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If any apple product managers are reading this, the biggest thing holding MacOS back is that it global searches when you search a folder. I know there's a confi

If any apple product managers are reading this, the biggest thing holding MacOS back is that it global searches when you search a folder. I know there's a config setting for it, but dammit I want the default to be local file name search and full text search should be an off-by-default option, and search the whole hard drive should be a different also off by default option.

Smoofer 5y ago
This is the _biggest_ thing holding MacOS back?
- treeman79 5y ago
  Yes
- fnord123 5y ago
  Reboot for an upgrade happens by holding a spin lock until it overheats and reboots. This happens every time on multiple computers so I think it's intentional(?) but the crash reports are pretty wild. No official package manager. The Macbook cases ground through the user when they're on an insulated surface (there is no ground pin on the Macbook power adapters). Audio crackles when the machine grounds through the user. Makes speakers hum. I guess some of these are hardware issues.
  - zepto 5y ago
    What do you want from an ‘official’ package manager?
    - smoldesu 5y ago
      For one, it would at least solve the issue of MacOS' coreutils being perpetually outdated. Secondly, it would be a nice way for developers to skip the burning dumpster fire otherwise known as the App Store when distributing basic apps, without having to download untrusted third-party software. As for specific features, I'd really like to see a list of all the different MacOS components so I can remove the things I don't care about (iMessages, Photos, Facetime, etc.) like I can do on all my Linux boxes. It would be nice to have integration with MacOS' various distribution formats too, and while we're asking I'd love to see a declarative approach like NixOS, that would really put MacOS head-and-shoulders above your average Linux distro.
      - zepto 5y ago
        You aren’t the person I asked. From your previous comments, it’s obvious that you want MacOS to be more like Linux. I was curious if there are other reasons someone might have.
      - vajrabum 5y ago
        A real uninstall capability would be a basic starting point.
      - cpuguy83 5y ago
        How would a official package manager solve packages being out of date? Apple has a means to deliver those updates already. If they had an interest in doing so, they'd update them. So it stands to reason it would be up to the community to deal with this, as it does now.
    - diffeomorphism 5y ago
      Not the person above, but I just want it to be official/blessed. Same as with winget vs chocolatey. Same as with netflix vs torrents. I want one and only one main place to look. The other options might be "better" in some aspect, but being standard/official/"the one" is a huge benefit. Every other OS, be it windows, android, ios, linux, *bsd,... has a package manager included. Mac is the only hold out.
    - fnord123 5y ago
      Annoint brew. It feels like a total hack that you need an open source project which gets meagre funding (I tishinkbthey donate some hardware) is the only way to get a >2k machine to be useful for development.
  - shawnz 5y ago
    They are grounded if you use the "power adapter extension cable" (not shipped with the unit): https://www.apple.com/ca/shop/product/MK122LL/A/power-adapter-extension-cable https://www.apple.com/ca/shop/product/MK122LL/A/power-adapte...
    - simondotau 5y ago
      Why don't Apple offer grounded duckheads? For that matter, why haven't any third parties made grounded duckheads? This has been irritating me for the past decade or more. The ground connection, where available, occurs through the metal stud which the duckhead slides into. Correct me if I'm wrong, but even the UK (Type G) duckhead doesn't connect ground even though the physical ground pin is mandatory. I know that most DC adapters are unearthed, but my lived experience is that you can often feel electrovibration in the aluminium Macbook chassis when ungrounded and it goes away when the Apple DC adapter is grounded.
      - jim-jim-jim 5y ago
        It's not just your experience. When using the Apple-supplied charger, the surface of the macbook feels slightly fuzzy, and even delivers minor shocks.
        cutthegrass2 5y ago
        I'm so glad you mentioned this. I thought it was just me!
        asddubs 5y ago
        getting zapped by ~50/100v (depending on what voltage your country uses) through the x rated capacitor, at a very low current. I don't use macbooks, but tried very hard to find a usb charger that actually has a ground prong for the same reason, and they seem to straight up not exist. It's also weird to me, since they have exposed metal and a transformer winding shorting could lead to passing through line voltage to the usb port/your phone chassis. So how does it count as double insulated?
      - 5y ago
  - astrange 5y ago
    > Reboot for an upgrade happens by holding a spin lock until it overheats and reboots. This happens every time on multiple computers so I think it's intentional(?) but the crash reports are pretty wild. That's a watchdog kernel panic (maybe). Shouldn't be seeing that unless you have misbehaving NFS mounts or something.
    - fnord123 5y ago
      Yes, it's a watchdog kernel panic which takes place after the fans spin up. No NFS mounts here.
      - frupert52 5y ago
        I have them happen too (for no particularly discernible reason)
        astrange 5y ago
        Well, you can always set up a coredump server and report it with Feedback Assistant…
        fnord123 5y ago
        I do this dutifully with each reboot.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - davidbarker 5y ago
    I’m not sure if you’re describing the same issue I had, but whenever my MBP (15”, 2018) would restart during an update (and sometimes just a regular restart), I would get the progress bar after entering my password. The fans would then spin up, the machine would get ridiculously hot, and the machine would restart. It was an endless loop. Usually, I was able to get it to complete whatever it was trying to do and log me in by holding it directly in front of my air conditioning unit (this was as ridiculous as it sounds), but a few weeks ago even that didn’t work. I had to completely wipe the machine and reinstall macOS. It’s been fine so far.
    - wpearse 5y ago
      I just had a similar endless loop on update (Catalina to Big Sur) last week. Apple guided me to do a T2 firmware update which bricked the machine. Sent it in for service. Logic board was replaced "under warranty" (it's a 3 year old machine with no Apple Care!).
  - mmastrac 5y ago
    > The Macbook cases ground through the user when they're on an insulated surface (there is no ground pin on the Macbook power adapters). Oooh, I had fun with this one on an airplane. Kept getting shocks to my funny bone.
  - hokumguru 5y ago
    Woah is that why it feels like my MacBook is humming sometimes when I touch it? Wondered this for years.
    - somedude895 5y ago
      Yes! I've been wondering what was up with that since forever! Weird that they say the power adapter doesn't have a ground pin though because the one of my 2019 MBP does in Switzerland.
      - vultour 5y ago
        Not sure how the charger looks in Switzerland, but if it's modular (you can swap the plug), does it have a third connection where it attaches to the brick? The ones in UK have 3 prongs but only 2 connections.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - mdisibio 5y ago
    > No official package manager. That's the app store. It just needs to be extended to deliver a wider range of things like CLIs or system extensions.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- abrazame 5y ago
  It may sound insignificant, but quality-of-life issues like these feel incredibly frustrating, and build the feeling that your computer is working against you, rather than with you (or at the very least at cross purposes to you). Friction is a big deal. It doesn't feel like your tool when it keeps doing things you don't want it to do. It was exactly this issue that made me finally dump Gnome.
jt_thurs_82 5y ago
I personally prefer the global search, I think the consistent behavior is good.
- pas 5y ago
  but it's not consistent with Mail for example :/
hk1337 5y ago
Meh. It’s only slightly annoying. It global searches by default but all you have to do is click your folder name at the top of the search
- pas 5y ago
  it's really confusing because in Mail the default is the opposite... oh well, first world problems! (plus I'm not a Mac user)
- EamonnMR 5y ago
  On my previous macbook it was a showstopper because it would lock the machine up returning thousands of irrelevant files.
divbzero 5y ago
I also prefer search by folder as default and always have to look for that Finder setting to flip. We already have Command–Space bar for quick access to global search.
egypturnash 5y ago
I dunno if this is “the biggest thing” but I will concur that it is really annoying. I almost always want to search for a file name, somewhere in the folder I’m looking at or it’s sub folders. I wish I could change the default to be that.
- latexr 5y ago
  Finder Preferences → Advanced → When performing search: Search the Current Folder.
  - egypturnash 5y ago
    oh awesome, thanks! Now if only there was a way to also make it default to searching for filenames instead of text contents.
    - roryokane 5y ago
      That feature exists as well. Press ⌃⇧⌘F in the Finder to activate File > “Find by Name…”.
      - e_proxus 5y ago
        You could even swap the key bindings to make it the default, by going to System Preferences → Keyboard → Shortcuts → App Shortcuts. I do this to swap the shortcuts Reply and Reply All in Mail.app as well, so that I always reply everyone when pressing ⌘R. See https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/mac-help/mchlp2271/mac https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/mac-help/mchlp2271/mac
      - hughlilly 5y ago
        I didn’t know this was a feature. No matter how many modifier keys I press with the File menu open, “Find” never changes to “Find by name”. (Searching the menu options through the Help menu does find the function, though.) Wonder why? (Edit: Never mind, BetterTouchTool was blocking it somehow!)
RussianCow 5y ago
If this is the biggest thing holding their operating system back, Apple must be doing okay.
- EamonnMR 5y ago
  Almost everything else I do in an application, so the most I interact with the OS is when I clumsily look around for a file. I've started using fzf (you can install it with brew) and open but I shouldn't have to. QOL would be on par with Windows and Linux if not for this type of issue.
gcatlin 5y ago
For those who are wondering what the config setting is: Finder -> Preferences -> Advanced -> When performing search: Search the current folder
- Implicated 5y ago
  Thank you.
- nyadesu 5y ago
  Thank you
- ksec 5y ago
  Thank You. This really should be the default settings.
- tailspin2019 5y ago
  Thank you
mxxx 5y ago
the one that does my head in is you can search for a file with spotlight but then the only thing you can do with the result is open it; you can't see what folder it's in or open the folder.
- brailsafe 5y ago
  Press tab to bring up the preview pane in spotlight, then holding CMD brings up the folder it's in near the bottom. CMD+double click opens it in it's enclosing folder.
- grincho 5y ago
  Hit command-return to open the folder the file is in.
  - lelandfe 5y ago
    This is a macOS pattern, by the way - other (good) search apps, like Alfred, maintain this behavior when searching for files. Very useful to remember
- willyt 5y ago
  In finder, View > Show Status Bar You can click on any of the folders to go there. In spotlight, cmd click on the file to show it in the finder.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  you can't see what folder it's in Hold down Command (or maybe Option), and it shows you the full file path in the bottom of the preview pane.
  - lrhegeba 5y ago
    and unfortunately cuts the path off when it is too long, as happens far too often for me
aikinai 5y ago
What any the fact that Spotlight is terrible at finding files and is now just trying to be a bad version of Google?
- jrochkind1 5y ago
  seriously, why is spotlight still so bad at finding files?
  - aikinai 5y ago
    I recently found Go-to-file[0], which is suspiciously obscure, but actually very good. It's a Spotlight-like search bar with fuzzy finding capabilities and it's a godsend after fighting with Spotlight for years. [0] https://www.soma-zone.com/GoToFile/ https://www.soma-zone.com/GoToFile/
  - EamonnMR 5y ago
    Oh you don't want every search to find every python bytecode file on your whole system every time?
willyt 5y ago
type name:nameoffileIwant or just start typing and press down arrow then enter to select and search the Name matches:blah blah option that appears usually straight away.
Angostura 5y ago
Yeh? Just opened a folder in Finder and clicked search in the window - it defaulted to searching that folder.
sygma 5y ago
That's an easy fix: https://www.techrepublic.com/a/hub/i/r/2020/07/10/22bb5b3d-ce4b-4a8a-ac09-61bcc78746f6/resize/770x/64a0f2aee8dcb60f5388d4ac2ae39f33/macos-finder-search-3.jpg https://www.techrepublic.com/a/hub/i/r/2020/07/10/22bb5b3d-c...
slmjkdbtl 5y ago
Are you sure it's not .DS_Store?
- EamonnMR 5y ago
  I've .gitignore'd it and never looked back.

Smoofer 5y ago

This is the _biggest_ thing holding MacOS back?

treeman79 5y ago
Yes
fnord123 5y ago
Reboot for an upgrade happens by holding a spin lock until it overheats and reboots. This happens every time on multiple computers so I think it's intentional(?) but the crash reports are pretty wild. No official package manager. The Macbook cases ground through the user when they're on an insulated surface (there is no ground pin on the Macbook power adapters). Audio crackles when the machine grounds through the user. Makes speakers hum. I guess some of these are hardware issues.
- zepto 5y ago
  What do you want from an ‘official’ package manager?
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    For one, it would at least solve the issue of MacOS' coreutils being perpetually outdated. Secondly, it would be a nice way for developers to skip the burning dumpster fire otherwise known as the App Store when distributing basic apps, without having to download untrusted third-party software. As for specific features, I'd really like to see a list of all the different MacOS components so I can remove the things I don't care about (iMessages, Photos, Facetime, etc.) like I can do on all my Linux boxes. It would be nice to have integration with MacOS' various distribution formats too, and while we're asking I'd love to see a declarative approach like NixOS, that would really put MacOS head-and-shoulders above your average Linux distro.
    - zepto 5y ago
      You aren’t the person I asked. From your previous comments, it’s obvious that you want MacOS to be more like Linux. I was curious if there are other reasons someone might have.
    - vajrabum 5y ago
      A real uninstall capability would be a basic starting point.
    - cpuguy83 5y ago
      How would a official package manager solve packages being out of date? Apple has a means to deliver those updates already. If they had an interest in doing so, they'd update them. So it stands to reason it would be up to the community to deal with this, as it does now.
  - diffeomorphism 5y ago
    Not the person above, but I just want it to be official/blessed. Same as with winget vs chocolatey. Same as with netflix vs torrents. I want one and only one main place to look. The other options might be "better" in some aspect, but being standard/official/"the one" is a huge benefit. Every other OS, be it windows, android, ios, linux, *bsd,... has a package manager included. Mac is the only hold out.
  - fnord123 5y ago
    Annoint brew. It feels like a total hack that you need an open source project which gets meagre funding (I tishinkbthey donate some hardware) is the only way to get a >2k machine to be useful for development.
- shawnz 5y ago
  They are grounded if you use the "power adapter extension cable" (not shipped with the unit): https://www.apple.com/ca/shop/product/MK122LL/A/power-adapter-extension-cable https://www.apple.com/ca/shop/product/MK122LL/A/power-adapte...
  - simondotau 5y ago
    Why don't Apple offer grounded duckheads? For that matter, why haven't any third parties made grounded duckheads? This has been irritating me for the past decade or more. The ground connection, where available, occurs through the metal stud which the duckhead slides into. Correct me if I'm wrong, but even the UK (Type G) duckhead doesn't connect ground even though the physical ground pin is mandatory. I know that most DC adapters are unearthed, but my lived experience is that you can often feel electrovibration in the aluminium Macbook chassis when ungrounded and it goes away when the Apple DC adapter is grounded.
    - jim-jim-jim 5y ago
      It's not just your experience. When using the Apple-supplied charger, the surface of the macbook feels slightly fuzzy, and even delivers minor shocks.
      - cutthegrass2 5y ago
        I'm so glad you mentioned this. I thought it was just me!
      - asddubs 5y ago
        getting zapped by ~50/100v (depending on what voltage your country uses) through the x rated capacitor, at a very low current. I don't use macbooks, but tried very hard to find a usb charger that actually has a ground prong for the same reason, and they seem to straight up not exist. It's also weird to me, since they have exposed metal and a transformer winding shorting could lead to passing through line voltage to the usb port/your phone chassis. So how does it count as double insulated?
    - 5y ago
- astrange 5y ago
  > Reboot for an upgrade happens by holding a spin lock until it overheats and reboots. This happens every time on multiple computers so I think it's intentional(?) but the crash reports are pretty wild. That's a watchdog kernel panic (maybe). Shouldn't be seeing that unless you have misbehaving NFS mounts or something.
  - fnord123 5y ago
    Yes, it's a watchdog kernel panic which takes place after the fans spin up. No NFS mounts here.
    - frupert52 5y ago
      I have them happen too (for no particularly discernible reason)
      - astrange 5y ago
        Well, you can always set up a coredump server and report it with Feedback Assistant…
        fnord123 5y ago
        I do this dutifully with each reboot.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- davidbarker 5y ago
  I’m not sure if you’re describing the same issue I had, but whenever my MBP (15”, 2018) would restart during an update (and sometimes just a regular restart), I would get the progress bar after entering my password. The fans would then spin up, the machine would get ridiculously hot, and the machine would restart. It was an endless loop. Usually, I was able to get it to complete whatever it was trying to do and log me in by holding it directly in front of my air conditioning unit (this was as ridiculous as it sounds), but a few weeks ago even that didn’t work. I had to completely wipe the machine and reinstall macOS. It’s been fine so far.
  - wpearse 5y ago
    I just had a similar endless loop on update (Catalina to Big Sur) last week. Apple guided me to do a T2 firmware update which bricked the machine. Sent it in for service. Logic board was replaced "under warranty" (it's a 3 year old machine with no Apple Care!).
- mmastrac 5y ago
  > The Macbook cases ground through the user when they're on an insulated surface (there is no ground pin on the Macbook power adapters). Oooh, I had fun with this one on an airplane. Kept getting shocks to my funny bone.
- hokumguru 5y ago
  Woah is that why it feels like my MacBook is humming sometimes when I touch it? Wondered this for years.
  - somedude895 5y ago
    Yes! I've been wondering what was up with that since forever! Weird that they say the power adapter doesn't have a ground pin though because the one of my 2019 MBP does in Switzerland.
    - vultour 5y ago
      Not sure how the charger looks in Switzerland, but if it's modular (you can swap the plug), does it have a third connection where it attaches to the brick? The ones in UK have 3 prongs but only 2 connections.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- mdisibio 5y ago
  > No official package manager. That's the app store. It just needs to be extended to deliver a wider range of things like CLIs or system extensions.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
abrazame 5y ago
It may sound insignificant, but quality-of-life issues like these feel incredibly frustrating, and build the feeling that your computer is working against you, rather than with you (or at the very least at cross purposes to you). Friction is a big deal. It doesn't feel like your tool when it keeps doing things you don't want it to do. It was exactly this issue that made me finally dump Gnome.

jt_thurs_82 5y ago

I personally prefer the global search, I think the consistent behavior is good.

pas 5y ago
but it's not consistent with Mail for example :/

hk1337 5y ago

Meh. It’s only slightly annoying. It global searches by default but all you have to do is click your folder name at the top of the search

pas 5y ago
it's really confusing because in Mail the default is the opposite... oh well, first world problems! (plus I'm not a Mac user)
EamonnMR 5y ago
On my previous macbook it was a showstopper because it would lock the machine up returning thousands of irrelevant files.

divbzero 5y ago

I also prefer search by folder as default and always have to look for that Finder setting to flip. We already have Command–Space bar for quick access to global search.

egypturnash 5y ago

I dunno if this is “the biggest thing” but I will concur that it is really annoying. I almost always want to search for a file name, somewhere in the folder I’m looking at or it’s sub folders. I wish I could change the default to be that.

latexr 5y ago
Finder Preferences → Advanced → When performing search: Search the Current Folder.
- egypturnash 5y ago
  oh awesome, thanks! Now if only there was a way to also make it default to searching for filenames instead of text contents.
  - roryokane 5y ago
    That feature exists as well. Press ⌃⇧⌘F in the Finder to activate File > “Find by Name…”.
    - e_proxus 5y ago
      You could even swap the key bindings to make it the default, by going to System Preferences → Keyboard → Shortcuts → App Shortcuts. I do this to swap the shortcuts Reply and Reply All in Mail.app as well, so that I always reply everyone when pressing ⌘R. See https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/mac-help/mchlp2271/mac https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/mac-help/mchlp2271/mac
    - hughlilly 5y ago
      I didn’t know this was a feature. No matter how many modifier keys I press with the File menu open, “Find” never changes to “Find by name”. (Searching the menu options through the Help menu does find the function, though.) Wonder why? (Edit: Never mind, BetterTouchTool was blocking it somehow!)

RussianCow 5y ago

If this is the biggest thing holding their operating system back, Apple must be doing okay.

EamonnMR 5y ago
Almost everything else I do in an application, so the most I interact with the OS is when I clumsily look around for a file. I've started using fzf (you can install it with brew) and open but I shouldn't have to. QOL would be on par with Windows and Linux if not for this type of issue.

gcatlin 5y ago

For those who are wondering what the config setting is: Finder -> Preferences -> Advanced -> When performing search: Search the current folder

Implicated 5y ago
Thank you.
nyadesu 5y ago
Thank you
ksec 5y ago
Thank You. This really should be the default settings.
tailspin2019 5y ago
Thank you

mxxx 5y ago

the one that does my head in is you can search for a file with spotlight but then the only thing you can do with the result is open it; you can't see what folder it's in or open the folder.

brailsafe 5y ago
Press tab to bring up the preview pane in spotlight, then holding CMD brings up the folder it's in near the bottom. CMD+double click opens it in it's enclosing folder.
grincho 5y ago
Hit command-return to open the folder the file is in.
- lelandfe 5y ago
  This is a macOS pattern, by the way - other (good) search apps, like Alfred, maintain this behavior when searching for files. Very useful to remember
willyt 5y ago
In finder, View > Show Status Bar You can click on any of the folders to go there. In spotlight, cmd click on the file to show it in the finder.
reaperducer 5y ago
you can't see what folder it's in Hold down Command (or maybe Option), and it shows you the full file path in the bottom of the preview pane.
- lrhegeba 5y ago
  and unfortunately cuts the path off when it is too long, as happens far too often for me

aikinai 5y ago

What any the fact that Spotlight is terrible at finding files and is now just trying to be a bad version of Google?

jrochkind1 5y ago
seriously, why is spotlight still so bad at finding files?
- aikinai 5y ago
  I recently found Go-to-file[0], which is suspiciously obscure, but actually very good. It's a Spotlight-like search bar with fuzzy finding capabilities and it's a godsend after fighting with Spotlight for years. [0] https://www.soma-zone.com/GoToFile/ https://www.soma-zone.com/GoToFile/
- EamonnMR 5y ago
  Oh you don't want every search to find every python bytecode file on your whole system every time?

willyt 5y ago

type name:nameoffileIwant or just start typing and press down arrow then enter to select and search the Name matches:blah blah option that appears usually straight away.

Angostura 5y ago

Yeh? Just opened a folder in Finder and clicked search in the window - it defaulted to searching that folder.

sygma 5y ago

That's an easy fix: https://www.techrepublic.com/a/hub/i/r/2020/07/10/22bb5b3d-ce4b-4a8a-ac09-61bcc78746f6/resize/770x/64a0f2aee8dcb60f5388d4ac2ae39f33/macos-finder-search-3.jpg https://www.techrepublic.com/a/hub/i/r/2020/07/10/22bb5b3d-c...

slmjkdbtl 5y ago

Are you sure it's not .DS_Store?

EamonnMR 5y ago
I've .gitignore'd it and never looked back.