Talk:Windows Search

General comments
It's worth noting that WDS is a user application, not Windows service (like MS Indexing Service). This may lead to a waste of resources if 2 users on same PC want to index the same files. The greatest problem with it for me is that it includes, in search results, all files contained in a folder whose name is matching a query (results are a list, not a tree). WDS does not index files in hidden directories (at least by default). WDS has its advanced searching expressions.

Privacy concerns
Does this software ever upload indexed results to Microsoft's servers like in Google Desktop? Shawnc 17:41, 9 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't think so, and Google will only cache shared information on its servers if you tell it to so that you can access it on another computer. 158.125.9.4 22:55, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I know there is a windows search on the task menu of windows XP, I often use it to find files and it is useful, but recently something similar has appeared on my task bar, at the bottom of the screen. Every time I restart the computer it starts indexing, flashing. Is this a virus or just an extension of the search from the task menu? I removed the search option from the task bar but the stupid thing still indexes whenever I restart the computer, tell me it's safe, it is freaking me out!!. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.153.33.192 (talk) 02:52, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Wildcard search
I'd like to highlight the fact Windows Desktop Search is one of few desktop search engines that can search using wildcard characters in Windows.--MrBobla 15:55, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Consumer Vs Business
The Microsoft site (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/desktopsearch/default.mspx) mentions two branches of the product: Consumer and Business, but did not actually provide any usable comparison between them. I know that with many MS products that have home vs pro versions, the home tends to be 'dumbed down' and/or assume the user is 'dumbed down'. There are often many advantages to using the pro/business version if you have a server and even more if you have a SQL Server (which is what I was initially curious about), but just as often, the big difference seems to just be in deployment / centralized management.

To make a long story short, I'm thinking that this kind of section may be a valuable addition to this Wikipedia entry, but I want to know if others share it, and/or if I've missed something big and obvious that would mitigate the need for such a section. DigitalSorceress 12:26, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
 * The basic diff here is that the business edn is centrally (group policy) manageable, whereas the consumer versions are locally managed. --soum talk 07:18, 6 August 2007 (UTC)


 * There is no difference any more; there is only one version, but two installation packages, the .msi and the .exe. The .exe file actually contain the .adm file needed to provide (under the Microsoft Management Console) the only way to tune the search index behaviour to do things like -not index in battery mode, not index attachments, offline files, etc. SteveLoughran 20:56, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

"Some people have nearly had heart attacks when important files seemed missing (Windows Search couldn't find them), because they searched for a certain string inside the file and had the logical but wrong assumption that for any file for which there is no special encoding or filetype structure known the file would be searched as if it was a plain text file." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 221.187.41.127 (talk) 17:52, 3 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Thats nothing of encyclopedic importance. Its just attention grabbing sensationalistic yellow journalism.--soum talk 14:54, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Windows Search in Vista
This whitepaper is full of information. --soum talk 10:10, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Windows Vista Search.png
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BetacommandBot 23:16, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Power Management/Performance
I'm surprised there's nothing dicussing the impact of WDS on battery life, system CPU load, etc. Here are some observations running WDS on a newly built up laptop, with outlook 2007 I dont know what happens on battery mode. Some discussion on the MS developer forums imply that in beta, WDS would index until battery level went down to 25%. This may have changed in production. The management interface has a switch to turn indexing off altogether on battery mode.
 * it puts tangible load on the system when plugged in to power. You can see the search applications near the top of the task list, if you sort it by CPU load.
 * it keeps the fan running more
 * The big issue appears to be indexing Outlook (a 150MB archive). Everything else has been turned off, and even after a week it claims that outlook is not yet indexed.

Some empirical data would be nice. I know Wiki doesnt like non-printed content, but experimental data is what we need.
 * What we need is reliable sources showing such behavior without a doubt. For example, I never had the Outlook issue. As such, it cannot be claimed that the issue is due to Windows Search and not any other component. As for processor usage, indexing IS a computation intensive task, and will eat processor time. It becomes an issue only when it takes processor time from other apps rather than using the idle CPU time. This behavior is shared by all indexing systems, ranging from desktop search apps to enterprise content management systems to even database servers. However, the only information available about this is people claiming that it uses more resources. Without any quanitification of the more. If a reliable source makes a statistical comparison, it can definitely be included. As for battery issue, whether or not the indexer runs when on battery power can be configured. --soum talk 07:14, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

How? I sit here watching the battery go down as it's indexing. The "indexing options" don't include anything about running on battery. I recently installed XP (home) service pack 3, which I assume started this up. I like indexing. I hate indexing while on battery! MikeyNolan (talk) 18:17, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Pros and Cons
Could it not be a good idea to have a section listing the advantages/benefits with using this service as well as the cons. How big are for instance the search time savings in the most frequent usage scenarios? I.e. in Outlook, there is not a big difference on a modern computer. On the cons side, power is a concern, as mentioned above, disk space as well as performance when the service is running is another. Petereriksson (talk) 08:21, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Article title
The article is named Windows Search because the search platform is named Windows Search and not Windows Desktop Search. WDS refers to the implementation of the platform on XP. The Vista version IS Windows Search. And the successor is WS4 not WDS4. While the XP port might get the update, the platform is still named Windows Search 4. See the blogs reffed. Please do not invent your own names, or mis-naming the Vista version. And definitely not cut-and-paste moves, the GFDL license does not allow it. Use the usual procedure if you want to move - discuss first and use WP:RM. --soum talk 11:29, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Good Article
I was wondering if we should consider a good article nomination! --soum talk 17:41, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Please incorporate a reference to MDAC -- Windows Search query interface requires it.
I found out the hard way (http://tech.kateva.org/2008/10/windows-search-4-broken-by-recent.html) that the desktop query interface to Windows Search requires MDAC (at least on XP). If the MDAC stack is corrupted Outlook queries will work, but the desktop queries won't return anything. It was very hard to debug this problem, but if this article had mentioned the dependence on MDAC it would have been a lot easier to debug.

I'm not comfortable adding it myself -- I'm not a serious Wikipedia contributor. I hope someone who maintains this page will add the information. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jfaughnan (talk • contribs) 19:33, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Community Review of Edits
I am a product manager at Microsoft and work on Windows Search. I would like to propose a number of changes to the article to make it more accurate from a technical standpoint. I would like to share these changes with the community before I make any updates. What is the preferred way of sharing these edits with this community so they are not reverted? --Ajsmith1 (talk) 18:40, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Two unclarities - please check and correct
The following sentence seems not a sentence (I'm looking at state of 2013-08-22T08:40:15). I suspect that only a period (.) is missing to split up the sentence in two, but I'm not sure. Please someone verify and correct it. It's in the 'Windows Search' section:
 * Windows Search indexes offline caches of network shares, in addition to the local file systems, Microsoft Outlook e-mail stores and Microsoft OneNote stores indexed by WDS Windows Search also supports queries against a remote index.

I suspect there should be period after 'WDS'.

Please also introduce the abbreviation 'WDS' (I didn't see a definition). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jacosi (talk • contribs) 14:34, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

What does it do?
The "overview" jumps straight into details that only a programmer would understand. I thought wikipedia would give a general explanation of what Windows Search does. It seems to be "Desktop Search" (whatever that is). Anyone qualified to read this article would already know what Windows Search does, hence it serves no purpose. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.147.125.176 (talk) 00:38, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Proposed merge with Windows Live Search Center
Windows Live Search Center is one milestones in the development of Windows Search. Windows Search article already has a section on Window Search 4. Also, the former suffers from lack of notability. So, merging it helps keep good contents. Codename Lisa (talk) 13:29, 7 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Probably not the greatest merge job, but the work is done. // coldacid (talk&#124;contrib) 00:55, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
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I have just modified 2 one external links on Windows Search. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/features/details/instantsearch.mspx
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/desktopsearch/technicalresources/filetypes.mspx

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Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 07:18, 1 April 2016 (UTC)

Link to FAQs
I'd like to add a link to the FAQs for Windows Search, since there seem to be users coming here for support versus learning how Windows Search works. Since I wrote the FAQs, it would be conflict of interest to add them myself. If it is within guidelines, can someone add the link for me?

The page is: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4098843/windows-10-search-indexing-faq

Slauter6 (talk) 20:00, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion: You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 14:52, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Windows 10 version 1909 Search filters.png

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 16:09, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Windows 10 version 1909 Search landing.png