS to jump to it).
  3. With the file type selected, make sure the 2nd option is selected "Index properties and file contents", then click OK to close each box.

I believe these two setting changes would resolve about 90% of search frustrations people commonly have with Windows 7.  Please let me know if this helps for you.

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Anonymous
2010-02-09T01:26:47+00:00

Maybe it's just me, but how can you even get that far?

My "search" usually just stalls before it lets me even BEGIN to add a filter. Do you just initiate the initial search from a new explorer window? Or do you initiate the search from the start icon and then add a filter...or.....?

To me, Search is defunct...99% of my data is on a network share and it can't find it even if I am in the folder that I am searching for

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@CmdrKeene 90,631 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2010-02-02T12:28:25+00:00

I think rather than finding the filter, they'd rather you just type a few parts of the file and Windows will figure it out for you (whether you type the author or whatever).  I don't necessarily agree with that, lol.

You can see more filters if you expand the search box, but who would consider that an intuitive interface?  I think this could have been implemented much differently with better results.  Perhaps the 'search filters' could be checkboxes at the bottom of that menu, or even at the top similar to the library pane's links.  Perhaps Windows 8 will have more time spend on this area.

![](http://public.bay.livefilestore.com/y1pqxrKJw4QR06lJSyyWRLZGs_D-sLwOfn4JwRyCdXTqAr9WQi9Yo8_mO_d7tlrgBUd4pD1DifYDmGpRLPVWrq4tw/Search Filters.png)

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@CmdrKeene 90,631 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2010-01-29T03:35:12+00:00

You don't have to learn or know the syntax.  It's really easier than it may appear on the surface.

Instead of trying to figure out the syntax, simply type what you're looking for.  If you want to search a specific type of info (like Author or Date, anything that used to be in the Advanced pane), it appears for you.  Simply click it and you're done.

In this picture below, I didn't have to type any of that, I just clicked "Add a search filter".  It's the same options from Windows 7, but now they're blue links instead of a big bunch of text boxes.

If this was helpful, please vote by clicking the green triangle. If it solves the issue, click Propose as Answer. Thanks!

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  1. Anonymous
    2011-04-12T09:05:35+00:00

    Windows 7 Explorer's search features are brain-dead.  The UI is the worst part, but there are a number of failings.

    Here is what I see needs changing:

    1. Reliability.  Search should always, always, always return content if we know it's there.  If indexing isn't on, it should still work, just slower.  We shouldn't have to configure search in some obscure location to search hidden files, we shouldn't have to configure search to, yes, include *.some_extension_that_microsoft_decided_not_to_return_by_default.
    2. Common things should be easy. In other words, if I just want to search for a string of text, no attribute qualifiers, that should be simple.  Windows 7 just about does this.  The search box is a good UI for a simple text string search.  But something as simple as "search for all occurences of "quarterly report" in all *.xls files" quickly becomes a non-starter in the search box.  Note that the most common things are to search for a content string and to search for (globbed) filename.
    3. More advanced search, on attributes like "size:", "name:", "modifieddate:", "type:" should be possible in a GUI point and click way. The underlying search should be an advanced query syntax, but the UI should expose, in a very simple and COMPLETE manner, a point and click advanced search.  Getting into advanced search should be obvious from the simple search.  People should not have to memorize advanced query syntax.   Explorer's current search box will sometimes expose a couple simple search filters, but I can not get it to expose more than "size:" and "date:", even if I make the search box wider (which is a really dumb requirement to find more attributes).  Windows 7's UI for more advanced search is just terrible.  REALLY BAD.  Note, I'm not for bringing back the animated dog of XP, nor do I want to waste a bunch of screen real estate on a search pane with check-boxes that is only occassionally used.  But there should be a drop-down/right-click/something that will allow me to expand the simple search box, when needed, into something more advanced.
    4. Standards. Search is common. Standards have evolved over the years for specifying search: regular expression syntax. Search should support, for advanced use, standard regular expressions. E.g.: content:[some-regex], name:[some-regex], date:[some-regex].

    In summary, searching my local hard disk (or network drive!) should be faster, easier, and potentially more "rich" (complex queries, but easy to construct) than searching the entire Internet.  It's not with the current Explorer search capabilities.

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