 |
 |
How to re-index Spotlight
|
|
|
|
|
Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Toronto, ON
Status:
Offline
|
|
I searched for this on MacNN and came up with a lot of useless discussion threads, so I figure I'll post this for anyone else who needs to re-index spotlight to save them the trouble of google'ing through a lot of useless articles:
To reindex Spotlight:
1) Go to System Preferences -> Spotlight
2) Click on the Privacy Tab
3) add your hard drive(s) to the privacy list
4) to verify that Spotlight stopped indexing your hard drive, you can do a search for anything and it should come up empty.
5) Remove your hard drive(s) from the Privacy List
6) Close System Preferences
7) At this point Spotlight should be reindexing your drive, depending on the hard drive size, it may take awhile (I have a 30 Gig HD and it took Spotlight an hour to reindex)
If it worked, you will get this when you try to invoke spotlight (command space):
Hope that helps someone in the future.
(
Last edited by mpancha; Jan 16, 2006 at 12:10 PM.
Reason: re-enabled screenshot)
|
|
MacBook Pro | 2.16 ghz core2duo | 2gb ram | superdrive | airport extreme
iBook G4 | 1.2ghz | 768mb ram | combodrive | airport extreme
iPhone 3GS | 32 GB | Jailbreak, or no Jailbreak
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Nov 2001
Status:
Offline
|
|
Or...
sudo mdutil -E /
from the terminal.
A lot easier, eh?
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Toronto, ON
Status:
Offline
|
|
heh.. yea, that would have been alot easier... I spent a few minutes google'ing and searching macnn and apple's kbase, and got a lot of articles, nothing that just said "do this".... but that command was exactly what I was trying to find earlier. Thanks!
|
|
MacBook Pro | 2.16 ghz core2duo | 2gb ram | superdrive | airport extreme
iBook G4 | 1.2ghz | 768mb ram | combodrive | airport extreme
iPhone 3GS | 32 GB | Jailbreak, or no Jailbreak
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Junior Member
Join Date: Oct 2004
Status:
Offline
|
|
Or you could just add it to the privacy tab, and remove it immediately without exiting system preferences. Works everytime for me, plus a lot of people aren't comfortable with inputting commands in the terminal. 
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Helsinki, Finland
Status:
Offline
|
|
After installing 10.4.3, rebuilding permissions and erasing/rebuilding the Spotlight index, it still fails to find most of my stuff. It's been this since I got Tiger.
'Touch'ing the affected folders or their contents via the command line doesn't help, but renaming does.
Maybe I'll create a script that adds a space at the end of every single (visible) file name in those folders and then renames them back. Sigh.
J
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Enthusiast
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: The Nut Ranch
Status:
Offline
|
|
Originally Posted by toneloco28
people aren't comfortable with inputting commands in the terminal.
I would be one of these people; really afraid I'll mess something up.
Thanks JF for the info.
P~
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: CO
Status:
Offline
|
|
Mpancha:
Are you aware the graphic you tried to place forwards browser to
http:// tamilfx.ezh/ suspended.page/
?
( As does anything going to www.matheepan.com )
(FYI)
|
|
TOMBSTONE: "He's trashed his last preferences"
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Enthusiast
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Nagoya
Status:
Offline
|
|
thx, nice tip. i was getting some erroneous items in my results here.
|
12" iBook 1.2ghz / 1.2gb
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Clinically Insane
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Los Angeles
Status:
Offline
|
|
Here's a great Macworld article on the subject. Scroll half way down and read the Force Spotlight to Reindex section.
|
"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground." TJ
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Toronto, ON
Status:
Offline
|
|
Originally Posted by Love Calm Quiet
Mpancha:
Are you aware the graphic you tried to place forwards browser to
http:// tamilfx.ezh/ suspended.page/
?
( As does anything going to www.matheepan.com )
(FYI)
yea, I just found out that my old host went under and was kind enough not to inform me. Looking for a new host now. 
|
|
MacBook Pro | 2.16 ghz core2duo | 2gb ram | superdrive | airport extreme
iBook G4 | 1.2ghz | 768mb ram | combodrive | airport extreme
iPhone 3GS | 32 GB | Jailbreak, or no Jailbreak
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Helsinki, Finland
Status:
Offline
|
|
Hmm, it seems mdimporter is crashing because of a font file or something and refuses to start indexing a big branch of files and folders. I'll keep digging.
J
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: CO
Status:
Offline
|
|
Mpancha:
Some pretty good threads in the web developer forum on hosts!
|
|
TOMBSTONE: "He's trashed his last preferences"
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: CO
Status:
Offline
|
|
Mpancha:
Some pretty good threads in the web developer forum on hosts!
|
|
TOMBSTONE: "He's trashed his last preferences"
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Helsinki, Finland
Status:
Offline
|
|
Ok, it was a font. The mdimport process crashed when encountering a font with probs and couldn't recover. Anything after that never got indexed, in my case a lot of stuff.
I placed the folderful of fonts in another place and ran mdimport again, successfully. I'm quite sure the UI based trick would work, too.
Lesson learned: corrupt fonts continue to cause problems for the OS, now in even more obscure places.
J
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Join Date: Nov 2005
Status:
Offline
|
|
I have tried everything I have read...
Adding volumes to the privacy tab: Nothing will stick...nothing will index.
All the terminal commands from several threads...it wan't take any commands, indicating there's no directory to index or something like that...
I have also been told to throw out the .Spotlight-V100 file in my root directory...
Maybe I don't know what a root directory is...I thought I did...but I can't find it. And I obviously can't search for it...
Please, someone explain to me like a child where to find this file so I can throw it away...or anything else I can do to get spotlight up and running...
Thanks in advance...
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Toronto, ON
Status:
Offline
|
|
type in these commands in terminal:
1) su <enter>
2) put in your root password
3) cd /<enter>
4) ls
you should see .spotlight-v100 there.
here's a screenshot if it will help.
|
|
MacBook Pro | 2.16 ghz core2duo | 2gb ram | superdrive | airport extreme
iBook G4 | 1.2ghz | 768mb ram | combodrive | airport extreme
iPhone 3GS | 32 GB | Jailbreak, or no Jailbreak
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Toronto, ON
Status:
Offline
|
|
|
|
|
MacBook Pro | 2.16 ghz core2duo | 2gb ram | superdrive | airport extreme
iBook G4 | 1.2ghz | 768mb ram | combodrive | airport extreme
iPhone 3GS | 32 GB | Jailbreak, or no Jailbreak
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Mar 2001
Location: CO
Status:
Offline
|
|
Must have been some juicy abuse. There's now NO post between your last two, mpancha.
|
|
TOMBSTONE: "He's trashed his last preferences"
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Seattle
Status:
Offline
|
|
no need to su to root for a simple directory listing. and potentially dangerous.
will do the trick
|
|
You can take the dude out of So Cal, but you can't take the dude outta the dude, dude!
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mac Elite
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Seattle
Status:
Offline
|
|
Just for the record, what was the abuse?
It was torture wasn't it? 
|
|
You can take the dude out of So Cal, but you can't take the dude outta the dude, dude!
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 
|
|
|
Forum Rules
|
|
|
|
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
|
HTML code is Off
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Top