Spotlight actually searching every file on "This Mac"
- by Cawas
I know of 2 ways to search for any file in your machine using Finder (some say it's Spotlight) and no Terminal.
To prevent answers / comments about Terminal, I consider it either for scripting something or as last resource. It's not practical for lots of usages. For instance, if you want to find something to attach to a mail, or embed in iTunes or any other app, you can just drag n' drop one or many of them. Definitely not practical to do under Terminal. There are many cases of use for any, but the focus here is Graphical User Interface.
Well, the 2 ways basically are:
Press Cmd + Opt + Spacebar and type in your search. Press the + button, select "System files" and "are included". This is so far my preferred way, but I'm not sure it will go through every file.
Open Finder, press Cmd + Shift + G and/or select just one folder. Type in your search and select the folder rather than "This Mac". This will bring files not shown in "This Mac" if you select a folder outside of the default scope.
Thing is, none of those is really convenient or have the nice presentation from regular Spotlight, which you get from Cmd + Spacebar and just typing. And, as far as I've heard, the default behavior on Spotlight in Tiger was actually being able to find files anywhere.
So, is there any way to make the process significantly simpler? Maybe some tweak, configuration or really good Spotlight alternative? I'd rather keep it simple and tweak Spotlight.
