Unfortunately the default out-of-the-box action is still set to look everywhere on your Mac. But don’t worry, it’s easy to change. 1. Make sure Finder is your active app (either click on the Finder icon in the dock, click the desktop or a visible Finder window, or cmd-Tab to switch to the Finder). 2. Choose Preferences in the Finder menu. Or you can just use the Command-comma key combo to invoke Preferences. 3. In Finder Preferences, click on the Advanced tab. 4. Choose your desired search scope from the drop-down menu under the heading “When performing a search.” 5. Close the Preferences and enjoy a search or two. That’s it. Just one example of the many little changes in Snow Leopard that make life with the OS easier and more efficient. I hope you find what you’re looking for!
One of the most annoying things about Leopard was that when I search within a folder the default was actually “This Mac”…not helpful. Now you can force it to be the Current Folder, but it isn’t the default setting…
Posted via web from Tris Hussey’s Lifestream
“Just one example of the many little changes in Snow Leopard that make life with the OS easier and more efficient.”
Can’t agree, not with search anyway.
On my previous Mac, I could specify multiple search locations. So if I partition my drive and have an external HD, I could specify which partitions to search or specify multiple subfolders. Now I have to do multiple searches on each partition, or wade through loads of backups on the external HD I’m not looking for.
Find defaults to ‘search content’ instead of ‘search file names.’ Usually, I’m looking for a file name. You can’t even index the content of most computer files, so again I have to wade through a load of text files I’m not interested in. I have to manually select “search for file name” every time I do a search.
For each partition, I make an empty search, save the search and store it in the sidebar. Ctrl-click in the sidebar opens the find window with my saved settings, then I type in the search string. But I have to cancel when it asks if I want to save the modified search. That’s more clicks.
I find it takes several seconds longer to search in Snow Leopard, and that much I don’t like. Clicks add up. But thanks for the tip, it makes things a little better.