VIsta Index and Search Puzzle

I am puzzled

The Indexed locations shown when I press the show all locations butto
are Microsoft Outlook Start Menu and Users. Only Microsoft Outlook i
checked

I was trying out the search facility above the start button on Vista t
look for a program and was very surprised when up popped a selection o
files that are stored on an external hard drive that I use from time t
time as a secondary backup. The files shown have not been accesse
recently and at the time of the search the external drive was no
connected. Hovering the cursor over the files told me that they wer
located on this external drive.

Can you help me understand why these files would have shown up on th
search as I have not chosen to have the external drive indexed

--
phmc

On Thu, 5 Mar 2009 13:28:24 -0600, phmc <> wrote:

>
>I am puzzled.
>
>The Indexed locations shown when I press the show all locations button
>are Microsoft Outlook Start Menu and Users. Only Microsoft Outlook is
>checked.
>
>I was trying out the search facility above the start button on Vista to
>look for a program and was very surprised when up popped a selection of
>files that are stored on an external hard drive that I use from time to
>time as a secondary backup. The files shown have not been accessed
>recently and at the time of the search the external drive was not
>connected. Hovering the cursor over the files told me that they were
>located on this external drive.
>
>Can you help me understand why these files would have shown up on the
>search as I have not chosen to have the external drive indexed?

This area is curious and not at all well documented, but I've learned a
few things about it.

First, just because a drive isn't indexed doesn't mean that it will never
be searched. My USB flash drive is not indexed (according to the indexing
dialog) but it does get searched from the Start menu window. It's almost
as if a separate index was created.

Second, by design Start menu searching works quite differently than from
Win Explorer, so it's normal to get different results from there than
elsewhere.

For example, Windows utilities like msconfig can be found very quickly
from the Start menu search, but not from Win Explorer with an indexed
search if the \Windows folder was excluded from indexing.

Doug M. in NJ

On Thu, 5 Mar 2009 13:28:24 -0600, phmc <>
wrote:

>
>I am puzzled.
>
>The Indexed locations shown when I press the show all locations button
>are Microsoft Outlook Start Menu and Users. Only Microsoft Outlook is
>checked.
>
>I was trying out the search facility above the start button on Vista to
>look for a program and was very surprised when up popped a selection of
>files that are stored on an external hard drive that I use from time to
>time as a secondary backup. The files shown have not been accessed
>recently and at the time of the search the external drive was not
>connected. Hovering the cursor over the files told me that they were
>located on this external drive.

>Can you help me understand why these files would have shown up on the
>search as I have not chosen to have the external drive indexed?

1. Because Vista's indexing and search mechanism is the most
convoluted, non-intuitive, malfunctioning, performance wasting search
interface anyone could ever imagine.

A better choice is to shut off the indexing service. Download and
install "Agent Ransack" and you'll have a useable search interface.

On Thu, 05 Mar 2009 16:11:25 -0500, Retroman wrote:

> On Thu, 5 Mar 2009 13:28:24 -0600, phmc <> wrote:
>
>>
>>I am puzzled.
>>
>>The Indexed locations shown when I press the show all locations button
>>are Microsoft Outlook Start Menu and Users. Only Microsoft Outlook is
>>checked.
>>
>>I was trying out the search facility above the start button on Vista to
>>look for a program and was very surprised when up popped a selection of
>>files that are stored on an external hard drive that I use from time to
>>time as a secondary backup. The files shown have not been accessed
>>recently and at the time of the search the external drive was not
>>connected. Hovering the cursor over the files told me that they were
>>located on this external drive.
>>
>>Can you help me understand why these files would have shown up on the
>>search as I have not chosen to have the external drive indexed?
>
> This area is curious and not at all well documented, but I've learned a
> few things about it.
>
> First, just because a drive isn't indexed doesn't mean that it will never
> be searched. My USB flash drive is not indexed (according to the indexing
> dialog) but it does get searched from the Start menu window. It's almost
> as if a separate index was created.
>
> Second, by design Start menu searching works quite differently than from
> Win Explorer, so it's normal to get different results from there than
> elsewhere.
>
> For example, Windows utilities like msconfig can be found very quickly
> from the Start menu search, but not from Win Explorer with an indexed
> search if the \Windows folder was excluded from indexing.
>
> Doug M. in NJ

Perhaps index != search...

What I mean is that indexing prepares in advance a list of search items,
but searching may very well search both that index and the unindexed files.

The above is a guess, but that doesn't mean it's a bad guess :-)

--
Gene E. Bloch letters0x40blochg0x2Ecom

On Sun, 8 Mar 2009 23:49:36 -0700, "Gene E. Bloch" <not->
wrote:

>> [snip]
>> This area is curious and not at all well documented, but I've learned a
>> few things about it.
>>
>> First, just because a drive isn't indexed doesn't mean that it will never
>> be searched. My USB flash drive is not indexed (according to the indexing
>> dialog) but it does get searched from the Start menu window. It's almost
>> as if a separate index was created.
>>
>> Second, by design Start menu searching works quite differently than from
>> Win Explorer, so it's normal to get different results from there than
>> elsewhere.
>>
>> For example, Windows utilities like msconfig can be found very quickly
>> from the Start menu search, but not from Win Explorer with an indexed
>> search if the \Windows folder was excluded from indexing.
>>
>> Doug M. in NJ
>
>Perhaps index != search...
>
>What I mean is that indexing prepares in advance a list of search items,
>but searching may very well search both that index and the unindexed files.
>
>The above is a guess, but that doesn't mean it's a bad guess :-)

Hi Gene,

I agree that a Start menu search does include some non-indexed areas,
regardless of settings in the main indexing options dialog. However, it
is unclear why those searches are so much faster than the same searches of
both areas from Win Explorer.

Perhaps when the "search programs" option is enabled in the Customize
Start Menu dialog, known program folders are searched first. This could
explain why executables like msconfig come up so much faster in Start menu
searches. That option is not available for searches from Win Explorer.

Doug M. in NJ

On Mon, 09 Mar 2009 11:27:40 -0400, Retroman wrote:

> On Sun, 8 Mar 2009 23:49:36 -0700, "Gene E. Bloch" <not->
> wrote:
>
>>> [snip]
>>> This area is curious and not at all well documented, but I've learned a
>>> few things about it.
>>>
>>> First, just because a drive isn't indexed doesn't mean that it will never
>>> be searched. My USB flash drive is not indexed (according to the indexing
>>> dialog) but it does get searched from the Start menu window. It's almost
>>> as if a separate index was created.
>>>
>>> Second, by design Start menu searching works quite differently than from
>>> Win Explorer, so it's normal to get different results from there than
>>> elsewhere.
>>>
>>> For example, Windows utilities like msconfig can be found very quickly
>>> from the Start menu search, but not from Win Explorer with an indexed
>>> search if the \Windows folder was excluded from indexing.
>>>
>>> Doug M. in NJ
>>
>>Perhaps index != search...
>>
>>What I mean is that indexing prepares in advance a list of search items,
>>but searching may very well search both that index and the unindexed files.
>>
>>The above is a guess, but that doesn't mean it's a bad guess :-)
>
> Hi Gene,
>
> I agree that a Start menu search does include some non-indexed areas,
> regardless of settings in the main indexing options dialog. However, it
> is unclear why those searches are so much faster than the same searches of
> both areas from Win Explorer.
>
> Perhaps when the "search programs" option is enabled in the Customize
> Start Menu dialog, known program folders are searched first. This could
> explain why executables like msconfig come up so much faster in Start menu
> searches. That option is not available for searches from Win Explorer.
>
> Doug M. in NJ

That makes sense. thanks.

--
Gene E. Bloch letters0x40blochg0x2Ecom