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Mac OS X  |  Desktop Enhancements  |  Themes  |  NotLight

NotLight

NotLight - 1.4

simple Spotlight substitute

All Time: (4.8)
This Version: Not rated (0.0)
Current Version: 1.4
Release Date: 2006-08-02
License: Freeware
Downloads (this version): 7,312
Downloads (all versions): 12,020
Price: Free

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Product Description:

NotLight is a simple Spotlight front-end substitute. I wrote this because I got sick and tired of Tiger's lousy Spotlight interface.

(How lousy is it? The magnifying-glass menu is a fake menu; it behaves oddly, and doesn't show all the matches. The Spotlight window looks like something from the Windows world: it works like a web browser, you can't easily navigate it with the keyboard, you have to keep pressing the "i" buttons just to learn where a file is, and so on. The Finder window requires that you jump through all sorts of hoops just to find a file by name. Worst of all, none of these front ends give you access to the real power of Spotlight: they automatically do wildcard searches, they don't let you do exact searches, they don't let you specify case-sensitivity or word-based searches, and they don't let you construct complex boolean searches with AND, OR, and NOT - or if they do, it isn't clear how.)

So I wrote this substitute, in order to access the real Spotlight. This front end is very simple; but it gives you full access to, and control over, the true power of a Spotlight search. You can use wildcards or not, specify word-based, case-insensitive, and diacritic-insensitive searches, and construct complex searches with AND, OR, and NOT. The Date Assistant lets you form date searches using Spotlight's date specifier syntax. By default, only seven search keys are included (to keep things simple); but you can add any others that you frequently use. You're shown (and can edit) the actual search query in Spotlight's native query language. Seach queries can be saved as simple XML. Results are displayed a simple list of filenames and paths.

What's new in this version:

  • Added ability to view file sizes in the Results listing.
  • Added support for CocoaTech Path Finder.
  • Interface tweaks: all checkboxes and operator popup are reset in accordance with search key popup selection; additional attributes reorderably by drag and drop
  • Massive code cleanup, many small bug fixes

Operating System Requirements:

This product is designed to run on the following operating systems:

  • Mac OS X 10.4 PPC

Additional Requirements:

  • Mac OS X 10.4 or later

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Feedback Summary:

This Version:
Overall Rating: Not rated (0.0) Features: Not rated (0.0) Support: Not rated (0.0)
Ease of Use: Not rated (0.0) Quality / Stability: Not rated (0.0) Price: Not rated (0.0)
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NotLight ReviewThe answer to my prayers - Version: 1.4, 4/14/2007 06:38AM PST

(2 of 2 users found this comment useful)

tomrob--2008
Brilliant, Matt. Just brilliant. I've depended on Apple's simple command-F "Find File" command ever since early System 7 days. The arrival of OS 10.4 and Spotlight was a major disaster - making simple filename searches MUCH more difficult and complicated. This simple, free app has given me back all that original ease of searching. The best documentation of how to use NotLight can actually be found at MacWorld: http://www.macworld.com/weblogs/macgems/2006/07/notlight/index.php?pf=1
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NotLight CommentaryNot so good - Version: 1.4, 12/16/2006 09:54PM PST

(5 of 5 users found this comment useful)

rjmm1
This might well be an excellent application, but it's a bit hard to figure out exactly how to use it intelligently from the supplied documentation.

A request to the author for help with figuring this out resulted in a rather bad-tempered response.

Just so people know.
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NotLight ReviewTHANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! - Version: 1.4, 8/2/2006 03:04PM PST

(3 of 3 users found this comment useful)

mkupietz
Leave it to the guy who brought us MemoryStick, another small but much-needed (to some of us) util. Matt Neuburg, you're an asset to the community.

RANTware indeed - it's a rant I've had for a long time, as well, and I am thrilled to see someone slap a better interface on spotlight. I was just starting to have to dive into raw queries, and not happy about it.

I'm not going to give it five stars because I still want to leave room for improvement - it could still be even simpler without losing any of its power. That's not really much of a complaint because right now I can use it - and LOVE it - but I bet with some work my mom could, too. The heirarchical way of building searches (the search within results features, etc.) is a bit arcane, I'd like to be able to build AND/OR/NOT searches in a more graphically intuitive way. Ditto for the Date Assistant. Check out File Buddy's Find window - it's busy, but at least everything is right there in front of you. And I second the call for a predefined tag to look for invisible files. Actually I'd just like to be able to customize the upper-left hand menu.

Perhaps building some control over Spotlight's volume indexing options into NotLight (I know other apps do this) wu\oukd be appropriate.

Please don't take these suggestions as criticism of this excellent, long overdue and generously free-of-charge utility. Thank you so much for this.
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