I'm getting mad again!

[Hermskii]

Windows 7 has the worst search ever. I found an old topic at HOOKS where Kelly tried to turn me on to WinGrep but I think it sucks. I'm sure I'm using it wrong or something because I can't find crap with it. Kelly please send me or tell me again the name of that other little program you gave me once before. It had the cute little name WinFind or WinGet or something small and simple. It worked. I used to search logs over the network with it and it worked freaking great! It color coded results too. You recalled it before and said it was weak.

[Kelly]

I know we've had this discussion a couple of times so write this time down

There are two programs that work really well for searching troves of documents. The first (and better) program is WinGrep. Grep will search massive, and I mean capital M massive, amounts of logs very fast. I have several hundred thousand logs saved, literally everything from every server I've ever had access to, and grep can search them all in about 4-8 minutes. Some of these logs are 600MB+ files too, something that would choke all existing text based editors. The beauty of this program is that you can just dump everything into a collective folder and grep out what you need. I don't have to use different folders or separations of any kind. I let the search do the heavy lifting whenever I need data.

The second program is Notepad++. It's weaker but will search entire folders too. The problem with N++ is that it returns all matches regardless of file name. This means if you try to search say your UT install for some specific player name, you'll get hits from pictures and sound files too since N++ looks at everything textually. It doesn't "see" something is a sound file or a jpeg, instead it automatically converts those to hexidecimal and searches them too. It's really good though if you have a particular folder and you only have one type of file in them. A good example would be the chat logs that Messenger saves. You can N++ through that entire folder to recall a specific conversation if you can remember keywords.

Hope that helps you Herm. Next time I have to explain this I'm sending you a bill. We are the same age, stop pulling that 'young alzheimers' crap

[Hermskii]

Back when you really liked me you would have posted links! LOL. Thanks bud. I have it here now. No more excuses. NotePad Plus doesn't sound right but I'l look at it and see. Thanks again you old fart!

[Hermskii]

Pad was in the name but this one isn't it. TextPad maybe?

[Kelly]

I'm not holding your hand any more. You are one of those creepy guys who has clammy palms and lets go reeeaaaalllllyy slowly while brushing his fingertips across the top of your fingers while the hands separate. You want to pet something then get a dog like normal people

Notepad++: http://notepad-plus-plus.org/
WinGrep: http://www.wingrep.com/

Better now? Heh heh....

Edit: Just saw your reply. Perhaps it might have been ConText?
http://www.contexteditor.org/
If that's it let me know and I'll explain how to install the UScript highlighter.

[Hermskii]

Not it. But it does have text or pad or both or something like that for a name. It was real simple like notepad I thought. Losing mind. Must get beer. LOL

[Kelly]

I'd just get Grep if I were you and get used to using it. It's by far the most powerful of the programs and the fastest.

[EvilGrins]

I still don't have Win7 and from what I've seen of it, I don't like it. I'll wait until Win8 gets outta beta and then probably come up with reason to hate that.

It's kinda funny how each version of Windows seems to remove features I like.

Take MSPaint, basic painting program. In Win3.1 it had a handy utility to selectively remove one particular color from any graphic image, a target specific eraser mode. They got rid of that in Win95, but Win95 had an option to print any image to a smaller resolution ideal for envelope art (for those of us that still liked to writer letters on paper and send them snail mail). Then WinXP got rid of that... but with XP I finally learned how to make my own skins for UT with that version of MSPaint.

I've looked at Win7 on a few other systems. a lot of the features I use for skinning have been removed from the Win7 version.

Or, to put it in a much simpler state, Argh!

[Hook]

So far, I really like Win7 - didn't realize that it too was missing a few things - that I downloaded now.
Win7 is fast and easy.

My Brother-in-law got Win8 on a new comp and he didn't like it until he tweaked it like old style and also downloaded some of the missing stuff, like th Start Button, etc.
Now it is fast and he loves it.
Win8 is very similar to Win7, but not worth it over Win7 unless you have touch screen or pad.

[Hermskii]

Muhahahaha!

I just found it by accident and yes, it is called "Text Pad" and the one I have is version 5.3 and it is lovely. Yay! I knew I had it somewhere. Now if I could just find my marbles. Yes. I have lost my marbles. DUH!

Thank you for giving me this so many years back Kelly!

[Hook]

Is Text Pad a free download?

[Hermskii]

I'll guess yes... Call me. or just go here:

http://www.textpad.com/

[Dr.Flay]

Excellent little text editor.

And re-reading this thread reminds me I gotta give Grins some alternatives to MSPaint.
A few of the tools aimed at 8bit web image editing, are perfect for our needs.

BTW. MS built-in search is rubbish because it searches an index first, fails to find what you want (because it was not in "My Documents or Library"), then you do a second search that actually physically "looks".

If you disable indexing of drives, you will get a single-pass search.
It also helps to not kill your drives.
That tool "Cacheman" I showed you, has convenient tick-boxes for various useless or annoying services.

[Hermskii]

So you think having indexed drives is bad? if so, why did they do it? That I know of it was for faster referencing of commonly used items searches. Granted the search suchs when you get into detail with it but for basic purposes it fairs well enough I thought.

[Dr.Flay]

Yeah, the idea is to speed up searching, but it only works if the things you are looking for are in an indexed area.
When looking for a file that you have no idea where it is, the whole computer gets searched, but this can take time and it does not need to search everywhere, so that is why it only searches the index first.

Generally you know where you put something when you put it in a structured place like "My Documents", so you just browse to it.

If you are searching any system folders or extra drives, they are not in the index.
Even though indexing may be enabled on all drives/partitions, it will still only index the locations listed in the indexing service (different versions of windows have different defaults)
eg. The default indexing in XP blocks the 2 folders I use the search in most.
"Application Data" and "Local Settings"
These 2 folders are a pain to navigate.

Personally I would only index system and network folders, and external USB drives with many folders.

If you are an "average" modern PC user, you may only ever need to look for a file in your library, but in real-life something will crash, and at some point you have to search your PC for "xyz.dll" to see if the version you have needs updating or replacing or even removing.

So on an indexed system you have to wait for it to fail to find the file before running a second real search.
At least on XP you can search from within the folder you are looking at, but with the new search, even if you were staring right at the file you wanted, it will still search the index first, instead of the folder-nest you have selected.

If you have a well organised PC, with fast drives indexing doesn't gain you much.
The big downsides to indexing are the extra drive wear and the wasted drive space.
The more you index, the more useful the index, but the bigger the index becomes.

The worst i've seen with indexing actually botching the job completely, was on a PC that got a lot of constant use, or was switched off.
Because indexing only happens when the PC is not busy, it had not managed to complete any indexing for over 2 years.
So for over 2 years (till i switched off the service) indexing just showed old results.

Be warned if you use SSD drives, it should never be enabled.
The best way to decide, is to disable the service for a few days and see if you miss it. Simple.

A few XP style niceties for Win 7
http://goffconcepts.com/products/filesearchex/
http://www.classicshell.net