Find emails and other files FAST!

If you are using Windows VISTA, then this is a feature you already have so this article won't be that interesting to you. Enjoy your fast searching... which I believe is turned on by default in Vista (though I am not 100% certain).

But, if like me, you've not quite decided you want to upgrade to Vista just yet, then there is a way to provide "Vista-Like" searching for files and emails to your Windows XP computer.

The idea is as follows: you click on search, type a few keywords of what you are looking for and pretty much instantly, you get a list of files, emails and other data in your computer that matches your keywords! This feature can be a HUGE time saver from having to scour through hundreds of emails looking for something!

Of course, without this "tip", you can search for files using Windows XP search (and wait HOURS for the search to look in your entire computer). You can also use Outlook's search and have it scan EVERY email when you ask it to do so (also taking HOURS if you have many emails like I do). The reason why both of these methods take so long is because each will "start" to search for what you are looking for the minute you start your query and once they start, they are going through your computer's hard drive through every file (or every email) sequentially... opening each file or email and painstakingly looking for whatever it is you queried. This process is VERY slow... and forget changing your search parameters. When you do that, the search starts ALL OVER again!

So, what if instead of having to search "from scratch" for the keywords you are interested in, your computer kept an "index" of every interesting file and email for you. Then, when you needed to search for anything, instead of searching file-by-file, your computer would simply look in the index and instantly give you files and emails that match.

This is exactly the idea behind the "Desktop Search" products, most notably, Microsoft's free version called "Windows Desktop Search".

As of the writing of this post, you can read more and download Windows Desktop Search at:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/desktopsearch/default.mspx

Why this feature has not been pushed via Windows Update into every computer (like MS did with IE 7) is beyond me... but if you don't already have it, you should consider getting this installed on your computer NOW. Trust me, it will save you HOURS of searching for data not to mention that you'll be the hero (or heroine) when you are the only one in your team that can instantly recall ANY/EVERY email sent to ANYONE mentioning a SPECIFIC topic in 1/2 a second!

For instance, on my computer right now, there are 81,000 items indexed. I could recall any document (or EMAIL) mentioning ANY TOPIC in a matter of seconds.