Query - File and Content Searches

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Query - File and Content Searches

In addition to organizing your files, the small application Find enables you to find applications by filename, and documents by filename or by content. You can also search for such things as e-mail or the names of audio files.

Find is accessable through the Deskbar and through Terminal. When you choose Find, the Find panel opens and you can specify the attributes of the thing you are looking for.

The Find panel shown here is prepared to search for any file or folder that contain the word "screen" in its name. You can choose where to search, in this example we have chosen to do the search on All disks (including Windows, Linux and Mac volumes).

Queries are case-insensitive, even though BFS itself is case-sensitive. For instance, the Tracker will allow you to store files called Screen, screen and SCREEN in the same folder, but a query on screen will show them all.

The Query Result window looks a lot like a Tracker window, but is only available in List Mode. The search results are interavtive, as you can double-click on found applications or documents. Also dragging a file or a folder to the desktop or a Tracker window moves that object to a new location.

A example of Zeta being a real-time OS, can be seen in the Query Result window. If you rename or delete a file from a folder, will make the file disappear instantly from the Query Result window.

Modify your query
The top-left popup lets you choose the type of item you want to find ("All files and folders", "Bookmark", "E-mail", "Person", etc.).

The center popup lets you choose one of three search techniques: You can search by name, by attribute, or by formula. The attribute search is the most powerful - it lets you ask for files of a certain age, size, and so on. The formula search, in which you type in a logical expression (such as name="screen") is the most flexible.

The right popup lets you restrict your search to a particular volume. If you already know that the file is not on the CD or the Zip, there is no reason to search all Drives. A query through a CD or a floppy, makes the query slow.

Toggle the Find panel's little grey arrowhead, and you will provided more choices:

- Query name: The field lets you name the query that you are making, so that you can run it again later. You don't have to name your queries, in fact this option is only ment for the queries that you run often. Zeta comes with some predefined queries in the Home folder (/boot/home/queries).
- Include Trash: Tells Find to rummage through the Trash can.
- Temporary: Means your search results will be saved only for a certain system-set period of time. If you want to save your query uncheck Temporary.

Saving and Editing Queries
Queries are saved as files in the /boot/home/queries folder, eihter under the names that you gave them or by the default names that the query mechanism gives them. When you double-click a query file, the query is re-run - it's as if you opened the Find panel, typed in the query criteria, and hit Search.

To edit a query, select a query file in /boot/home/queries window and select Edit Query from the File menu. This brings up the Find panel that's filled in with the query's criteria; you can then change the criterias. The Query Result window also has an Edit Query option in its File menu. This lets you bring back the Find panel for a query that you've just run.

Query by Attributes
When you are searching by an attribute, the Attribute pop-down menu becomes linked to the selected filetype. For instance, if you search on the Person filetype, the attribute options will be address, phone number, fax, and so on. For mails you will find similar options: From:, To:, Subject:, Unread mails, etc.

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