file searcher with user-defined metadata columns (Windows)

Posted by 22111
Feb 27, 2021 at 10:58 PM

Hi jimspoon,
you say, “an ADS is no different from the unnamed $DATA stream when it comes to where it is stored - depending on length it might be resident in the MFT or non-resident. If non-resident a search program would have to follow pointers to clusters and index the data found there.”

As for the former, I don’t know, I have never heard of ANY ADS stored in the MFT, and then it would probably not being named as such?

I suppose though - I might be wrong here - that the NTFS “file attributes” are stored within the MFT; unfortunately, their list is finite, i.e. neither the developer nor the user can create any other.

For “attributes” within the files, you say it’s up to the developer, which is true, but most file formats are standard formats, e.g. for pics, audio…, and I think they have a FIXED set of possible (internal) “attributes” which the developer then can “use” (i.e. make available to the user) or not, but the developer cannot (I might again be mistaken here) create further, specific (internal) “attributes”; this doesn’t apply of course to new, proprietary file formats but users nowadays tend to avoid those and will certainly not accept them in the pic-vid-audio field.

EV has a (default = “on”) setting for EV also indexing those NTFS file attributes; except for your “C:\” system drive which you should leave alone of course, you could use “hidden” and “system”, and their combination, as 3 different “ToDo” indicators, which, thanks to EV, could bring IMMEDIATE, sorted “ToDo”, “Project” lists, etc. onto the screen, even spanning elements from your whole system - the interest here is that you don’t have to fiddle with the file names, and “ToDo” indicators and such should indeed leave the file names alone, tagging within the file names just should be made for non-ephemeral indications / referrals (to avoid link-breaking, among other things); those lists are also exportable, etc. (It’s even possible to do it by command-line, i.e. to trigger STORED “filtered and ordered searches”...

As for numbers in file names, in many cases and for private use cases, these will be years, i.e. 19xx to 20xx for movies, CDs, etc., or even years-and-months for pics (e.g. 2004-11); the necessary regexes will be utterly simple.

wsp, I had tried the MI fields in version 5 for “real use”, and MI crashed. Then, in MI mid-v6 (i.e. not early 6, not the latest version either), I just “wanted to know”, and on a modern PC (where everything else works just fine), I just created some 10, 15 (certainly not 20 or more) items, and with some 5 or 6 fields, with very simple data, numbers without decimals, short strings, simple (not even combined, and I don’t remember if that would have been possible) filtering then IMMEDIATELY CRASHED that very tiny, very simple MI file, and I never spent another minute with that.

(I had a full version of v6 and had intended to apply it to a real whilst limited use case, so I was interested in it functioning well, not in confirming some bad prejudice (“it’ll crash again”: no, that was some 8 years and many minor versions later), but I don’t have any use case for a program which crashes less than 5 minutes into its first use with minimal data.)

Now, I’ll wait some other months, will then try again with a very simple, tiny trial set-up. Considering that v7 is said to have changed the underlying DB (SQLite now, like UR and RN?), those problems may have been resolved indeed, but prospects allured by those fields should be aware of possible problems before buying hastily though, all the more so since the (possible) use of SQLite is not, per se, a guarantee that all will be okay: It was you who told us here that once you brought the (also SQLite-driven) CintaNotes to its limits, things didn’t go so well anymore…

And in v5/6, users complained about the lack of different sets of fields in different sub-folders within MI: Whenever they wanted to use a certain set of fields for a certain set of items, and another set of fields for another set of items, they thus were forced to create multiple DBs. (And no, that’s not a limitation inherent to the use of a relational DB in general or of SQLite in particular, it’s just lazy programming; I know how it’s be done, within a SIMPLE DB setup, NOT by multiplying DB tables or such, which would be as totally unnecessary as it would be totally ugly indeed.)

MadAboutDana (another current thread): Trying just another app? Hoho! There are spouses who’ve got 300 pairs of shoes within their walk-in wardrobe, but you don’t call them “collectors”, they swear they needed them, and they will certainly be useful again (both, spouse+shoes). That’s an expensive hobby if those shoes are “Prada” and the like - men, on the other hand, would be ashamed to pretend that multiple items of (for the most of them, perfectly) IDENTICAL use would be needed in droves, so they do it all the like, but with pretended DIFFERING use - technical stuff, books, and apps vs applications even are quite cheap, by comparison - let alone the Pradas -, at least before you go into the subscription trap…

It’s exactly the same phenomenon though, just in its more manly, less pretty shaping, since we all know that with app x, y and z (and then, it all will begin again with abc, over and over), there will be NO thinking enhancement either…

Newbie alone, in yet another current thread, being excused for earnestly hoping for that. And, to answer the question in which category to file TheBrain, in again another thread: Into the Scambox, naturally! And yes, if it really helped, instead of just pretending while in fact slugging your thinking, it’d be worth it’s annual subscription, per month… (But they know that, too, and wouldn’t hesitate a sec to charge you accordingly if it worked.)