A program for searching files on a computer. Quick search

Surely, any of us have duplicate files accumulated on our disk over time. Files in "Downloads" that you have downloaded multiple times identical photos And musical compositions, lying in such depths that hands simply cannot reach them. You can get rid of all this manually, but they will do the work for you much faster special utilities, looking for identical files.

A very popular “cleaner” that probably everyone has installed. Yes, it not only searches for system garbage and clears browser history and cookies, but also removes duplicate files.

Platforms: Windows, Mac.

Price: free, $24.95 for premium version.

The program searches for files with the same or similar names and identical content. Works well with music and can find similar music files, even if they have different tags. In addition, dupeGuru can compare images to find not only identical, but simply similar photos.

Developed for Mac and Linux. The Windows version is no longer supported by the developer, but it can be downloaded from the official website - it is fully functional.

Platforms: Windows, Mac, Linux.

An advanced file search application that, among other things, can remove duplicates. SearchMyFiles has flexible filters so you can customize your search results the way you want.

Platforms: Windows.

Popular Mac app that searches for identical or similar files and shows what the difference is between them. Copies in “Photos”, in the iTunes music library - nothing will pass by Gemini 2. The developers have announced a smart duplicate search mechanism that remembers which files you leave and what you decide to delete.

Platforms: Mac.

Although AllDup is free, it does a lot. Searches for, deletes, copies and moves duplicate files, including identical audio recordings with different tags. There is a flexible search setting. Using the built-in viewer, you can examine files and choose what to delete.

Platforms: Windows.

Duplicate File Finder quickly and efficiently finds duplicate files. Provides an interesting opportunity to search for duplicates not only on the hard drive, but also in local network. Can work with images and music, comparing both tags and content. The preview function will help you figure out what to really delete and what to leave. Unfortunately, in free version Quite a lot of options are not available.

Platforms: Windows.

Price: free, $29.95 for premium version.

A universal file manager that can do anything with your files. Including finding duplicate files. You can enable the search for copies option on the search parameters tab, in the same place where you specify other attributes of the searched files.

Platforms: Windows.

DupeGuru looks like the most attractive option. It's free, but it offers all the necessary features to rid your drive of accumulated junk. The only sad thing is that development of the Windows version has been stopped. For Windows users who don't want to pay for commercial alternatives, AllDup is a better choice. CCleaner and Total Commander are more universal and widespread solutions that are probably already installed on everyone.

Professional Internet search requires specialized software, as well as specialized search engines and search services.

PROGRAMS

http://dr-watson.wix.com/home – the program is designed for exploring arrays text information in order to identify entities and connections between them. The result of the work is a report on the object under study.

http://www.fmsasg.com/ - one of the best programs in the world for visualizing connections and relationships Sentinel Vizualizer. The company has completely Russified its products and connected hotline in Russian.

http://www.newprosoft.com/ – “Web Content Extractor” is the most powerful, easy-to-use software for extracting data from web sites. It also has an effective Visual Web spider.

SiteSputnik – has no analogues in the world software package, allowing you to search and process its results on the Visible and Invisible Internet, using all the search engines necessary for the user.

WebSite-Watcher – allows you to monitor web pages, including password-protected ones, monitoring forums, RSS feeds, news groups, local files. Has a powerful filter system. Monitoring is carried out automatically and is delivered in a user-friendly form. A program with advanced functions costs 50 euros. Constantly updated.

http://www.scribd.com/ is the most popular platform in the world and increasingly used in Russia for posting various kinds of documents, books, etc. for free access with a very convenient search engine for titles, topics, etc.

http://www.atlasti.com/ is the most powerful and effective tool for qualitative information analysis available to individual users, small and even medium-sized businesses. The program is multifunctional and therefore useful. It combines the ability to create a unified information environment for working with various text, tabular, audio and video files as a single whole, as well as tools for qualitative analysis and visualization.

Ashampoo ClipFinder HD – an ever-increasing share of the information flow comes from video. Accordingly, competitive intelligence officers need tools that allow them to work with this format. One of such products is the presented free utility. It allows you to search for videos by given criteria on video file storages such as YouTube. The program is easy to use, displays all search results on one page with detailed information, titles, duration, time when the video was uploaded to the storage, etc. There is a Russian interface.

http://www.advego.ru/plagiatus/ – the program was made by SEO optimizers, but is quite suitable as an Internet intelligence tool. Plagiarism shows the degree of uniqueness of the text, the sources of the text, and the percentage of text match. The program also checks the uniqueness of the specified URL. The program is free.

http://neiron.ru/toolbar/ – includes an add-on for combining Google and Yandex search, and also allows for competitive analysis based on assessing the effectiveness of sites and contextual advertising. Implemented as a plugin for FF and GC.

http://web-data-extractor.net/ is a universal solution for obtaining any data available on the Internet. Setting up data cutting from any page is done in a few mouse clicks. You just need to select the data area that you want to save and Datacol will automatically select a formula for cutting out this block.

CaptureSaver is a professional Internet research tool. Simply an irreplaceable working program that allows you to capture, store and export any Internet information, including not only web pages, blogs, but also RSS news, email, images and more. It has the widest functionality, an intuitive interface and a ridiculous price.

http://www.orbiscope.net/en/software.html – web monitoring system at more than affordable prices.

http://www.kbcrawl.co.uk/ – software for working, including on the “Invisible Internet”.

http://www.copernic.com/en/products/agent/index.html – the program allows you to search using more than 90 search engines, using more than 10 parameters. Allows you to combine results, eliminate duplicates, block broken links, and show the most relevant results. Comes in free, personal and professional versions. Used by more than 20 million users.

Maltego is a fundamentally new software that allows you to establish the relationship of subjects, events and objects in real life and on the Internet.

SERVICES

new https://hunter.io/ – an effective service for detecting and checking email.

https://www.whatruns.com/ – easy to use, but efficient scanner, allowing you to discover what works and doesn't work on a website and what its security holes are. Also implemented as a plugin for Chrom.

https://www.crayon.co/ – American budget platform market and competitive intelligence on the Internet.

http://www.cs.cornell.edu/~bwong/octant/ – host identifier.

https://iplogger.ru/ – a simple and convenient service for determining someone else’s IP.

http://linkurio.us/ is a powerful new product for economic security workers and corruption investigators. Processes and visualizes huge amounts of unstructured information from financial sources.

http://www.intelsuite.com/en – English-language online platform for competitive intelligence and monitoring.

http://yewno.com/about/ is the first operating system for translating information into knowledge and visualizing unstructured information. Currently supports English, French, German, Spanish and Portuguese.

https://start.avalancheonline.ru/landing/?next=%2F – forecasting and analytical services by Andrey Masalovich.

https://www.outwit.com/products/hub/ – full set standalone programs for professional work in web 1.

https://github.com/search?q=user%3Acmlh+maltego – extensions for Maltego.

http://www.whoishostingthis.com/ – search engine for hosting, IP addresses, etc.

http://appfollow.ru/ – analysis of applications based on reviews, ASO optimization, positions in tops and search results for the App Store, Google Play and Windows Phone Store.

http://spiraldb.com/ is a service implemented as a plugin for Chrom, which allows you to get a lot of valuable information about any electronic resource.

https://millie.northernlight.com/dashboard.php?id=93 - a free service that collects and structures key information on industries and companies. It is possible to use information panels based on text analysis.

http://byratino.info/ – collection of factual data from publicly available sources on the Internet.

http://www.datafox.co/ – CI platform collects and analyzes information on companies of interest to clients. There is a demo.

https://unwiredlabs.com/home - a specialized application with an API for searching by geolocation of any device connected to the Internet.

http://visualping.io/ – a service for monitoring sites and, first of all, the photographs and images available on them. Even if the photo appeared for a second, it will be e-mail subscriber Has a plugin for Google Chrome.

http://spyonweb.com/ is a research tool that allows for in-depth analysis of any Internet resource.

http://bigvisor.ru/ – the service allows you to track advertising campaigns for certain segments of goods and services, or specific organizations.

http://www.itsec.pro/2013/09/microsoft-word.html – instructions from Artem Ageev on using Windows programs for competitive intelligence needs.

http://granoproject.org/ is an open source tool for researchers who track networks of connections between individuals and organizations in politics, economics, crime, etc. Allows you to connect, analyze and visualize information obtained from various sources, and also show significant connections.

http://imgops.com/ – a service for extracting metadata from graphic files and working with them.

http://sergeybelove.ru/tools/one-button-scan/ – a small online scanner for checking security holes in websites and other resources.

http://isce-library.net/epi.aspx – service for searching primary sources using a fragment of text in English

https://www.rivaliq.com/ is an effective tool for conducting competitive intelligence in Western, primarily European and American markets for goods and services.

http://watchthatpage.com/ is a service that allows you to automatically collect new information from monitored Internet resources. The service is free.

http://falcon.io/ is a kind of Rapportive for the Web. It is not a replacement for Rapportive, but provides additional tools. In contrast, Rapportive provides a general profile of a person, as if glued together from data from social networks and mentions on the web. http://watchthatpage.com/ - a service that allows you to automatically collect new information from monitored resources on the Internet. The service is free.

https://addons.mozilla.org/ru/firefox/addon/update-scanner/ – add-on for Firefox. Monitors web page updates. Useful for websites that do not have news feeds (Atom or RSS).

http://agregator.pro/ – aggregator of news and media portals. Used by marketers, analysts, etc. to analyze news flows on certain topics.

http://price.apishops.com/ – automated web service for monitoring prices for selected product groups, specific online stores and other parameters.

http://www.la0.ru/ is a convenient and relevant service for analyzing links and backlinks to an Internet resource.

www.recordedfuture.com is a powerful tool for data analysis and visualization, implemented as an online service built on cloud computing.

http://advse.ru/ is a service with the slogan “Find out everything about your competitors.” Allows you to obtain competitors' websites in accordance with search queries and analyze competitors' advertising campaigns in Google and Yandex.

http://spyonweb.com/ – the service allows you to identify sites with the same characteristics, including those using the same statistics service identifiers Google Analytics, IP addresses, etc.

http://www.connotate.com/solutions – line of products for competitive intelligence, management information flows and transforming information into information assets. It includes both complex platforms and simple, cheap services that allow for effective monitoring along with information compression and obtaining only the necessary results.

http://www.clearci.com/ - competitive intelligence platform for businesses of various sizes from start-ups and small companies to Fortune 500 companies. Solved as saas.

http://startingpage.com/ is a Google add-on that allows you to search on Google without recording your IP address. Fully supports everything search capabilities Google, including in Russian.

http://newspapermap.com/ is a unique service that is very useful for a competitive intelligence officer. Connects geolocation with an online media search engine. Those. you select the region you are interested in, or even a city, or language, see the place on the map and a list of online versions of newspapers and magazines, click on the appropriate button and read. Supports Russian language, very user-friendly interface.

http://infostream.com.ua/ is a very convenient news monitoring system “Infostream”, distinguished by a first-class selection and quite accessible to any wallet, from one of the classics of Internet search, D.V. Lande.

http://www.instapaper.com/ is a very simple and effective tool for saving the necessary web pages. Can be used on computers, iPhones, iPads, etc.

http://screen-scraper.com/ – allows you to automatically extract all information from web pages, download the vast majority of file formats, and automatically enter data into various forms. Saves downloaded files and pages in databases, performs many other extremely useful functions. Works on all major platforms, has fully functional free and very powerful professional versions.

http://www.mozenda.com/ - has several tariff plans and is accessible even to small businesses, a web service for multifunctional web monitoring and delivery of information necessary for the user from selected sites.

http://www.recipdonor.com/ - the service allows you to automatically monitor everything that happens on competitors' websites.

http://www.spyfu.com/ – and this is if your competitors are foreign.

www.webground.su is a service for monitoring the Runet created by Internet search professionals, which includes all the major providers of information, news, etc., and is capable of individual monitoring settings to suit the user’s needs.

SEARCH ENGINES

https://www.idmarch.org/ – the best search engine in the world in terms of quality results pdf archive documents. Currently, more than 18 million pdf documents have been indexed, ranging from books to secret reports.

http://www.marketvisual.com/ is a unique search engine that allows you to search for owners and top management by full name, company name, position, or a combination thereof. The search results contain not only the objects you are looking for, but also their connections. Designed primarily for English-speaking countries.

http://worldc.am/ – search engine for photographs in free access with reference to geolocation.

https://app.echosec.net/ is a public search engine that describes itself as the most advanced analytical tool for law enforcement and security and intelligence professionals. Allows you to search for photos posted on various sites, social platforms and in in social networks in relation to specific geolocation coordinates. There are currently seven data sources connected. By the end of the year their number will be more than 450. Thanks to Dementy for the tip.

http://www.quandl.com/ – search engine for seven million financial, economic and social bases data.

http://bitzakaz.ru/ – search engine for tenders and government orders with additional paid functions

Website-Finder - makes it possible to find sites that Google does not index well. The only limitation is that it only searches 30 websites for each keyword. The program is easy to use.

http://www.dtsearch.com/ is a powerful search engine that allows you to process terabytes of text. Works on desktop, web and intranet. Supports both static and dynamic data. Allows you to search in all MS Office programs. The search is carried out using phrases, words, tags, indexes and much more. The only one accessible system federated search. It has both paid and free versions.

http://www.strategator.com/ – searches, filters and aggregates information about the company from tens of thousands of web sources. Searches in the USA, Great Britain, major EEC countries. It is highly relevant, user-friendly, and has free and paid options ($14 per month).

http://www.shodanhq.com/ is an unusual search engine. Immediately after his appearance, he received the nickname “Google for hackers.” It does not search for pages, but determines IP addresses, types of routers, computers, servers and workstations located at a particular address, and traces chains DNS servers and allows you to implement many other interesting functions for competitive intelligence.

http://search.usa.gov/ is a search engine for websites and open databases of all US government agencies. The databases contain a lot of practical, useful information, including for use in our country.

http://visual.ly/ – today visualization is increasingly used to present data. This is the first infographic search engine on the Web. Along with the search engine, the portal has powerful data visualization tools that do not require programming skills.

http://go.mail.ru/realtime – search for discussions of topics, events, objects, subjects in real or customizable time. The previously highly criticized search in Mail.ru works very effectively and provides interesting, relevant results.

Zanran is just launched, but already working great, the first and only search engine for data that extracts it from PDF files, EXCEL tables, data on HTML pages.

http://www.ciradar.com/Competitive-Analysis.aspx is one of the world's best information retrieval systems for competitive intelligence on the deep web. Retrieves almost all types of files in all formats on the topic of interest. Implemented as a web service. The prices are more than reasonable.

http://public.ru/ – Effective search and professional information analysis, media archive since 1990. The online media library offers a wide range of information services: from access to electronic archives of Russian-language media publications and ready-made thematic press reviews to individual monitoring and exclusive analytical research based on press materials.

Cluuz is a young search engine with ample opportunities for competitive intelligence, especially on the English-language Internet. Allows you not only to find, but also to visualize and establish connections between people, companies, domains, e-mails, addresses, etc.

www.wolframalpha.com – the search engine of tomorrow. In response to a search request, it provides statistical and factual information available on the request object, including visualized information.

www.ist-budget.ru – universal search in databases of government procurement, tenders, auctions, etc.

To find the files you need on your computer, we have already looked at standard features, which are native to the Windows system. You can read more about standard search in Windows in the articles: and.

The advantage of standard search is that you don’t need to install anything additional on your computer!

But there is also a serious drawback - not everyone’s standard search works or does not work as well as we would like!

Therefore, in this article we will look at a separate excellent free program Everything, which allows you to very quickly, one might even say instantly (on the fly), find the necessary files on your computer!

Using the Everything program, you can search for files on your computer not only by full name files, but even part of the word! This is a great feature for situations where we don't remember the name of the entire file.

We simply enter a word or part of a word in the search field and immediately get the result! At the same time, surprisingly, Everything does not slow down the computer at all, as happens with other programs.

Everything is a fast, lightweight and convenient program for searching files and folders on your computer.

Let's start with a step-by-step analysis of installing and using this program.

How to download Everything in Russian

Let's say I don't remember where this book is stored on my computer.

To find it using the program Everything, I don't have to type in all this long book title. I can enter just a word book and get this result:

In this case, the search showed me that I have 33 elements in which the word occurs book. Moreover search results displays all items by file type, highlighting the word I was looking for.

And I can already find the file I need in the displayed list and go to it, just by quickly clicking on it twice. If it is a file, it will open immediately. If this is a folder with files, the folder will open.

Or I can narrow the search so that the list is a smaller file. For example, I’ll write the word the most. Instantly I get the folder I need:

As you can see, finding files and folders on your computer is very easy with Everything. I'm glad that it's free, in Russian, and gives search results very quickly!

Additional settings Everything

Program Everything initially already optimally configured for most users. However, there are additional features that you can use if necessary.

So, for example, using the menu Search you can specify by what criteria the results will be displayed: by files of certain formats, by folders, or everything. Such restrictions can be useful if the name appears in different files and the list of such files is large. And thanks to the restriction on certain categories, you can narrow your search precisely:

It would also be helpful to simply review the functions that can be found in the menu Service-> Settings. I repeat that by default everything is already configured for the needs of most users, but perhaps you will want to enable or disable some additional settings.

Portable version of the Everything search program

At the beginning of the article, we already talked about such a portable version of this program. Use the portable version as well as the stationary one. It is only worth mentioning that the portable version is archived.

Therefore, after downloading the archive of the portable version, you need an archiver so that you can open the archive. If the downloaded archive cannot be opened, it means that the archiver is not installed on the computer. In this case, download and install, the installation and use of which we have already discussed in a separate article.

If you plan to use the portable version on a computer whose bit depth you don’t know, use an archive designed for 32-bit systems. Or it’s better to download both versions - one will definitely start, but otherwise it will simply display the message:

So: If you even have to search for files or folders on your computer from time to time, I am sure you will appreciate this free program!

Download, use, share your impressions in the comments!

Every day the volume of information from the network, and therefore on users’ computers, increases. On hard drives For an average user, the number of files can reach several hundred, and finding the one you need in the total mass is not at all easy. The standard Windows search engine does not always work quickly and has very limited functionality, so it makes sense to use third-party programs.

In this review, we will look at several programs that will help you find the necessary data on your computer.

This program is perhaps the most powerful tool for searching PC disks. Has many fine settings, filters and functions. The distribution also includes additional utilities for interacting with the file system.

One of distinctive features Search My Files is a possibility complete removal files by overwriting them with zeros or random data.

SearchMyFiles

Search My Files is often confused with the previous software due to its similar name. This program differs in that it is easier to use, but at the same time, it lacks some functions, for example, searching on network drives.

Everything

A simple search program with its own features. Everything can search for data not only on the local computer, but also on ETP and FTP servers. It stands out from other representatives of similar software in that it allows you to track changes in the computer’s file system.

Effective File Search

Another very easy to set up and use software. With a very tiny size, it has a sufficient number of functions, is able to export results to text and table files, and can be installed on a flash drive.

UltraSearch

UltraSearch can find not only files and folders, but also search for information in the contents of documents by key phrase or word. The main distinguishing feature of the program is the automatic initialization of connected media.

R.E.M.

REM has a friendlier interface than previous participants. The principle of the program is to create zones in which files are automatically indexed, which can significantly speed up the search process. Zones can be created not only on the local computer, but also on disks on the network.

Google Desktop Search

Developed by a world famous company, Google Desktop Search is a small local search engine. With its help, you can search for information both on your home PC and on the Internet. In addition to the main function, the program provides for the use of information blocks - gadgets for the desktop.

All the programs given in this list are excellent for replacing the “native” one. Windows search. Choose for yourself: install simpler software, but with a smaller set of functions, or a whole search engine with the ability to process files. If you work with folders and drives on a local network, then REM and Everything are suitable for you, and if you plan to “carry the program with you,” then pay attention to Effective File Search or Search My Files.

To say that in our time of information technology and the endless growth of the volume of data available to both an individual and society, there are many problems with processing information and searching for it is already blasphemy. Who doesn't raise this topic? And in order not to burden you with subjective and, in part, objective judgments drawn from various information sources regarding the problem, I will move directly to its solution. Today we'll talk about search. That is, about programs and serious information systems that search for the documents and data we need.

Upgrade "direct search"

Not so long ago, when the trees were large, and there wasn’t much information even on the enterprise’s local network, any search was carried out by simply searching through a handful available files and consistent checking of their names and contents. Such a search is called direct, and programs (utilities) that use direct search technology are traditionally present in all operating systems and tool packages. But even the power modern computers not enough for quick and adequate search in gigantic volumes of data during direct search. Searching through a couple of hundred documents on a disk and searching a huge library and several dozen mailboxes are two different things. Therefore, direct search programs today are clearly fading into the background - if we're talking about about universal means.

Of course, this type of search has not been in demand for a long time in the corporate sector. The volumes are not the same. And therefore, for many years now, and in Lately definitely, technologies capable of carrying out fast and exact search documents various formats and from various sources, more than relevant. Not so long ago, Microsoft’s “father” Bill Gates, apparently envious of the phenomenal success of the Internet search engine Google, at one of the press conferences announced the desire of the software industry (and not only) to contribute in every possible way, develop and deepen the creation of search engines and technologies. But it’s too early to create any phenomenally working program from Microsoft or a competitive server on the Internet (MSN still doesn’t reach Google). Therefore, let's turn to existing developments. Index, query, relevance

At the core modern technologies there are two fundamental processes. First of all, it's indexing. available information and processing the request and then outputting the results. As for the first, any program (be it a desktop search engine, corporate Information system or Internet search engine) creates its own search area. That is, it processes documents and generates an index of these documents (an organized structure that contains information about the processed data). In the future, it is the created index that is used for work - quick receipt list of required documents as requested. What follows, although by no means simple in terms of technology, is quite understandable to the average user. The program processes the request (by keyword phrase) and displays a list of documents that contain this key phrase. Since the information is contained in a structured index, query processing is much faster (tens and hundreds of times!) than in the case of direct search (the selection of documents is carried out not by enumerating files, but by analyzing text information in the index).

The program displays the found documents in the resulting list according to relevance - the document's compliance with the query text. IN various technologies Of course, there are various methods for searching and determining the relevance of a document (the number of “occurrences” of a word and its frequency of mention in the document, the ratio of these parameters to the total number of words in the document, the distance between the words of the query phrase in the searched files, and so on). Based on these parameters, the “weight” of the document is determined and, depending on it, a particular file appears in the list of results at a certain position. In the case of Internet search, the situation is even more complicated. Indeed, in this case, many other factors must be taken into account (Google’s Page Rank is an example of this). But this is a topic for a separate article, so we won’t touch the Internet. Review of search engines

This material discusses the possibilities of several popular programs search engines, which boast both decent speeds and good functionality. But showing off in brochures is one thing, but standing under the gaze of an expert is quite another. And there were no more experts, no less an office full of people who liked to tinker with the software for its usability. On an experimental computer (Athlon 2.2 MHz, with a capacity random access memory 1 GB, 160 GB IDE hard drive Seagate 7200 rpm and Windows XP) a set of programs was installed: dtSearch Desktop, Ischika Prof Deluxe, Google Desktop Search, SearchInform, Copernic Desktop Search, ISYS Desktop. For tests, a text database of documents was compiled in doc formats, txt and html with a total size of neither more nor less, but 20 gigabytes. A group of comrades under the leadership of your humble servant tested, compared and shared their subjective impressions of each software. Read a summary of the findings below. dtSearch Desktop

A program that, according to the developers, claims to be the fastest, most convenient and best search engine. Like, in general, everyone else from this review. The dtSearch interface is quite simple, but some windows or tabs are somewhat overloaded with elements, which makes it seem difficult to use. But in reality there are no particular difficulties. The only really unpleasant point is the software’s lack of support for the Russian language (despite the fact that the program can search for documents in several languages, its interface is exclusively English).

But dtSearch is one of the few programs that can index web pages to a user-specified “depth” (albeit, taking into account the “additional purchase” of the dtSearch Spider add-on kit). This is in addition to supporting files on disk of various text formats and emails from the mail Outlook mailbox. At the same time, the program cannot work with databases, which are such a tasty morsel for search engines due to the large volumes of information contained in them and their wide distribution in companies, and therefore in corporate networks. The speed of indexing dtSearch documents turned out to be at the proper level. Looking ahead, I will say that this program coped with the indexing of a given amount of information on a level with another competitor - iSYS - and shared second place with it in the list of the fastest systems. dtSearch indexed a test 20 gigabytes of information in 6 hours and 13 minutes, creating an index of 7.9 GB for subsequent search needs.

As for the search capabilities, here they are at the proper level. Firstly, dtSearch has a morphological search (searching for a word in all its morphological forms). Using this opportunity, you free yourself from, say, such thoughts as “in what case was a certain word used in the document I needed?” The use of morphological search is almost always justified, so it should be present in any professional search engine.

Search by sound is a non-standard feature even for professional search engines. Its essence is that the program will search for words that sound the same as the word you entered. And the best part is, this function also works for the Russian language! For example, when you type the word "ear" in a search query, you will see not only the words "ear" but also "ear" as a result.

Search with error correction is a very important function. Used to search for words containing syntax errors- these can be both typos and errors in documents obtained using character recognition systems, for example. A simple example - you are looking for the word keyboard. Some document contains the word “keyboard”, it is obvious that in fact this is the word “keyboard”, the person just made a typo when typing. So, an error correction search will detect and include a document with the word "keyboard" in the result. There is also a setting in dtSearch that allows you to determine the degree of possible erroneous characters.

Search using synonyms. This feature uses a list of synonyms for various words. So, for example, by entering the word “fast”, the program will also find the words “high-speed” and others that are synonyms for the word “fast”, if, of course, they are present in the list of synonyms. A ready-made list of synonyms is not supplied with the dtSearch program, however, it is possible to use lists on the Internet (accordingly, a connection is required, which is not always convenient), or you can create your own list of synonyms.

In addition to the listed capabilities, dtSearch can search using phrases consisting of words connected by logical operations. Each word in a query can be assigned its own “weight,” that is, significance. A useful option is to use a dictionary consisting of meaningful words in order not to take them into account when searching, however, this dictionary is also empty and you will have to fill it out yourself.

Next, let's look at the program's capabilities when working on the network. In fact, dtSearch does not offer any specific capabilities for working with the network. However, it is quite possible to use it online. Alternatively, you can create some kind of index and put it in a public (shared) folder. The program itself can be installed on each user’s computer, or it can also be placed in a folder open to public access, and create shortcuts in a special way for each user separately, using command line parameters, the purpose of which is described in the help file supplied with the program. Also, it is possible to automatically install the program on the network using MSI file. This will take into account the settings for each connected user.

In general, it is a good program from the category of professional search engines. It may qualify for a good rating, but gaining trust and respect from users may not be easy for dtSearch due to certain factors (not everything is smooth with the interface, Russian users are deprived, there are no bright features for working with the network). As for directly searching for documents, the program had no problems with Russian text. As there were none with the declared morphology, or with a fuzzy search. The system quite adequately found the necessary documents both by a simple one-word query and by using a couple of paragraphs or a document as a key phrase.

Official site:
Distribution size: 23 MbIschika Prof Deluxe

Based on the name, you can guess that there is support for the Russian language in this program. This is already nice. As for the interface, in general, it is somewhat unusual, but in appearance it is very attractive. Another thing is convenience. A very controversial criterion, but still, probably, a multi-window solution is not the most successful option (the request is entered in one window, the result is displayed in another, and the like).

Snoop uses the same indexes to perform a quick search, but indexing is much slower than other programs. This is very strange, especially considering that its capabilities for processing search queries are very weak, and therefore the index structure is not complex. Most likely, this is due to unoptimized algorithms. This program turned out to be a clear outsider in indexing and search speeds: the time spent on creating an index is six times longer than that of dtSearch and iSYS. Indexing 20 gigabytes of texts for the bloodhound resulted in 38 hours and 46 minutes of work. And the created “search area” took up the same size on the hard drive as the original data with a small minus - 19 gigabytes.

Bloodhound can be presented as an alternative to the standard search in Windows; it is unlikely to be capable of more. About the fact that the Bloodhound's first priority is simple search files is indicated not only by a small number of functions for analyzing the text of search queries and an advanced search by file attributes, but even a results window that provides direct links to the files found, as well as to the folders containing these files. The results window is not very informative in the sense that you can read the entire found file only by running it, that is, it does not have a built-in file viewer. But an excerpt from the file where the searched word was found is displayed; in general, this display scheme is very reminiscent of Internet search engines.

Talking about specific opportunities When processing search queries, it is worth noting that there is no such thing as “search text”; the maximum that can be searched is a phrase, if only because there is no multi-line text input field. However, you can analyze the entered phrase, and Snoop offers us a standard search set here: logical operations, mask search and quote search... not a lot. The program contains some rudiments of morphological search, but probably so crude that it rather interferes correct operation(during testing, many overlays with incorrect use of morphology were noticed).

But the program allows you to specify file attributes when searching (document date, file name, folder name), and in these queries you can also use the same search set. You can also search for letters by specifying the parameters (From, Subject..., etc.).

So, we figured out the search itself, what else is interesting about the program, for which it received so many awards, according to information from the official website? It’s hard to say what’s so special about it; most likely, the Bloodhound interface is attractive (exactly in appearance, not to mention usability).

Operations with indexes are very standard; a nice feature is the ability to update indexes on a schedule. Additionally, indexes can also be used online. From now on we need more details.

Despite the primitiveness of search queries, the program can be used to search for files, so its use can be justified in networks. Although with great reserve, since in large network The priority is to quickly search for data using complex search queries due to the huge amount of information - and there are clearly problems with the speed of the search and the program. I must say that the work with the network at Izhishka is thought out as it should be. Designed specifically for this separate application- Bloodhound Server. It works the same way as simply Snooper (they have the same search engine), only for documents hosted on a central server or on shared resources on the corporate network. Snooper Server creates new indexes on shared resources or uses previously created ones. Any user of the corporate network can connect to the Search Server and use it to access any document (located in the current index) using an Internet browser. Agree, this scheme is extremely convenient: it turns out that files on your own network can be searched in the same way as information on the Internet through, for example, Google.

Assessing all the advantages and disadvantages of this program, the conclusion suggests itself that its capabilities are most likely not enough for corporate networks (despite the good organization of working with the network), but for a home computer or even for home network In principle, it might be suitable. Although neither the speed of work nor the search capabilities inspire optimism...

Official website in Russian:
Distribution size: 6 MbGoogle Desktop Search + GDS Enterprise

Of course, we couldn’t ignore such a famous developer. Name Google already says a lot. People who have been using the most powerful Internet search engine for years will certainly, without a single doubt, decide to install this particular search engine on their computer. Just think: Google on your home computer! However, without giving in to provocations with a widely promoted brand, let’s try soberly, and most importantly objectively, to consider the capabilities of the “desktop” search engine from Google.

The first thing that catches your eye is the lack of its own shell for the program. Google Desktop Search is still located in the browser window, respectively, the entire interface of the desktop version was inherited from the software from its older Internet brother. Is it good or bad - controversial issue: some people like the minimalism in the design of this search engine, while others want to see full application, filled with all kinds of buttons and so on.

What catches your eye right after the design? And the fact that this same Google Desktop Search begins to index everything on the computer, without any demand! And what’s most interesting is that it is impossible to select indexing paths using Google Desktop Search. You will have to download a separate program (TweakGDS), which will allow you to slightly expand Google settings Desktop, including specifying the places required for indexing. Although, by the time you figure all this out, it will already index a standard hard drive, so this setting is more likely to be needed when working with large amounts of data, which is very important when used in corporate networks (Enterprise versions). However, it is not a fact that after downloading TweakGDS, your problems will be solved. After all, she needs Microsoft to work. NET Framework and Microsoft Scripting Runtime. Yeah... the installation, as well as access to the settings, could have been made simpler, although the developers can probably understand: why write something new when there is a ready-made search engine, ported it to the local computer and let the user “enjoy” , and a famous name will make another masterpiece out of “this”. Okay, let's end it here lyrical digression and let's move on to the search.

As for analyzing search queries and delivering results, everything here is absolutely identical to Google on the Internet: the same system for displaying results, the same standard set of logical operations for search queries. IN general Google Desktop Search, like the previous program, is designed exclusively for searching files - it, of course, does not have an internal viewer for these files. The number of file formats supported by Google Desktop Search is quite sufficient, and it is also nice that it searches visited Internet pages, taking data from the cache. Search and indexing speeds are quite acceptable. True, for home use. Google Desktop Search coped with an impressive 20 gigabytes of texts in 8 hours and 17 minutes. Spending several days processing information from the corporate network of a large enterprise is not something any system administrator would like to do. On the plus side: the size of the created index was on the same level (4.5 GB) as another search engine tested in this review - SearchInform.

The big advantage (or disadvantage - you decide) of Google Desktop Search is that it supports plugins, which can change a lot for the better. Another thing is that connecting plugins and setting them up complicates the task of installing a search engine so much that you begin to wonder whether all this is necessary when you can install a normal one. full-fledged program, in which everything will already be present. After all, to use each feature you will have to install a new plugin. Even in order for the program to fully work with archives, a separate gadget is needed. It’s fascinating and seductive that all these additional modules are free. However, if you do not take into account the desktop version of the search engine, then competent configuration of GDS Enterprise may not be within your power - after all, it is not for nothing that specialists from Google offer their services for setting up their own software for your network for only $10,000.

If you do go through the setup and installation procedure (or pay $10,000 to a quick response team from Google), you will understand that the complexity of the installation is more than compensated by the very flexible settings when used in corporate networks. An important aspect of using Google Desktop on a corporate network is the use of group policies, which makes it possible to set settings for each user.

To summarize, the most reasonable use for this program is a home or work computer. After all, for an ordinary computer, it’s enough just to install the program - it will do the rest itself (it won’t even ask you anything).

However, Google Desktop Search Enterprise will be acceptable in cases where there is an urgent need for flexible configuration of network policy to use the search engine, while the ability to process search queries will be in second place in importance, and the time (or money) spent on setting up the program will be in first place place.

Official site:
Distribution size including TweakGDS: 1.2 MbCopernic Desktop Search

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The program interface evokes extremely positive emotions - everything is done in accordance with generally accepted standards, nothing superfluous, in a word, a pleasant design. For a beginner, understanding the Copernic Desktop Search interface will be very easy. Although, it is somewhat confusing that the designers clearly created the program interface taking into account the fact that the program will work in the standard Windows XP theme. When using the classic theme, the program does not look so nice. But this is more a matter of taste.

At the first launch, the program prompts you to create indexes for search. It seemed somewhat unusual that after selecting folders for indexing, the program did not offer to press any button, such as “Start indexing”, and indexing did not start automatically, only then it was noticed that Copernic was trying to start indexing while the computer was idle. You'll have to dig a little deeper into the program's options to configure everything properly. It should be noted that there are quite a few ample opportunities for setting up automatic index creation: built-in scheduler, the ability to index while the computer is idle, in background, with low priority. Indexing was not too fast - 10 hours 51 minutes - this is slower than in other search engines (except for Isle of Bloodhound, but Copernic is still an order of magnitude faster than the development of iSleuthHound Technologies.

Now about the structure of the index. In general, there is nothing special about it. It is possible to select file types, both in general and detailed form. That is, initially you can choose what you want to index - Documents, Images, Videos, Music. On the other tab of the options window, you will be able to select specific file types by extension. Additionally, you can configure the index so that, for example, pictures smaller than 16x16 in size are not indexed or sound files less than 10 seconds in length are not indexed. In addition to indexing files from folders, Copernic can work with emails and contacts from the address Microsoft books Outlook and Microsoft Outlook Express, indexing of Favorites and History from Internet Explorer is possible.

As for the search capabilities, they are very weak here. During tests, it was even revealed that the program does not search for documents in txt and html formats in Russian, allowing you to find them only by titles, and not by content. The only thing the program provides to improve search efficiency is the use of a standard set of logical operations, and even then, this feature was discovered experimentally, since it was not documented. By the way, the program’s help is also not all right - it is only available via the Internet, which, you see, is very inconvenient, and there is not too much help information on the Internet. Apparently, the developers decided that the simple interface of the program does not imply the presence of normal help. Continuing the conversation about search capabilities, it should be noted that, despite the weak analysis of queries, the program provides an interesting search system - the user can select the type of files (images, videos, music, etc.), enter a search query and select attributes specific to selected file type. For example, for sound files, these can be values ​​from mp3 tags (artist, album, date, etc.), for images, for example, you can select their size (by resolution), in general, each type has its own settings. After searching for a specific file type, the program will display a very informative list in the results window, and if your request includes files of other types, you can open them by clicking on a specific link.

Separately, it is worth mentioning the results display window. Below the list of found files, the contents of these files are displayed (a similar scheme is often used in mail clients). True, text viewing can only be done in the native format, and there is no plain text display mode, which is not always convenient, since opening a document in this case takes more time. But, given that Copernic can search for images and music, it is possible to view these too multimedia files.

The basic principles of operation of this program are described, now let's see what Copernic Desktop Search can offer us for working with the network... In principle, you can watch for a very long time, but you will hardly be able to see anything. In other words, this program was not intended to be network-based. Copernic Desktop Search is a home search engine exclusively.

Obviously, the only (most logical) application of this program is a home computer. Here it will fully cope with all simple user search queries consisting of one or two words, find necessary information, and the division of search by file type and support for multimedia files along with background indexing in low priority mode, coupled with a pleasant interface, only give the program the strength to gain trust among inexperienced users.

Official site
Distribution size: 2.6 MbISYS Desktop

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Very powerful program. In terms of its level of equipment with all sorts of functions, it is somewhere close to the next SearchInform search system on the list. Moreover, the size of the installation file is more than 40Mb! It’s hard to say what could be squeezed into such dimensions, because the same SearchInform, with similar functionality, takes up 15Mb.

The installation process here is also not very pleasant, or rather not even the installation process. Even before downloading the program, you will be asked to register, otherwise there is no way. Next, the interface. It is made very nicely, nothing unnecessary catches the eye, however, these are the impressions of a person who is already somewhat accustomed to it. It will not be easy for a beginner to figure out where and what is located, where to click and where to finally search. It is highly recommended to read the help before starting work - you will save a lot of nerves and time. To everything else it is also added complete absence Russian language support in the program. Not good. In addition, the windows here are not overloaded with controls, but we had to pay for this with multi-modules and the use of additional windows. For example, search queries are entered by launching one program, and index management is performed using another program. Search queries are also entered here in separate pop-up windows. It’s hard to say which is better - an overloaded interface or ubiquitous multi-windows; rather, it’s a matter of taste.

When it comes to creating indexes, the program provides features to simplify the process of setting options for a new index. These features include several ready-made templates for creating indexes for the "My Documents", "Mail", "Mail and Documents" folder, " Specific folder", "Folder with a selection of file types", etc. Such templates simplify the creation of indexes at the first stage. The utility for working with indexes does not have a very good interface, which is frightening with some complexity (this is a very subjective assessment, to be honest), however, if you look closely , it provides many useful options and in general its use does not cause much difficulty. ISYS Desktop can index data from various data sources, and also provides many flexible settings for such indexing. Among additional features for indexing: support for SQL, FTP, TRIM Context, WORLDOX 2002, scripts. When creating an index, if you selected the "Folder with selection of file types" item, you have the opportunity to select file types for indexing manually (by extension). It must be said that there are simply a huge number of supported file types, but add your own type (extension) to existing list It won't work. You can also note the presence of an indexing scheduler. Creating an index and processing 20 gigabytes of information took ISYS Desktop 6 hours and 13 minutes, ultimately showing a good time and the size of the created file - 7.9 GB.

The search capabilities of this program are quite good. What is used in ISYS is much more powerful than conventional support for logical operations. Among the advanced search capabilities, the program offers the use of synonyms and a sorting filter (by path, name and date of file creation). Kit logical operators somewhat wider than the standard set. In addition to logical operations, the program allows you to work with many other operators, which, in principle, can replace some types of search; for example, search with parsing can be completely replaced by using special operators. I was very surprised that the program does not have a search using morphology. This is a serious omission, since search efficiency is greatly improved when using morphological analysis. In addition, there is no list of significant words, but there is an extensive list of insignificant words. Search functions such as “approximate search” and “heuristic analysis” are also announced.

ISYS provides a choice of several types of search queries, namely visual types. This is done using different types windows for entering search queries, however, in fact, not a single window allows the use of technologies other than those listed above.

The search results are very informative and are displayed as a list of documents sorted by relevance. A preview of the selected document is displayed below. Unlike Copernic Desktop Search, preview here is available only in the form of plain text; it was not possible to display documents in their native format, be it Word, Html or PDF, although this, in principle, is not too critical. The program allows you to divide found documents into groups according to certain criteria (by default they are divided by relevance). You can also view documents that have already been found by selecting separate folders(this is convenient when the result produces a very large number of documents).

Using the program on a corporate network is also very justified, since it provides good opportunities for organizing network searches. The search system is based on the creation of a public index that contains indexed data from publicly available online resources.

In fact, the program from ISYS is worthy of attention, at least getting acquainted with it. This program is a mature project with a huge amount functions (not always and not everyone needs them, of course, but still). The chances that the program will see some improvements in terms of processing search queries are unknown, but this moment it can be recommended for almost universal use. And given that it is still too heavy for home systems, the main places for its installation are corporate networks.

Official site:
Distribution size: 40 MbSearchInform

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It’s probably not worth starting right away with a description of the SearchInform interface. We should first describe the installation process, or rather one of its details: you cannot install the program without an Internet connection. The fact is that before the first launch, the program requires user registration (free) and sends all entered data to the server. Apparently, the developers had to take such measures in the fight against piracy, but this did not have a positive effect on the ease of installation.

The program interface is designed in compliance with all generally accepted rules, however, at first glance, it is somewhat cumbersome. Using the program for the first time, it seems that it is too complicated, sometimes it is not easy to remember in which menu or on which tab the desired option is located, however, with more long-term use, the interface no longer seems so terribly complex. The main thing is to read the certificate first.

Having understood the interface a little, you can start creating an index. The process itself is very simple and the indexing speed, even by eye, is significantly higher than all other search engines in the review. Clear test numbers show that SearchInform is twice as fast as dtSearch and iSYS in terms of indexing speed! The program indexed the provided data in the amount of 20 gigabytes in a record time of 3 hours 17 minutes. And the size of the created index turned out to be the smallest 4.4 GB - 100 megabytes less than Google Desktop Search.

The program supports, in addition to ordinary files and folders, also indexing emails, connecting and indexing databases (!) and other external sources (DMS, CRM), immediately during indexing you can specify a dictionary for conducting a morphological search, and all attributes can be indexed files. After creating the index, when trying to conduct the first test search for documents, you may become somewhat confused: “there are two types of search here, but which one do I need?” As mentioned earlier, the main thing is to read the certificate, then everything will become clear. The program can actually carry out two types of searches - phrase search and search for documents similar in content to the query text.

A description of all the main functions for analyzing a search query was given above, so now we will only list the search capabilities provided by this program. Let's start with phrase search: of course, morphological search, citation search, logical operations, search with word parsing (search at the beginning of the word, at the end, at the middle part, or a complete match), mixed citation search (when all words from the query must be present in the document, but not necessarily in the entered order), search with error correction, use of synonyms, “almost citation search” (search for the entered phrase as a citation, but other words may be present between the entered words), etc. Some of the options listed have their own specific settings. In addition, it is possible to use a dictionary of unimportant words, and the program already has ready list these words, you can also use the dictionary of priority words to search (of course, you will have to fill it out yourself).

Here, in principle, we briefly reviewed all the main features of phrase search.

Let's move on to consider the features of this program - searching for similar documents. The developers claim that this is by no means a simple text search, it is precisely a “search for similar ones” - this is exactly how it is described everywhere, but oh well, you can call it whatever you want - the main point is. A quick search on the Internet can quickly reveal that so-called "similar search" is a new development in the field of text analysis. This system allows you to find texts that are similar in semantic content. The most pleasant thing was that after conducting test search queries, it turned out that the theory coincides quite well with practice! The program actually searches for documents with similar content and displays them in a list, sorting them by percentage of similarity.

Next, let's look at what SearchInform (in particular, its corporate version SearchInform Corporate) offers for working on a corporate network. There are two types of applications: server side and user side. The server part independently processes the specified indexes, and users can use them for search, depending on the access rights assigned to them. Users can be configured automatically using Windows accounts (speaking professional language, SearchInform uses NTFS Windows authentication) and manually (users will have to be added separately). Each user can be allowed or denied access to certain indexes, and users can also be combined into groups. In general, SearchInform’s settings for working on the network are ahead of Google in terms of flexibility, and Ishcheika Server in terms of convenience and simplicity.

Official site:
Distribution size: 14.7 Mb Comparison of indexing speeds

* Most of the documents.html and .txt containing Russian text, although they were indexed, were impossible to find except by their names. Summary

All programs are worthy of attention.

Based on tests and a careful examination of each program presented in the review, certain conclusions can be drawn. So, Google Desktop Search Copernic Desktop Search is quite suitable for the inexperienced user as a home information search system. They do a good job with simple queries, will not overload the user with settings and, moreover, are completely free. Google's attempt to enter the corporate search engine market is not yet very justified: for full-fledged work the program needs to be updated additional modules, and it’s far from easy to set up. Therefore, the self-explanatory names Desktop Search, Copernic, and Google reserve behind them the niche of “desktop” search engines.

True, more powerful solutions - dtSearch, iSYS and SearchInform are also not foolproof and offer users their “desktop” versions. But at a reasonable price, unlike free software from Google and Copernic. Of course, you have to pay for power, speed and functionality. But the main focus of the developers of dtSearch, iSYS and SearchInform is, of course, on the corporate sector. Networking, functionality, indexing and search speed are what distinguish these products from their “competitors.” Based on the test results, the favorite was identified - SearchInform. The program provides the ability to search for similar documents, has highest speed indexing and searching, has a good set of functions.