4 ms·

Default osx spotlight search is just as good as Alfred? What’s different?

by j7ake 2y ago

kadomony 2y ago
Alfred does a lot more beyond just searching.
- nomilk 2y ago
  Very true, for me, spotlight search felt so broken that Alfred would be worth it even if search was all it did.
- robertoandred 2y ago
  Such as?
  - nicky0 2y ago
    https://www.alfredapp.com/help/features/ https://www.alfredapp.com/help/features/
  - timrichard 2y ago
    I should do a lot more with Alfred, but apart from using it as a launcher my most used feature is the clipboard search. After invoking it by typing 'clip' into the box, I get an incremental search on all clipboard contents it has tracked, and can re-copy any of those items to the current clipboard by pressing enter. Very useful and efficient when it's part of your workflow.
andelink 2y ago
Agreed. Spotlight search does quite well for me. I think there is a discoverability problem with native mac functionality. People tend to install lots of software that duplicates native features
- hansvm 2y ago
  > install lots of software that duplicates native features I installed some software for key remapping and window tiling (karabiner and rectangle) when I couldn't figure out how to do it natively. You seem like you know what you're talking about; do you happen to have native recommendations?
  - andelink 2y ago
    Welp. I don't know what I'm talking about. But at least for key remapping, I use `hidutil`. For example, to remap right ctrl to fn: hidutil property --set ' { "UserKeyMapping": [ { "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingSrc": 0x7000000E4, "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingDst": 0xFF00000003 } ] } ' To make it stick through reboots, you can run it in a launch agent. Posted my notes and plist file here: https://gist.github.com/andelink/9df452c8cafb6790f196277705c45ef1 https://gist.github.com/andelink/9df452c8cafb6790f196277705c... For window tiling, can't say I've ever looked into it.
    - n8henrie 2y ago
      I was using Karabiner for years just to remap caps to a hyper key. A few months ago replaced it with a launchagent to run something like this remapping caps to F19 (and using F19 instead of hyper, in hammerspoon) -- has been working great.
nomilk 2y ago
I tried reindexing a few times (each took a few hours) but spotlight search still rarely brought up the file/thing I was after. Examples: Spotlight search would bring up a wikipedia entry for app store instead of the app store on my laptop: https://imgur.com/QV1w7Kq https://imgur.com/QV1w7Kq Typing 'finder' and hitting enter (e.g. to browse for a file), would open finder settings, rather than finder itself. I haven't used it in ~1 year, those are a couple of examples I can recall.
eszed 2y ago
I have no problems with Spotlight search. I use Alfred for the plug-ins, it's extensibility, workflows, clipboard history, everything else it can do. Alfred search, in fact, really irritates me in that I've not found a good way to limit the search space. No, I really don't want files inside various node_modules folders filling up the search results. <Sigh> I'll try Spotlight, or go directory traversing, again. Anyone have a solution for that?
- quacker 2y ago
  I'm on Sonoma (14.5). In System Settings > Siri & Spotlight, 1. I can deselect some pre-defined categories that Spotlight searches 2. I can click the "Spotlight Privacy..." button (at the very bottom right). Then I can add folders for it to ignore. (My preference is for Spotlight to ignore almost everything, so that it isn't indexing stuff and eating CPU on this old Macbook Air. I only have it scan Applications, Calculator, and System Settings. I have it specifically ignore my entire home directory which is where all my git repos are.)
  - eszed 2y ago
    Are you saying that if I limit the Spotlight search space then Alfred will follow? Makes sense, if it's relying on Spotlight's index. I'll give it a try.
- numpy-thagoras 2y ago
  Spotlight search seems to have gotten better, while Alfred search has had me rebuild my index more than just a few times and it doesn't cope well with nested directories. Something happened in 15.1 onwards for me where Spotlight has become way faster and way better. But yes, Alfred used to dominate in search and speed as well.
- latexr 2y ago
  https://www.alfredapp.com/help/kb/node-modules/ https://www.alfredapp.com/help/kb/node-modules/

Default osx spotlight search is just as good as Alfred? What’s different?

by j7ake 2y ago

Default osx spotlight search is just as good as Alfred? What’s different?

kadomony 2y ago

Alfred does a lot more beyond just searching.

nomilk 2y ago
Very true, for me, spotlight search felt so broken that Alfred would be worth it even if search was all it did.
robertoandred 2y ago
Such as?
- nicky0 2y ago
  https://www.alfredapp.com/help/features/ https://www.alfredapp.com/help/features/
- timrichard 2y ago
  I should do a lot more with Alfred, but apart from using it as a launcher my most used feature is the clipboard search. After invoking it by typing 'clip' into the box, I get an incremental search on all clipboard contents it has tracked, and can re-copy any of those items to the current clipboard by pressing enter. Very useful and efficient when it's part of your workflow.

andelink 2y ago

Agreed. Spotlight search does quite well for me. I think there is a discoverability problem with native mac functionality. People tend to install lots of software that duplicates native features

hansvm 2y ago
> install lots of software that duplicates native features I installed some software for key remapping and window tiling (karabiner and rectangle) when I couldn't figure out how to do it natively. You seem like you know what you're talking about; do you happen to have native recommendations?
- andelink 2y ago
  Welp. I don't know what I'm talking about. But at least for key remapping, I use `hidutil`. For example, to remap right ctrl to fn: hidutil property --set ' { "UserKeyMapping": [ { "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingSrc": 0x7000000E4, "HIDKeyboardModifierMappingDst": 0xFF00000003 } ] } ' To make it stick through reboots, you can run it in a launch agent. Posted my notes and plist file here: https://gist.github.com/andelink/9df452c8cafb6790f196277705c45ef1 https://gist.github.com/andelink/9df452c8cafb6790f196277705c... For window tiling, can't say I've ever looked into it.
  - n8henrie 2y ago
    I was using Karabiner for years just to remap caps to a hyper key. A few months ago replaced it with a launchagent to run something like this remapping caps to F19 (and using F19 instead of hyper, in hammerspoon) -- has been working great.

nomilk 2y ago

I tried reindexing a few times (each took a few hours) but spotlight search still rarely brought up the file/thing I was after. Examples: Spotlight search would bring up a wikipedia entry for app store instead of the app store on my laptop: https://imgur.com/QV1w7Kq https://imgur.com/QV1w7Kq Typing 'finder' and hitting enter (e.g. to browse for a file), would open finder settings, rather than finder itself. I haven't used it in ~1 year, those are a couple of examples I can recall.

eszed 2y ago

I have no problems with Spotlight search. I use Alfred for the plug-ins, it's extensibility, workflows, clipboard history, everything else it can do. Alfred search, in fact, really irritates me in that I've not found a good way to limit the search space. No, I really don't want files inside various node_modules folders filling up the search results. <Sigh> I'll try Spotlight, or go directory traversing, again. Anyone have a solution for that?

quacker 2y ago
I'm on Sonoma (14.5). In System Settings > Siri & Spotlight, 1. I can deselect some pre-defined categories that Spotlight searches 2. I can click the "Spotlight Privacy..." button (at the very bottom right). Then I can add folders for it to ignore. (My preference is for Spotlight to ignore almost everything, so that it isn't indexing stuff and eating CPU on this old Macbook Air. I only have it scan Applications, Calculator, and System Settings. I have it specifically ignore my entire home directory which is where all my git repos are.)
- eszed 2y ago
  Are you saying that if I limit the Spotlight search space then Alfred will follow? Makes sense, if it's relying on Spotlight's index. I'll give it a try.
numpy-thagoras 2y ago
Spotlight search seems to have gotten better, while Alfred search has had me rebuild my index more than just a few times and it doesn't cope well with nested directories. Something happened in 15.1 onwards for me where Spotlight has become way faster and way better. But yes, Alfred used to dominate in search and speed as well.
latexr 2y ago
https://www.alfredapp.com/help/kb/node-modules/ https://www.alfredapp.com/help/kb/node-modules/