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contextual text searching for 10.3.9?
Authored by: tracey on Mar 23, '06 05:29:20AM

Thanks for the suggestion. I just tried Easyfind and it works well for finding files, but I needed something that will return a line of text from a text file with my word in the middle, not just the file name. This is useful for finding the exact piece of information you need, from multiple sources, like searching all of classical literature for the name "Hercules".

In case any one else is looking for a similar function I am now trying the demo version of Foxtrot (which costs $29) which looks like it indexes and performs this type of search, though in my experience not too quickly. However, the files have to be 'previewed' manually in a slider, one at a time, rather than the program returning results in the main window.



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contextual text searching for 10.3.9?
Authored by: sjk on Mar 23, '06 03:56:35PM

Thanks for the more detailed explanation of what you're looking for. I was also going to suggest Foxtrot but you've already discovered and tried that.

Unless I'm missing something, NotLight only displays filenames (like EasyFind) and not any context within matching files of search results.



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yet another option ...
Authored by: sjk on Mar 23, '06 04:58:50PM
If/when you upgrade to 10.4 there's an example of what I think you're trying to do in MacSlash | Using Spotlight In Terminal.app:

mdfind -onlyin ~ -0 password | xargs -0 fgrep -H -n "password"

It's a powerful combination using mdfind (Spotlight) to quickly find files, then fgrep to display matching content within them. Different varieties of contextual search results could be produced with different options for those commands plus other post-processing refinements. Many possibilities.

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