How to Search in Windows 7 for text within a document?

This does not work at all.

Dave,

We must have been typing at the same time.  I recommend SearchMyFiles [see above] but I would probably still use Windows explorer search for such a simple one as the Fred example.  If that doesn't work for you I suggest that you have an indexing problem.

Perhaps you can investigate this further [in slow time] whilst using SearchMyFiles for any searches that matter.

The Fred example works on my Win7 Home Premium x64.

1   To search for .xlsx files using the search box in Windows explorer, you can enter

type:=.xlsx

in the highest level folder of those you want to search through.  You can use this syntax for other file extensions as well.

2  A variation of this is to enter

kind:

then choose one of the categories from the dropdown list that appears.  These are much more general then file extensions so, for example, I have found kind: searching useful for music files because it searches for .mp3, .wma etc all at once.  The category "Document" searches for Word files, Excel files & others but this is so general that I've never found a use for it.

3  When you first click in the search box, it should offer you a date filter in a dropdown box.  Click on the blue text "DateModified:" entry & you'll see a calender in which you can select single dates or date ranges.

Winephile,

I have also had great problems with Win7 searching.  For contents to be found, you need the syntax to be different from what you've given above [the following example finds files that have the text fred within them as long as those files are within those set for contents indexing in Control panel search options]

content:(fred)

I could not find a Win7 search syntax guide that includes this particular entry but I've tried it successfully.

I have also installed SearchMyFiles - Alternative to Windows Search For Files + Duplicates Search and it is a very good utility.

PDF contents' searching - not an answer but a good alternative

I missed dancetolead's query above as I don't get on the forum much these days.  There are several threads that refer to pdf indexing but I could never get any suggested solutions to work.  The Adobe forums are also vocal on the subject & it seems that there is no fix yet [apparently an Adobe dll file needs to be modified for Win7 searching to deal with pdf contents properly].  As an alternative,

1  Open Adobe Reader and see if there is a binoculars icon on the toolbar indicating the "Advanced search" facility.  Maximise the window first or it might be there but simply not visible.

2  If it has not been set up yet then - View menu, Show/hide, Toolbar items, Edit, Show all edit tools, select Advanced search.

3  Click on advanced search & enter something that appears more than once in  any pdf document you happen to have open at the time. You'll see how it displays results in a tree structure - I've found this such a marvellous facility when researching subjects that I now routinely save "static" Office documents in pdf just so I can use this search capability.

4  Note that you can set it to search in the current document or across complete folder structures.  This is where the Adobe Advanced search really impresses.  The tree structure of results makes it very easy to find your way around.  Once you've used it in a particular folder then that folder will always appear in the dropdown list so you don't have to browse for it everytime.