You can run updatedb more frequently. By default it is run on a daily cron job and has the smarts to not run when on battery. (see /etc/cron.daily/mlocate) You

You can run updatedb more frequently. By default it is run on a daily cron job and has the smarts to not run when on battery. (see /etc/cron.daily/mlocate) You can also exclude directories in /etc/updatedb.conf that you don't want locate to index. I think in your case a more frequent cron job make sense. If run often enough, it finishes very quickly when running updatedb, which will you give you the instant search you're looking for.