FileLocator Pro

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

FileLocator Pro

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

All rights reserved. No parts of this work may be reproduced in any form or by any means - graphic, electronic, or
mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or information storage and retrieval systems - without the written
permission of the publisher.

Products that are referred to in this document may be either trademarks and/or registered trademarks of the respective
owners. The publisher and the author make no claim to these trademarks.

While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this document, the publisher and the author assume no
responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages resulting from the use of information contained in this document or
from the use of programs and source code that may accompany it. In no event shall the publisher and the author be liable
for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage caused or alleged to have been caused directly or indirectly by this
document.

Created: December 2021

Publisher
Mythicsoft Ltd
 Contents 3

Table of Contents
Foreword 0

Part I Introduction 6
1 Getting started................................................................................................................................... 7
2 Simple Searches
................................................................................................................................... 8
3 Criteria View ................................................................................................................................... 9
Advanced Interface .......................................................................................................................................................... 9
Options tab ......................................................................................................................................................... 13
Date tab ......................................................................................................................................................... 14
Attributes tab ......................................................................................................................................................... 14
Scripting tab ......................................................................................................................................................... 15
Compressed Files .........................................................................................................................................................
tab 15
Date/Time Selection......................................................................................................................................................... 16
Document Search Settings
......................................................................................................................................................... 18
Cache Settings ......................................................................................................................................................... 19
OCR Settings ......................................................................................................................................................... 20
Basic Interface .......................................................................................................................................................... 22
Index Interface .......................................................................................................................................................... 22
4 File List View................................................................................................................................... 26
5 Contents View
................................................................................................................................... 27
6 Internal File Viewer
................................................................................................................................... 33
7 Search Navigation
................................................................................................................................... 36
8 Favorites ................................................................................................................................... 36
9 Reports ................................................................................................................................... 39
10 Sessions, Workspaces
...................................................................................................................................
and Search Criteria 43
11 Index Manager
................................................................................................................................... 45
Index List .......................................................................................................................................................... 46
Create/Edit Index .......................................................................................................................................................... 51
Index Scheduling .......................................................................................................................................................... 54
Shared Indexes .......................................................................................................................................................... 56
Command line utility .......................................................................................................................................................... 57
12 Hints & Tips ................................................................................................................................... 58
13 Questions/Comments
...................................................................................................................................
? 60

Part II Configuration 61
1 General Settings
................................................................................................................................... 63
History Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 63
Display Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 64
Search Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 66
Email Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 68
Character Processing Settings
.......................................................................................................................................................... 69
Shell Integration Settings
.......................................................................................................................................................... 70
Sounds/Alerts Settings.......................................................................................................................................................... 72
Localization Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 73

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

3
 4 FileLocator Pro

Color Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 73

User Interface Settings.......................................................................................................................................................... 75
2 Expression Settings
................................................................................................................................... 76
Boolean Expression Settings
.......................................................................................................................................................... 76
Wildcard Expression Settings
.......................................................................................................................................................... 77
Regular Expression Settings
.......................................................................................................................................................... 79
File Hash Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 80
3 Editor Settings
................................................................................................................................... 80
Default Editor .......................................................................................................................................................... 80
External Editor .......................................................................................................................................................... 81
Internal Viewer .......................................................................................................................................................... 82
4 Advanced Settings
................................................................................................................................... 83
File Lists .......................................................................................................................................................... 83
Folder Settings .......................................................................................................................................................... 85
Symbolic Links/Shortcuts
.......................................................................................................................................................... 86
Memory Manager Settings.......................................................................................................................................................... 86
Threads/Priority Settings
.......................................................................................................................................................... 87
XSLT Processor Settings.......................................................................................................................................................... 89
5 Extensions ................................................................................................................................... 89
IFilters .......................................................................................................................................................... 90
UTF-8 Default Format .......................................................................................................................................................... 91
Compressed Document..........................................................................................................................................................
Raw Data Reader 92
Application Extensions.......................................................................................................................................................... 93

Part III Advanced features 96

1 Command Line
................................................................................................................................... 97
2 Expression Types
................................................................................................................................... 101
3 Boolean Expressions
................................................................................................................................... 102
4 Wildcard Expressions
................................................................................................................................... 106
5 Scripting ................................................................................................................................... 107
6 Look In ................................................................................................................................... 111
7 Persistent Search
...................................................................................................................................
Filters 114
8 Unicode Support
................................................................................................................................... 115
9 Search within
...................................................................................................................................
Search 116
10 Outlook PST...................................................................................................................................
Archive Searching 116
11 MSG File Searching
................................................................................................................................... 118
12 Thunderbird...................................................................................................................................
Searching 120
13 Export Results
................................................................................................................................... 122
14 Custom Extensions
................................................................................................................................... 126

Part IV Wizards 129

1 Search Wizard
................................................................................................................................... 130
2 Expression Wizard
...................................................................................................................................
(Expr Wiz) 130

Part V Regular Expressions 133

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Contents 5

1 Quick Start ................................................................................................................................... 134

2 What is a regular
...................................................................................................................................
expression? 135
3 Regular expression
...................................................................................................................................
basics 136
4 *, ?, + (Occurrence
...................................................................................................................................
characters) 136
5 \ (Escape character)
................................................................................................................................... 137
6 | (Expression
...................................................................................................................................
OR) 137
7 (...) (Expression
...................................................................................................................................
group) 137
8 [...] (Character
...................................................................................................................................
lists) 138
9 . (Wildcard character)
................................................................................................................................... 138
10 $ (End of string)
................................................................................................................................... 139
11 ^ (Beginning...................................................................................................................................
of string) 139
12 {n,m} Bounded
...................................................................................................................................
repeats 139
13 Other Examples
................................................................................................................................... 140

Index 141

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

5
Introduction

Part

I
 Introduction 7

1 Introduction

Welcome to FileLocator Pro

FileLocator Pro is the award winning file searching tool from Mythicsoft.

FileLocator Pro offers a comprehensive set of features to help you locate and understand
the information on your computer.

What next? Check out the Getting started section for a quick introduction.

We want to ensure that you have a positive experience with FileLocator Pro so please contact us
with any questions you may have:
support@mythicsoft.com

1.1 Getting started

When you start FileLocator Pro it should look something like this:

The interface is broken up into three main sections:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 8 FileLocator Pro

Criteria view, used to enter search criteria. Depending on the criteria type you will see the
Advanced Interface (default), the Basic Interface, or the Index Interface.
File list view, displays files found during search.
Contents view, displays various information about the search and the found files currently
selected in File List view.

Note: To change the look and feel of FileLocator Pro use the User Interface Settings.

1.2 Simple Searches

Here are some simple search examples:

Find all .txt files in a folder:

Find all files greater than 10MB in size:

Find all subfolders in a directory:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 9

Find all .doc, .docx, or .pdf files in a folder with the words 'awesome' or 'amazing' in
them:

Note: Use a semi-colon to separate multiple different file types, e.g. *.doc ; *.docx ; *.pdf

1.3 Criteria View

FileLocator Pro provides three different interfaces, one for experienced computer users, one for
novice computer users (who don't want to deal with some of the more advanced searching
features) and one for index based searches. To switch between the interfaces use the criteria
type drop down list, highlighted below.

User Interfaces:
· Advanced Interface
· Basic Interface
· Index Interface

Saving

FileLocator Pro supports several options for saving criteria options as described in the Sessions,
Workspaces and Search Criteria topic.

1.3.1 Advanced Interface

With Expert User checked the criteria section should look like this:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

10 FileLocator Pro

File name

File name filter, e.g. to search all doc, txt, and xls files using the default expression type Wildcards
you would enter:
*.doc;*.txt;*.xls

The equivalent regular expression would be:

\.(doc|txt|xls)$

To exclude a group of files prefix the Wildcard Expression with NOT:, e.g.
NOT:*.doc;*.txt;*.xls. To make the file name filter case sensitive click the 'Aa' button (a
tick appears when switched ON).

For convenience there are also some preset file type collections in the list: Folders Only, Files
Only, Documents, Music, Pictures, and Videos.

When a preset collection is picked the File name field is processed as a Boolean Expression.

Containing text

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 11

Specifies the contents to find in the files for a content search. The default expression type is
Boolean.

To make the content search case sensitive click the 'Aa' button (a tick appears when switched
ON).

Note: If the expression type is set to 'File Hash' then the containing text box can include a comma
separated list of hash values or a pointer to a file containing a list of hash values, e.g.
5A9C9B42A16F5E1985B7B0A019114C7A,675C9B42A16F5E1985B7B0A019114C7A

or,
=c:\FileHashTable.txt

The actual algorithms used to calculate the hash, e.g. SHA1, MD5, are specified in the Options
tab.

Look In

The Look In field can specify various criteria for the search location including exclusion locations,
location filters etc. (for a full description of the advanced features see Look In). Multiple Look In
locations are separated by a semi-colon.

Browse for Folders button and Browse for Multiple Folders button provide a convenient
mechanism to select the folders to search. Press the 'Browse for multiple folders button' ...

... and the multiple folders dialog will appear. Enter each folder on a separate line.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

12 FileLocator Pro

Locations can be loaded/saved to or from a text file. For more information on FileLocator Pro's
advanced location features please read the Advanced Look In and Persistent Search Filters
pages.

Dates

Modified Before and After fields are used to search by file modified date. To activate the date
criteria either click on the button, i.e. After or Before, or the Calendar icon next to the value. See
Date/Time Selection for more information.

The other tabs available with the Advanced Interface are:

Options tab Options relating to the search, document processing etc
Date tab Search by last accessed and created date.
Attributes tab Attributes to filter the search by, e.g. Read-only, Folders etc.
Scripting User Scripts for customizing search logic.
Compressed Compressed/Archive file searching
Files tab

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 13

1.3.1.1 Options tab

Boolean Expression

Boolean expression search type defines whether Boolean expressions are matched on a line by
line basis or matched across the whole file.

For example "File AND Pro" on a line by line basis would find only lines with both File and Pro on
them and therefore only files where File and Pro both occurred on at least one line. However if
matching across the whole file the same expression would find files where both File and Pro
occurred anywhere in the file either on the same line or on different lines.

The 'Allow wildcards' option specifies whether or not the Boolean expression phrases will treat
the characters * or ? as wildcard characters. For more information see Boolean Expressions.

Email Searching

The Outlook/Thunderbird files checkbox switches on .PST, .MSG and .MBOX archive
searching. By default only the text of the email body will be searched but if Search attachments
is checked email attachments will also be searched.

For more information see Outlook PST Archive Searching, MSG File Searching, and
Thunderbird Searching.

Enhanced File Searching

Selecting the 'Office/PDF documents' option instructs FileLocator Pro to perform extra
processing of common Office file formats that are registered on the computer. Without this option
selected FileLocator Pro will only search through the raw binary data of the file formats (unless the
Exclude binary files check box is switched on).

Additional settings for how FileLocator Pro will search document file types is available by clicking
the Settings... link which will open the Document Search Settings dialog.

The Exclude binary files option will exclude any files which contain non-text characters.

Caching

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 14 FileLocator Pro

Since the extra processing required to read document file formats can be time a time consuming
operation FileLocator Pro has a caching feature to temporarily save the processed text in a
database. When the caching feature is switched on FileLocator Pro first checks the cache
database for the processed text of the file before trying to process the actual file itself resulting in
much faster searches. The caching feature can be switched on by checking the Cache text
option.

Additional settings for the caching functionality is available by clicking the Cache... link which will
open the Cache Settings dialog.

OCR Images

Optical Character Recognition (OCR) converts images of text, e.g. scanned documents, to
searchable text. For more information see the OCR Settings topic.
1.3.1.2 Date tab

The date tab allows searching by last modified, created, and last accessed date.

Clicking the calendar buttons will open the Date/Time Selection Dialog.

Note: Any changes made to the modified date criteria are immediately reflected in the Main tab.

1.3.1.3 Attributes tab

The attributes tab allows filtering of files/folders based on their attributes.

Each attribute can be one of three values:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 15

-- Ignore the attribute.

On The attribute must be set on the file/folder.
Off The attribute must NOT be set on the file/folder.

1.3.1.4 Scripting tab

Scripting allows customization of the search engine's file name and contents matching algorithms
through any valid Active Scripting script.

It is possible to specify a script for either the file name matching rules or the containing text
matching rules.

Set the Engine value to the appropriate Active Script engine Prog Id that will be used to run the
script. Two script engines are listed in the drop down, JScript and VBScript, but any installed
script engine can be specified.

Use the Parm field to pass additional parameters to the script.

The 'Test' button attempts to create the specified script engine, load the specified script into it,
and make a test call to the script, e.g. isValidFileName( "c:\", "TestFile.txt" ).

For more information please visit the Scripting page.

1.3.1.5 Compressed Files tab

The Compressed Files tab shows the list of extensions relating to compressed/archive formats.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 16 FileLocator Pro

When a compressed file format is activated FileLocator Pro treats any files it finds of that type as
part of the file system folder hierarchy. e.g. c:\zips\file1.zip\compressed\doc.txt

1.3.1.6 Date/Time Selection

FileLocator Pro accepts various different date/time formats for filtering files based on the
modified date/time. To help specify the correct value the open the Date/Time Selection dialog by
clicking on the Calendar buttons shown above.

Date/time values fall into one of two broad categories:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 17

· Fixed date/times - an absolute date/time value that stays the same on subsequent searches,
e.g. 19/04/16 12:00
· Relative date/times - a value that is relative to the moment the search is run, e.g. Today Start of
hour

The dialog shows how the current selection evaluates at that point in time. It is constantly updated
to reflect the values of relative date and times.

Date values

Relative dates can be one of the following:

Today (Default) Date the search is run. e.g. 09/03/16

(Wednesday)
Start of week First day of the week when the search is run (Monday is e.g. 07/03/16
considered the start of the week). (Monday)
Start of month First day of the month when which the search is run. e.g. 01/03/16
Start of year First day of the year when the search is run. e.g. 01/01/16
End of week Last day of the week when the search is run (Sunday is e.g. 13/03/16
considered the last day of the week). (Sunday)
End of month Last day of the month when the search is run. e.g. 31/03/16
End of year Last day of the year when the search is run. e.g. 31/12/16

Dates can be adjusted forward or back by any number of days, weeks, months, or years. For
example to set the date to be the first day of the previous week select 'Start of week' and then
apply an adjustment of '-1 Week'.

Time values

Relative times can be one of the following:

Now Time at the point the search is run. e.g. 13:24:52

Start of minute Time at the point the search is run with the seconds part e.g. 13:24:00
set to zero.
Start of hour Time at the point the search is run with the minutes and e.g. 13:00:00
seconds part set to zero.
Start of day (Default) Time is set to 00:00:00 e.g. 00:00:00
End of minute Time at the point the search is run with the seconds part e.g. 13:24:59
set to 59.
End of hour Time at the point the search is run with the minute and e.g. 13:59:59
seconds part set to 59.
End of day Time is set to 23:59:59 e.g. 23:59:59

Times can be adjusted forward or back by any number of seconds, minutes, or hours.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 18 FileLocator Pro

Note: Relative date/times are evaluated at the point the search is started and are fixed to that
value for the duration of the search. The date/time is only re-evaluated at the start of the next
search.

1.3.1.7 Document Search Settings

The Document Search Settings is opened from the Options tab. The settings on this page define
how FileLocator Pro searches the specified document formats.

Note: The actual extensions listed will depend on each individual computer setup.

Many document formats, such as docx and pdf, need to be converted to text before they can be
read properly. The file formats with registered 'document readers' are shown in the list and the
options on this page define whether or not those readers are used.

Text Search All available document readers are used to convert the supported formats into
(default) text. Document formats not shown in the list, such as .txt, are searched without
any special conversion process.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 19

Deep Like Text Search all available document readers are used but if the search term
Search is not found in the converted text FileLocator Pro performs a second search on
the raw data of the file, which might find meta-data not produced by the document
reader.

Custom User defined selection of document readers to use. The option Also search raw
processing document data of processed files defines whether or not a secondary raw
settings data search occurs, as happens with Deep Search.
.

1.3.1.8 Cache Settings

The Cache Settings dialog is opened from the Options tab.

The cache is used to retain text extracted from processed document files, ie it does not cache
text from non-processed files such as .txt files. If a file's last modification date does not match the
date stored in the cache the file is re-cached to ensure search accuracy. Text is compressed
before being stored in the cache to reduce disk usage but uses a very fast compression
algorithm to minimize retrieval time.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 20 FileLocator Pro

The dialog shows the amount of information used by the cache, the maximum allowed size for any
single document, and also the expiration policy for each document.

Maximum document size relates to the size of the extracted text not the size of the original
document and defaults to around 10MB.

The default expiration is to remove any items from the cache if they have not been referenced in a
search in the last 60 days.
1.3.1.9 OCR Settings

The OCR Settings dialog is opened from the Options tab.

OCR (Optical Character Recognition) converts text from images, such as scanned or faxed
documents, into searchable text. The supported image formats are shown in the File Formats list
and the supported languages are shown in the Languages drop down.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 21

Cache OCR Text

(Recommended) Image OCR is normally a CPU intensive task and can therefore slow searches
considerably, but it is possible to Cache the results of the OCR so that subsequent searches are
much faster.

PDF Settings

Although PDF is a common format for scanned documents, where the PDF is just a collection of
image files, the PDF format is also used for documents that have regular text and would not
benefit from OCR analysis. To skip OCR for PDFs with existing searchable text use the option
Do not OCR PDFs with existing searchable text.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 22 FileLocator Pro

1.3.2 Basic Interface

Main features:
· From the Main tab the fields Filename, Containing Text, and Look in can all be freely entered or
selected from previously used search criteria (note: last twenty values for each are retained).
· The main difference between this and Windows Find is the 'Search Wizard...' button, which
opens the Search Wizard to walk the user through entering the criteria required for searching.

Options Tab

Main features:
· File name, Contents, and Look In expression type.
· 'Match case' specifies if the searches are case-sensitive.

1.3.3 Index Interface

Indexed searching works by searching a pre-built index to locate files, its main advantage is that
a search on an index is normally very fast, e.g. sub-second times. So, before you can perform a
search you need to create an index. Once the index has been created you can search it by typing
information into the search field. Multiple indexes can be created and shared over network drives
with other people.

Index based searches can be performed using the Index Search interface, opened by selecting
the option Index Search from the criteria drop-down or by using the menu option Search ->
Criteria -> Index Search.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 23

This will change the criteria interface to look like this:

The Index Interface has three main sections:

Search field. This is a search-as-you-type field and shows previous searches using the
drop-down box. The 'Aa' button switches on/off case-sensitive searching, if the specified
index supports it.

Index list. Shows the current index and when dropped-down all the available indexes, to
add a new one pick the '<Create New Index...>' option, which will open the Index Manager.

Index Manager button. Click this button to open the Index Manager.

Performing a Search

The search terms can be specified using standard Boolean Expressions logic, such as AND, OR,
NEAR, NOT, and LIKE. There is, however, one important difference. Whereas a classic Boolean
search will match mid-word an index search assumes that the term matches the start of the word.
Index searches have an implicit '<' at the start and classic searches have an implicit '*' at the front.

This table illustrates how search terms will be matched:

Search Term Index Search Classic Search

fine Any word starting with 'fine', e.g. Any word with 'fine' in, e.g.

fine, fined, finest, etc. fine, define, refined etc.

*fine Any word with 'fine' in, e.g. (Same as index search)

fine, define, refined etc.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

24 FileLocator Pro

<fine Any word starting with 'fine', e.g. (Same as index search)

fine, fined, finest, etc.

<fine> Just the whole word 'fine'. (Same as index search)

fin*n Any word starting with 'fin' and having Any word with 'fin' somewhere in
'n' in it, e.g. it, followed by 'n', e.g.

finding, finance, etc. finding, definitions

"fine" Just the whole word 'fine'. Any word with 'fine' in, e.g.

fine, define, refined etc.

"fine day" Matches the phrase 'fine day' (Same as index search)

Searching Attributes

By default searches will search the file name and the file content (if indexed), however you can
specify other attributes of the files using search prefixes.

Prefix Purpose Example

name: Search on the name of the item. To search all files with a name starting
'accounts'

name:accounts

You can also search by extension, so

to limit the above search to just .pdf
and .txt files:

name:accounts
name:*.pdf;*.txt

lookin: Search on the location of the item. To search all items with Program files
in the path:

lookin:"Program Files"

ext: Search on the file extension. To search all .pdf and .txt files:

ext:pdf;txt

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 25

Note: 'ext:' is implied if you use the

pattern *.abc when searching with no
prefix or the 'name:' prefix.
moddt: Search on the modified date of the For all files modified since 1 Nov 2021
item.
moddt:"> 1 Nov 2021"

createdt: Search on the created date of the item. For all files created between 1 Jan
2020 and 1 Mar 2020:

createdt:"> 1 Jan 2020"

createdt:"< 1 Mar 2020"

size: Search on the size of the item. For all files greater than 100 KB

size:"> 100KB"

Prefixes can be combined so to search for all .pdf files created since the 1 Jan 2020 for the word
"excellent"

Excellent name:*.pdf createdt:"> 1 Jan 2020"

Limitations of Indexed Search

Although indexed searching is very fast there is one very important fact to keep in mind, the term
being searched for must be in the index for it to be found. Common issues to be aware of:

File changes If files are changed, added or deleted and the index is not updated then
searches on the index will be driven by the old information not the new
changes. You can use the Index Scheduling functionality to help keep indexes
up to date.

Search terms During the indexing process not all terms are considered 'indexable'. Words
that are very common and appear in all documents, such as the or and, are
not indexed nor are character sequences that do not seem to be valid
language terms, eg. 4*2.

Performance Impact of Indexes

The indexing feature is not constantly running in the background and indexes are not loaded
unless you try and search them, so there is no performance impact to people who never need to
use the indexing functionality. If you don’t use the feature then you won’t notice it because it’s
effectively disabled by default.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 26 FileLocator Pro

This method of operation has the advantage that the program is not secretly consuming CPU
cycles or eating away at disk space but it has the disadvantage that the index isn’t updated
unless you specifically update it. This is fine for large repositories of fairly static data but can
cause problems when files are changing frequently. You can schedule index updates using the
Index Scheduling feature.

1.4 File List View

As files are found during the search they appear in the File List view. For each file its name and
location are displayed. All files selected in this view are shown in the Contents view.

FileLocator Pro supports context menus to list valid operations for a selected file or group of files.
Context menus will work on selections of multiple files but the list of valid operations will be
reduced to only the operations common to all selected files.

Column Filters

Files can be temporarily filtered from the list through column filters. Click the Filter button
(highlighted below) to display the filter edit boxes.

The filters are applied immediately and can contain Boolean or type specific expressions:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 27

Boolean All column filters can accept Boolean expressions, e.g. tower NOT (bridge
expressions OR hamlets)
Numeric Numeric columns, such as Size and Hits, can be filtered on the text in the column
expressions using Boolean expressions or the underlying numeric value. The greater than or
less than symbols are used to indicate numeric range filtering, e.g. > 10 < 20.
The size column also accepts Byte, KB, MB, or GB symbols.
Date/time Date/time columns, such as Modified, Created, and Last Accessed columns, can
expressions be filtered on the text in the column using Boolean expressions or the underlying
date/time value. The greater than or less than symbols are used to indicate
date/time range filtering, e.g. > 20 Sep 2010. Date/times can be specified in
any format accepted by the standard Date/Time processing functionality
including relative date times, e.g. < Today -3 years.

1.5 Contents View

Any files selected in the File List view are displayed in the Contents view.

Summary Tab

The summary tab simply provides a summary of the latest search:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

28 FileLocator Pro

Depending on the type of search (e.g. File name search, content search, index search etc.)
different information is displayed. In the above example it shows the statistics for:

Found the count and size of all the files that matched both the file name and containing text
criteria and are therefore displayed in the File List View.
Text the total number of hits found in the text of the files
Searc the count and size of all files that were searched after matching the file name criteria
hed (only applicable for content searches)
Pendi the number of files that remain to be searched (when the search has finished this value
ng should always be 0).
Searc
h
Check the count and size of all files that were checked against the file name criteria
ed

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 29

Status the search status and total running time

Compl The time the search finished
eted

The Summary tab also shows any error, warnings, and informational data generated during the
search to help understand the results of the search. In the above example there is a warning that
the content search was case sensitive and additional information showing that 5,164 files were
excluded based on their name (ie the name did not match the File name field) and 3,102 files
excluded based on the contents of file (ie the contents did not match the Containing Text field).

Hits Tab

When searching through the contents of files the Hits tab displays the found information, ie the
hits, from each of the selected files (click Select All from the Edit menu to see hits for all files). For
non-content searches only the file name is displayed.

Lines that contain the search text are shown with the hit text highlighted in a different color. The
highlight color is by default blue but this can be changed to any color through Set Highlight Colour
on the Edit menu.

The expansion buttons next to the lines of text can be used to show surrounding lines of text as
shown below.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

30 FileLocator Pro

The number of surrounding lines can be set via the Configuration dialog.

The file can be opened at the specified line by either double-clicking on the line or right-clicking
on the line to bring up the context menu and selecting "Open in New Window...". To open the file
with an external editor (e.g. Notepad++) select "Open in External Editor..." from the context menu.
For more information see Editor Settings.

Note: When displaying file contents the line number of each line found within the file is also
displayed. This line number is estimated by counting end of line markers within the file and
therefore if the file contains non-text information then the line numbers may not be accurate.

Text Tab

To view the hits in context of the actual file use the Text tab. The Text tab embeds the Internal File
Viewer into the Contents View for faster previewing of files:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 31

To open the file in a larger window choose 'Open in New Window...' option from the context menu
or use the Ctrl+Enter key combination.

Note: By default FileLocator Pro will open the file in Text tab when double-clicking on a hit in the
Hits tab. This default behaviour can be changed in the Editor Settings page.

Thumbnails Tab

When searching for pictures, or other graphical files, the Thumbnail tab provides a preview of the
selected files.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

32 FileLocator Pro

Reports Tab

The reports tab provides an easy way to export, print, or summarize search data.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 33

More information on FileLocator Pro's reporting feature is available in the Reports topic.

Hiding/Docking the View

If displaying of content information is not important then it is often more efficient to hide the
contents view, especially with very large file selections. To hide the contents view either select
'Hide Contents View' from the Contents View context menu or select the 'Window->Contents
View->Hide' menu option.

To display the contents view below the file list view either select 'Dock Below' from the Contents
View context menu or select the 'Window->Contents View->Dock Below' menu option.

Printing

The Hits tab is the printable area of the application and prints whatever the user has selected in
the File List view. To print this view click Print or Print Preview from the File menu.

1.6 Internal File Viewer

The Internal Viewer is a read-only display of the found file with the search hits highlighted.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

34 FileLocator Pro

Secondary Allows additional searches of the file to be performed by entering text in the
Search edit box.
Location Bar Provides an overview of the location of the lines shown in the File Contents
in relation to the rest of the file.
File Contents Displays the file opened at the line that was selected in the Contents View
with the found text automatically highlighted.

Content Menu

Additional operations are available through the context menu (right-click menu):

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 35

Available commands:

Word Wrap Toggles word wrap on and off.

Copy Copies the selected text (shown in pale green) into the clipboard. If no text
is highlighted then the word at the current cursor position is copied. If the
cursor is not on a valid word then the whole line is copied.
Open in External Opens the file at the current line in the external editor specified in Editor
Editor Settings.
Open in Visual Opens the file at the current line in Visual Studio (if Visual Studio is installed
Studio on the machine).
Search Again Runs the original search again for the highlighted search text.
New Search Creates a new search window based on the original search but for the
highlighted search text.
Find Performs a secondary search on the currently selected text. If no text
selected then the search uses the word at the current cursor position.
Find Next Moves to the next highlighted hit.
Find Previous Moves to the previous highlighted hit.
Highlight Original Toggles the highlighting of the original search hits.
Highlight Current Toggles the highlighting of the secondary search hits.
Set Font Selects the font used by the viewer. The default font is Courier New.
File Displays the Explorer shell menu for the file.

Highlighting

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 36 FileLocator Pro

When a file is first opened the original found text is highlighted. If a secondary search is
performed then that is also highlighted but in a different color. Highlighting can be switched on
and off by either using the context menu or the short cut combinations Ctrl+Shift+O for original hits
and Ctrl+Shift+C for secondary hits.

Where hits from the original and secondary search overlap the hit is highlighted in red.

Navigation

To move to each of the highlighted hits either use the context menu or press F3 (or Shift+F3 to
move backwards). Navigation is always to the next highlighted match independent of whether that
was from the original or secondary search. Therefore, to only move through the secondary search
hits turn off the highlighting for the original search.

1.7 Search Navigation

Using search navigation it is possible to browse and/or reuse previous searches. Much like the
forward and back buttons on a web browser the search navigation buttons navigate backwards or
forwards through searches.

The number of searches available for browsing is determined by the Search Navigation settings
in the History Settings.

1.8 Favorites

Searches that are performed frequently can be saved as Favorites. Favorites are saved
searches that can be quickly loaded into the search panel for easy movement between different
search types.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 37

To access the Favorites functionality click the Favorite button on the toolbar (or press Ctrl+D):

This will open the Favorites pane and display any previously saved favorites.

Adding a Favorite

To add a new favorite click the Add Favorite toolbar button:

which will open the Add a Favorite dialog:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

38 FileLocator Pro

There are two values to associate with the favorite:

Desc A short meaningful description of the favorite

riptio
n
Tags (Optional) Tags that can be used to help group favorites and aid favorite filtering

Managing Favorites

When you click on a favorite it will be loaded into the current search window. To load the favorite
into a new search window open the favorite's context menu and click 'Open in New Window'.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 39

To filter the number of favorites displayed enter search terms in the 'Search' box. Any favorites
that include all the terms in either the Description or Tags (or combination of both) will be
displayed.

Importing Favorites

Favorites are simply saved searches, ie SRF files, with just a little extra meta data for the
description and tags. Therefore you can import existing SRF files as favorites by copying them
into the Favorites folder. To open the Favorites folder click on the Open Favorites Folder toolbar
button:

1.9 Reports

FileLocator Pro's reporting feature provides a quick way to export, print and summarize search
information. There are four main reports: File List Report, Contents Report, Keywords Summary
Report and Keyword by File Report. All the reports can be customized to include/exclude different
sections and columns.

File List Report

The File List Report is very similar to the File List View and is only available in a Tabulated style.
The report only outputs file information, ie it does not output any of the found content.

Contents Report

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

40 FileLocator Pro

The Contents Report is for reporting on the found content. In the Standard style the output looks
similar to the output displayed in the Hits tab.

The report can also display information in a Tabulated style, which is better suited if you need to
export the information to a spreadsheet application.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 41

Keyword Summary Report

Keyword statistics are displayed in the Keyword Summary Report. Each keyword is displayed
along with the total number of occurrences of that keyword found during the search. If the keyword
includes wildcard characters then the statistics are broken down into each separate keyword the
keyword pattern matches. The keyword breakdown can be disabled by removing the Keyword
Hit column.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

42 FileLocator Pro

Keyword by File Report

While the Keyword Summary Report displays combined keyword hit statistics across the whole
search the Keyword by File Report breaks down the keyword statistics on a file by file basis.

Report Options

To customize the information shown in each report click the Options button (shown highlighted
below).

The Report Options lists the available columns for each report and which headers to display for
the report. The options shown below are for the Contents report.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 43

1.10 Sessions, Workspaces and Search Criteria

FileLocator Pro allows search data to be exported in a number of different ways but while the
Export Results and Reports functionality is useful for exporting to common formats, such as Text,
CSV, and HTML, these formats can't be used to reload search data back into the application. For
that FileLocator Pro has three different save options: Search Criteria, Sessions, and
Workspaces.

Search Criteria

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

44 FileLocator Pro

The simplest save option (and the one used by the Favorites functionality) is to save just the
Search Criteria using the File -> Save Criteria menu option. The resulting SRF file can be used
to load FileLocator Pro's search criteria fields.

Note: The SRF file also contains the configuration settings at the time of the save but these are
not normally re-applied when the SRF file is loaded. However, by using the command line switch
'-pc' the current configuration can be reset to configuration settings at the same of the save.

Sessions

A single search tab is referred to as a Session and can be saved using the File -> Save Search
menu option. The resulting FLSX file contains the search criteria and search results for not just
the current search but also the search history for that search tab (if specified).

Workspaces

A Workspace consists of all the search Sessions and can be saved use the File -> Save
Workspace menu option. The resulting FLWX file contains the search criteria and search results
for all the specified search sessions.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 45

1.11 Index Manager

The Index Manager can be launched from the Index Search interface or from the menu option
Tools -> Index Manager.

The Index Manager application controls the indexes available for searching and update
scheduling.

Index List

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 46 FileLocator Pro

Index List. Shows a summary of all available indexes. Operations can be performed on
each index using the main or context menus.

Index Details. Shows details for the currently selected index or group

For more information see Index List.

Index Schedule List

For more information see Index Scheduling.

1.11.1 Index List

The Index List shows individual indexes and index groups. Various operations are available for
via the toolbars, menus, and keyboard short-cuts:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 47

Edit Index modify the index parameters

Remove index remove the index from the list or completely delete the index

Add New Index create a new index or reference an existing index

Update index rescan the indexed files look for any changes

Recreate index delete the index and re-create from scratch

Cancel indexing Cancel the indexing process currently in operation and rolling back to
the previous index state.

Index Details

The index details contains a summary of information about the index and various tabs that drill
down on the index information and status to help diagnose issues.

Explore Tab

The Explore tab allows you to view the details for the items in the index. It reads directly from the
index and so provides a good indication of what is searchable in the index.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

48 FileLocator Pro

The information available shows the attributes recorded the last time the item was indexed:

Name Name of the item.

Modified The last modified date.

Size Size of the item.

Index date Date item was last indexed.

Terms The number of indexed terms recorded for the item.

Content Yes/No flag indicating if contents of the item was indexed.

Binary file Yes/No flag indicating if the item was detected as having non-text content.

Error Yes/No flag indicating if an error was detected when indexed the item.

Partial Index Yes/No flag indicating if the item was too large to index and was therefore
only partially indexed.

Attribute Item attributes, for debugging purposes.

Update Log

The Update Log is a log of files that were indexed, it is not read from the index but from a
separate database that monitors the indexing operations. Any file indexing errors are reported
here.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 49

The information available shows the important log information for the item:

Time Item log time

Name Name of the item

Location Path to item

Duration Amount of time spent indexing item. This is an indication only and can be
skewed by index maintenance tasks that could interrupt indexing.

Size Size of the item.

Type Type of index action taken:

Indexed: Item was indexed, including content.

Indexed - Name Only: Only the name of the item was indexed.
Unchanged: Item was unchanged in the last index update and so the content
was not re-indexed.

Status Status of the index operation, either: Success, Warning, Error. See Message
column for more details on any warnings or errors.

Message More information for any log items that are flagged as Warning or Error.

Updates Counter to indicate how many times the log item has been updated, for
debugging purposes.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

50 FileLocator Pro

History Tab

The History tab shows a high-level history of indexing actions, such as updates, monitoring etc.

Messages Tab

The Messages tab shows recent messages that were produced during indexing actions.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 51

1.11.2 Create/Edit Index

To add an existing index click the Add Index button in the Index Manager and select Create a
new index option.

Index Name and Store

Index name The main identifier for the index.

Store Index The folder where the index data is stored.

Index Content

These settings decide what is included in the index:

Documents/PDF/Text Files Includes common document types, such as Word, Excel,

PDF etc. and regular text files.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

52 FileLocator Pro

Outlook PST/MSG Files Includes emails from within PST, OST and MSG files. To
index the attachments of the emails check the Email
attachments option.

Specific files Other file types that might not be included in the options
above. For example to include two extra file types ALT and
ALT2 you would add:

*.alt;*.alt2

Or, if you wanted to ONLY index DOC files you would

uncheck the Documents/PDF/Text Files option and add:

*.doc

Include all other files using name Includes the file names of all the other files which were
only found during indexing but didn't have their content indexed.
This allows for files to be found by name without requiring
their content to also be indexed.

Index Locations

These settings decide which locations will be scanned for valid index content:

Standard document locations Includes the standard document locations such as

Desktop, My Documents, My Music, My Pictures etc.

Specific locations Other locations to scan for indexable content. To include

multiple locations separate them with a semi-colon, e.g.

M:\Documents;S:\Archive

Advanced Settings

Additional settings are available via the 'Advanced...' link.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 53

Enable case sensitive searching By default case-sensitive searching is switched off, since
case sensitive searching requires the index to include the
case-sensitive variants of the same word and therefore
increases the size of the index. You can enable case-
sensitive searching by checking this option.

Detect binary content Switching this option on prevents binary (ie non-text data)
from being indexed. (Recommended)

Allow partial commits If this option is enabled the indexer will periodically commit
changes to the index during the update/recreate process.
This means that if the indexer is prevented from finishing
(power-cut, crash etc.) the index will contain recent
changes.

Note: This option does not have any impact on Index

Monitoring, which always periodically commits changes.

Index compressed archives To index compressed archives, such as ZIP, RAR etc.
check the appropriate extensions.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 54 FileLocator Pro

1.11.3 Index Scheduling

The Index Scheduler allows you to specify the update frequency for different indexes. Where
some indexes may be based on static rarely changing data, others may be based on dynamic
frequently changing data. Without regular updates searches on indexes where the underlying data
is frequently changing can become quickly unreliable.

Important: The index scheduler runs as a hidden user process and so relies on the user being
logged on to work. If you need indexes updated whilst the user is not logged on you might want to
consider using Windows Task Scheduler to run the update task via flpidx.exe.

The Schedule List shows active schedules and the Schedule Details shows the details for the
actively selected schedule.

Adding a new schedule

Click on the Add Schedule button in the toolbar to add a new schedule:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 55

Real-time Monitoring

Real-time monitoring actively monitors index locations for changes, as changes are recorded the
indexer will incrementally re-index the changed files.

Refresh Frequency

Even with real-time monitoring enabled it is recommend to run a full index update periodically.
The frequency can be Daily, Weekly, or Monthly.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 56 FileLocator Pro

Assigned Indexes

A schedule can have one or more indexes assigned to it, each index will be monitored and
updated according to the schedule. It is possible to assign the same index to more than one
schedule, in which case the index will be updated according to each schedule.
1.11.4 Shared Indexes

Indexes can be shared among multiple users. To add an existing index click the Add Index
button in the Index Manager and select Reference an existing index option.

Then select the location the index is stored:

Important

When performing index based searches FileLocator Pro uses the index to initially identify valid
files but then re-accesses the file when displaying the results to the user. Therefore, for an index
to be shared successfully among multiple users the index must use a location that is available to
all users and mapped in the same way.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 57

For example, to index the mapped network folder S:\IndexFiles all users of the index must have
the same mapping for S:\ and be able to access all files included in the index otherwise the user
will see results but no hits, e.g.

1.11.5 Command line utility

Indexes can be created, updated, or recreated via the console application:

flpidx.exe -name [index name] | -path [path to index store] | -recreate | -update | -create | -cf | -
d [locations] | -ds | -f [file types] | -fd | -fm | -fma | -fnc | -remove | -delete | -verbose | -help

-name [index name] Name of the index to perform the operation on.
-path [index path] Path to the location of the index store.
-addref Add a reference to an existing index to the list of indexes
-list Print the list of indexes
-recreate Re-create the index
-update Update the index with changes found
-create Create a new index

-cf Enable case-sensitive searching

-d [locations] Semi-colon list of locations to index
-ds Index standard document locations
-f [file types] File types for indexing (e.g. *.doc;*.docx;*.txt)
-fd Index standard document files types
-fm Index Outlook PST/MSG files
-fma Index email attachments
-fnc Include file names for non-content file types
-i Index the files now

-remove Remove the index reference from the configured index list (use
with -delete to delete the index files)
-scheduler Start the scheduler process.
-help Show help information
-verbose Show detailed information of files being indexed

Examples:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 58 FileLocator Pro

To update the 'Emails' index the command line would be:

flpidx.exe -name "Emails" -update

To recreate the index stored in 'C:\Indexes\Shared' the command line would be:

flpidx.exe -path "C:\Indexes\Shared" -recreate

To create a new index stored in 'C:\Indexes\New' the command line would be:

flpidx.exe -create -name "New Index" -path "C:\Indexes\New"

-ds -fd -i

Note:

Since flpidx.exe is a console application when you run it you might get an annoying console
window popping up. To prevent the console window from displaying you can run flpidx.exe via the
IndexManager.exe application using the -exec flag, e.g.

IndexManager.exe -exec -name "Emails" -update

1.12 Hints & Tips

Searching for multiple You can search multiple files by using regular expressions or Wildcard
file types expressions. e.g.
Searching the file types .cpp, .h, .c, .INL the regular expression would
be:
\.(cpp|h|c|INL)$

OR, alternatively as a Wildcard expression it would be:

*.cpp;*.h;*.c;*.INL

Excluding file types Prefix Wildcard expression with NOT: to exclude certain file types from
being searched. For example, you can search everything but COM and
EXE files by setting the file name to the Wildcard Expression:
NOT:*.exe;*.com

Searching multiple FileLocator Pro can search multiple folder paths. In the 'Look In' field
locations separate each folder with a semi-colon e.g.
c:\winnt;c:\tmp

Using expressions in Expressions are supported on folder paths, to use the feature use the
the Look In field expression drop down list next to the Look In edit field. The expression
is not processed on the whole path but on the path parts, e.g.
c:\usr\dev\.*\release

would match all folders called "release" two levels down from the "c:
\usr\dev" folder.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Introduction 59

Launching FileLocator Pro can be integrated with the Windows Shell through the
FileLocator Pro from Shell Extensions settings. For example, while browsing files and
Windows Explorer folders in Windows Explorer you can launch FileLocator Pro by right-
clicking on the folder and selecting FileLocator Pro from the folder's
context menu or using the short-cut key combination Ctrl+F.

Common searches Save your most common search criteria as a SRF file and put a
shortcut to the file on the Start menu. Then when you open the shortcut
FileLocator Pro will start up with your most common search options.

Note: Make sure that FileLocator Pro is associated with SRF files in
the Shell Integration settings.

Specifying default You can specify the initial values for FileLocator Pro through command
values via the line parameters. There is even an option to switch off the GUI
command line (Graphical User Interface) and save the results directly to a file, useful
when integrating FileLocator Pro with other applications. To see a list
of valid command line parameters go to the "Help->Command Line
Parameters" dialog (or run FileLocatorPro.exe -h).

Performance effect of Word wrapping is expensive, especially when trying to display a lot of
word wrapping contents. If the Contents View display is slow consider switching Word
Wrapping off.

Performance effect of If you are selecting a large number of files and do not need to see the
Contents View search contents of those files it is much quicker to turn the 'Contents
View' off, through the "Window->Contents View->Hide" menu option.

Performance effect of FileLocator Pro deferred searching works in a two phase process.
deferred searching The first phase collects a list of files that match the File name criteria.
The second phase searches the contents of the files found in the first
phase. If many files are found in the first phase FileLocator Pro may
use a significant amount of memory resources maintaining the list of
files.

Therefore there is an option Immediate in the Search Settings to

instruct FileLocator Pro to search the contents of the file as soon as
the File name is matched, avoiding the maintenance of an internal file
list. The only drawback to immediate searching is that FileLocator Pro
cannot display a progress meter. Use this feature for more memory
efficient contents searching of a large group of files (i.e. > 1,000,000),
normally this option is NOT required.

FileLocator Pro will automatically switch to immediate searching if it

detects a very large search.

Note: The multi-phase searching option is compromise of these two

methods and is now the default search method.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 60 FileLocator Pro

Searching Unix and Unix and Mac text file formats use a different sequence to mark the
Mac files end of a line. Windows and DOS use the character sequence CR-LF
(Carriage Return - Line Feed) but Unix only uses LF and Mac only
uses CR. To instruct FileLocator Pro to look for alternative EOL (End
of Line) sequences go to the Configuration settings (via the menu
option "Tools->Configuration") and select Character Processing.

Testing regular Test your regular expressions through the "Tools->Regular Expression
expressions Tester" menu option.

Hiding/Showing Menu The menu can be hidden/shown by using the key combination
Alt+Ctrl+M.

More information can be found online at the Mythicsoft Knowledge Base:

http://www.mythicsoft.com/kb.

1.13 Questions/Comments ?

More information is available at the Mythicsoft Questions and Answers site:

http://qa.mythicsoft.com/

Or please feel free to contact us with any questions or comments at:

http://www.mythicsoft.com/filelocatorpro/support

Or via email: support@mythicsoft.com

If you would like to purchase a registration code please visit the web site:
http://www.mythicsoft.com/filelocatorpro/buy

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

Configuration

Part

II
 62 FileLocator Pro

2 Configuration

FileLocator Pro stores all its configuration information in XML files located, by default, in the
Mythicsoft AppData folder defined in the Folder Settings. The configuration information can be
changed by clicking on the Configuration button on the tool bar or by selecting the
'Configuration...' option from the 'Tools' menu.

Configuration Window

The configuration information is presented as tree view of configuration groups and individual
settings for each group.

For more information visit the help page for each group:
· General Settings
· Expression Settings
· Editor Settings
· Advanced Settings

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 63

· Extensions Settings

2.1 General Settings

General settings are broken up into the following configuration groups:

· History
· Display
· Search
· Email
· Character Processing
· Shell Integration
· Sounds/Alerts
· Localization
· Colors
· User Interface

2.1.1 History Settings

History settings control which information FileLocator Pro remembers about previous searches.

To clear the current history click the 'Clear History...' button. To clear the history every time
FileLocator Pro exists check the 'Clear all history on exit'.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 64 FileLocator Pro

Remember

Options settings When checked FileLocator Pro restores options settings from
the last search session, such as expression type, match case
settings etc.
Window size When checked FileLocator Pro restores the Window
positioning from the last session.
Column sort order When checked FileLocator Pro remembers the column sort
order between searches.
Load last search on startup When checked FileLocator Pro loads, on startup, the criteria
used for the last successful search. This option effectively
overrides the 'Options settings' since the last search will
include all the options.

Maximum List Sizes

Recent Files The number of files shown in the Recent Files list on the File menu.
Drop Down Lists The maximum number of items shown in the criteria drop down list
boxes, e.g. File name, Containing text, and Look in. These items are
remembered across sessions so the list from the previous session will
be used to initialize the list of the new session.
Search Navigation The maximum number of searches shown in the search navigation list.
Searches are not remembered across sessions so the list is always
initially empty.

2.1.2 Display Settings

Display settings control how FileLocator Pro displays results.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 65

Display Lines

Max displayed lines per file Limits the number of lines that will be returned per file,
to avoid errant searches on very large file consuming
too much memory. The default is 10,000 lines.

Limit the maximum characters When checked, limits the number of characters
displayed per line displayed in the Contents View for each line (the
abbreviated line is centered around the found text on
the line).

If not checked the full line, as defined in the Character

Processing Settings, is displayed.

Surrounding lines

Sets the number of surrounding lines stored for each found line. Surrounding lines are shown in
the Contents View pane and can be seen by clicking on the '+' expand icon next to the found line.

The settings only effects new searches so old searches will continue to display the surrounding
lines previously recorded.

File path display preference

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 66 FileLocator Pro

When FileLocator Pro displays file paths there are several display options for when the path
doesn't fit in the available space. For example, the sample path:

C:\Program Files\Mythicsoft\FileLocator Pro\FileLocatorPro.exe

if display space was limited should be displayed as:

Truncation method File List View Contents View

Don't truncate C:\Program Files\Mythics... C:\Program

Files\Mythicsoft\FileLocator
Pro\FileLocatorPro.exe

Truncate start ...Mythicsoft\FileLocator Pro ...soft\FileLocator

Pro\FileLocatorPro.exe

Truncate middle C:\...soft\FileLocator Pro C:\...\FileLocator

Pro\FileLocatorPro.exe

Truncate end C:\Program Files\Mythics... C:\Program Files\My...

\FileLocatorPro.exe

2.1.3 Search Settings

Search settings define how FileLocator Pro searches files.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 67

Search Method

When searching the contents of files FileLocator Pro can operator in one of three modes:

Multi- As files are discovered they are added to a queue for immediate search. Files are
phas continually added to the queue and concurrently files are pulled from the queue (in the
e order they were added) for content searching.
(defa
ult)
Imme As files are found they are immediately searched. The search does not progress to
diate matching the next file until there is a free content searching thread.

Orde As files are discovered they are added to a queue. Once this queuing/discovery phase
red has finished the files are content searched in the order chosen: default, File name, Size,
Modified, Folder depth.

This also has the benefit that accurate content searching progress can be shown because
the full list is known.

Note: Prior to version 8 this was the default search method.

The Calculate Hit Count option specifies whether or not FileLocator Pro displays the number of
hits found within each file in the Hit column in the File List View. When this option is switched OFF
FileLocator Pro may search files in 'Just In Time' (JIT) search mode.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 68 FileLocator Pro

JIT searching only searches enough of the file to decide whether or not it is a valid result and not
necessarily the whole file. The last search position in the file is recorded and the file is only
completely searched when the full results are required for display or export. This can be useful for
searching very large files where the full results aren't necessarily required.

Search As You Type

For index searching and text tab searching the search is started as soon as you start typing. You
can switch this feature off by unchecking these options and the search will only occur when you
press Enter.

2.1.4 Email Settings

Email Settings control how FileLocator Pro searches through email repositories, such as MSG
and PST files.

The options are:

Include parent message name in If this option is checked an attachment prefixes the parent
attachment name message's name to its name, e.g. An attachment name
"Welcome.png" would be named something like
"RE:Hello from Mythicsoft - File: Welcome.png".

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 69

This is useful if you want to search by the parent message

name AND attachment name at the same time.
Add separate message body With this option checked each message has a separate
text attachment .txt file attachment with the message body text. This is
useful if you want to extract the message body as a text
file from a group of emails.
Remove HTML markup from If the message body contains HTML this option will
message body remove the markup from the HTML to try and present
cleaner text.

Thunderbird

Since the default Thunderbird mailbox file has no extension and treating all files without an
extension as MBOX files would be an expensive search operation the product uses the
Thunderbird Profile configuration to determine where files without an extension are read as
MBOX files. If you need to search through Thunderbird mbox files outside of the Thunderbird
profiles either add the location of the mbox files to the Thunderbird Profile or give the mbox files a
.mbox extension.

For more information on Thunderbird search please see Thunderbird Searching.

2.1.5 Character Processing Settings

Character processing settings control how FileLocator Pro handles information found in files.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 70 FileLocator Pro

File name

When searching by File Name the expression is normally matched against just the name of the
file, e.g. *.txt would match history.txt. However, if you would like the File name field to
match against the full path of the file switch on the Include folder path in file name search
option, e.g. soft*.txt would match against:

C:\Program Files\Mythicsoft\Agent Ransack\Credits.txt

Containing Text

When searching by Containing Text the expression is normally matched against just the contents
of the file. To include the file name and/or path in the content search use the Include file name in
content search or Include folder path in content search options, otherwise only the content
of the file is used for searching.

End of Line (EOL) Identifiers

Defines which other EOL identifiers FileLocator Pro should use. Normally a Windows text file will
use a CRLF (carriage return 0x0d, line feed 0x0a) combination to indicate the end of a line.
However, other operating systems use different standards, usually either a stand alone CR or a
stand alone LF character.

Maximum characters per line - sets the limit to the line length if an EOL character is not found.
Lines that exceed the maximum line length are broken into separate lines, although the line
number for the line stays the same.

2.1.6 Shell Integration Settings

Shell integration settings control how FileLocator Pro integrates into the Window shell.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 71

Associate with file types Associates FileLocator Pro with the files types:
- SRF the default extension for FileLocator Pro's saved
result file.
- FLSX the default extension for FileLocator Pro's saved
session file.
- FLWX the default extension for FileLocator Pro's
workspace file.

When set double-clicking on a file of any of those file types

will launch FileLocator Pro opening the specified file.

Add to a Folder's context menu Adds FileLocator Pro to the context menu of folders and
drives. This provides a convenient way to launch
FileLocator Pro for a given folder through right-clicking on
the folder and selecting the program from the context menu.

Add to a File's context menu Adds FileLocator Pro to the context menu of all files. This
provides a convenient way to use FileLocator Pro to search
a limited selection of files through right-clicking on a
selection of files, and selecting the program from the
context menu.

Replace default Explorer Search Launches FileLocator Pro, instead of Windows Search,
when Ctrl+F or F3 is pressed in Windows Explorer.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 72 FileLocator Pro

Enable HotKey launch Enables launching of FileLocator Pro using the key
combination WinKey+Alt+F or WinKey+Alt+F3.

Note: Hotkey support in enabled through the use of a small

light weight application called FLProHotKey that is added
to the system start-up list.

UAC Note: Since changing shell settings requires administrative privileges FileLocator Pro
launches a separate application, ShellAdmin.exe, to actually make the shell changes.
ShellAdmin.exe requires privilege escalation and therefore displays a UAC escalation request if
UAC is enabled.

2.1.7 Sounds/Alerts Settings

Sounds and Alerts configuration optionally provides additional visual or audible notifications for
different events.

File Found

Play sound Specifies the wave file to play if a file is found.

Show task bar notification Specifies whether or not to show a notification window by
message the task bar showing how many files have been found when
a file is found.
Repeat for every file found Causes the sound and task bar notifications to occur for
every file found and not just the first file found (the default).

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 73

Search Finished

Play sound Specifies the wave file to play when the search finishes.
Show task bar notification Specifies whether or not to show a notification window, by
message the task bar, showing that the search has finished and how
many files were found during the search.

2.1.8 Localization Settings

Localization settings specify which language should be used for the user interface.

2.1.9 Color Settings

Color settings for FileLocator Pro can be configured here.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

74 FileLocator Pro

Keyword Hits

Keyword hits can have a specific fore color, have bold weight, and/or be underlined. Each
keyword for Boolean searches will also be assigned one of ten different colors background
colors, e.g.

Each color can be changed by clicking on the color and selecting a different color:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 75

Text Tab highlighting

The text tab will use the keyword hits background colors but has separate settings for the fore
color, font weight, and italic options.
2.1.10 User Interface Settings

User Interface settings control the 'Look and Feel' of FileLocator Pro.

Theme

Defines the visual theme used to display the user interface. Options include:

· Standard
· Dark
· Blue
· Silver
· Classic

Look and Feel

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 76 FileLocator Pro

Tabbed search Individual searches are shown in a tabbed environment. If

this option is switched off an MDI interface is used.
Individual taskbar tab previews The taskbar includes separate previews for each tab
Show tabs in Content Views Shows or hides the tabs in the Contents View.

Default contents tab

This option specifies which tab should be shown when a result is selected in the File List View.

2.2 Expression Settings

Expression settings control the various matching rules for each of FileLocator Pro's expression
engines. This section is broken into:
· Boolean Expression Settings
· Wildcard Expression Settings
· Regular Expression Settings
· File Hash Settings

2.2.1 Boolean Expression Settings

Boolean expression settings are used to control how the operators LIKE and NEAR behave.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 77

LIKE Sensitivity

The LIKE operator can be configured for different sensitivity when matching search terms to
similar words. The possible settings are:

Very similar Only slight differences in words are accepted, e.g. a single character out of
place.
Similar A wider range of similar words will be matched, e.g. for larger words
multiple characters can be out of place.
Approximate Words only need a very approximate similarity to the search term to match.

NEAR Distance

By default the NEAR operator requires related search terms to be within 100 characters of each
other. This can be changed to a user defined limit. The lower the limit then the closer the terms
need to be to each other and vice versa.

Please see Boolean Expressions for more information on how to use Boolean Expressions.

Expression Parsing

When pasting an expression into FileLocator Pro from a 3rd party application, such as Microsoft
Word, the quotes may appear stylized, e.g. “Tower London” OR “Canary Wharf”. The
Process stylized quotes as normal quotes option instructs FileLocator Pro to convert those
quotes into the standard quotes FileLocator Pro uses to separate expressions, e.g. "Tower
London" OR "Canary Wharf".

2.2.2 Wildcard Expression Settings

Wildcard settings specify whether the expression matching rules will follow strict matching rules.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

78 FileLocator Pro

Strictly conforming

When set to 'Strictly conforming syntax' the matching rules will force a boundary check at the
beginning and end of the expression if a wildcard character is found. e.g.

the expression locator* would NOT match the filename FileLocatorPro.exe since it doesn't
begin with the term 'locator', instead the search term would need to be set to *locator*.

When the option has been switched off it is still possible to specify the boundary check using the
'<' and '>' characters, e.g.

the expression <locator*> is equivalent to Strict expression locator*

Imply boundary markers

When switched on Wildcard expression matching assumes that an expression that includes a dot
(period) is specifying a file extension and therefore implies a boundary marker at the end of the
expression, e.g. file*.txt will match:

filelocator.txt

but not:

filelocator.txt.backup

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 79

Please see Expression Types for more information about Wildcard Expressions.

Note: In earlier versions of the product Wildcard expressions used to be referred to as DOS
Expressions.
2.2.3 Regular Expression Settings

Regular expression settings defines the regex syntax to use when searching. This can either be
the Perl compatible regular expression syntax or the Classic regular expression syntax. See
Expression Types for more information.

When searching for text in foreign languages it can often be useful to 'Collate character ranges'
which allows characters outside the standard a-z range to be included in the range, e.g. to include
the é in Années when using the range [a-z]+

Multi-line Regular Expressions

The Max lines per match sets the maximum number of lines over which a single multi-line regular
expression match can be made, and therefore the maximum number of lines FileLocator Pro
needs to hold in memory when performing multi-line regular expression matching.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 80 FileLocator Pro

2.2.4 File Hash Settings

File Hashing Settings specifies which hashing algorithms FileLocator Pro should use when
searching for a given file hash.

2.3 Editor Settings

FileLocator Pro allows you to open files using the built-in viewer or external editors. These
options specify which viewer should be used:

· Default Editor
· External Editor
· Internal Viewer

2.3.1 Default Editor

FileLocator Pro by default uses its built-in file viewer to display a read-only view of a file's
contents. However, it is possible to change the default viewer to an external 3rd party editor by
specifying the path name and command line parameters for the external editor. Also, FileLocator
Pro supports opening files in Microsoft's Visual Studio.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 81

Visual Studio Version

If you have more than one version of Visual Studio installed you can pick which version you'd like
to use via the drop down list.
2.3.2 External Editor

To use an external editor specify the full path to the editor application and then, in the field below,
any command line parameters to be passed to the editor when it is launched. To pass the file
name and line number in the command line use the variables $(FILEPATH) and $(LINENUM).

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 82 FileLocator Pro

Common Editor Defaults - contains the preset settings to quickly set the command line
parameters for a few well known editors. To use these defaults simply select the editor from the
drop down list.
2.3.3 Internal Viewer

You can change the Tab size for the Internal Viewer.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 83

2.4 Advanced Settings

Advanced settings are broken up into the following configuration groups:

· File Lists
· Folders
· Junction Points
· Threads/Priority
· XSLT Processor

2.4.1 File Lists

File Lists indicate whether or not a criteria value can be loaded from a text file.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

84 FileLocator Pro

Example: File name list

If the File name criteria allows file lists (the default setting) then instead of specifying:
*.c;*.cpp;*.h;*.hpp;*.inl;*.res;*.rc

the user could specify:

=C:\FileLists\CodeFiles.txt

with CodeFiles.txt containing something like:

*.c
*.cpp
*.h
*.hpp
*.inl
*.res
*.rc

adding each expression on a new line.

Example: Containing text list

To search for a list of keywords from a file switch on 'Containing Text' file lists and then specify the
full path to the keyword file in the 'Containing text' criteria field on the Main tab:
=C:\FileLists\Keywords.txt

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 85

with Keywords.txt containing something like:

Telephone
Email
Contact

adding each keyword on a new line.

2.4.2 Folder Settings

Folder Settings specify the location that FileLocator Pro stores its configuration, log, favorites,
and temporary files.

The default locations are:

$(ApplicationData)\logs\
$(ApplicationData)\config\
$(ApplicationData)\Favorites\
$(TempFolder)\

The $(ApplicationData) macro evaluates to the ApplicationData folder defined by Windows. On

Windows 7 this is commonly:
C:\Users\<id>\AppData\Roaming\Mythicsoft\FileLocatorPro

Other macros available include $(InstallFolder) which evaluates to the installation location of
FileLocator Pro, e.g.
C:\Program Files\Mythicsoft\FileLocator Pro

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 86 FileLocator Pro

This can be very useful when installing FileLocator Pro to a USB drive so that all configuration
information is kept on the USB drive and not stored in the computer.

The information changed in this dialog is stored in the master.xml file located in the root of the
FileLocator Pro's installation folder.

$(TempFolder) evaluates to the default temp folder for the user.

2.4.3 Symbolic Links/Shortcuts

NTFS Junction Points are links to other folders on the system. They are similar to symbolic links
only stronger, ie. referring to a junction point is for most intents and purposes the same as
referring to the folder itself.

By default FileLocator Pro will search junction points, apart from junction points that have the
System and Hidden attributes (which normally identify system junction points).

2.4.4 Memory Manager Settings

If FileLocator Pro detects that it's consuming large amounts of memory it can truncate the search
results to reduce the amount of memory required. The Memory Manager Settings allow you to
customize the point at which truncation occurs or to switch off the functionality altogether.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 87

2.4.5 Threads/Priority Settings

Thread/Priority settings effect how FileLocator Pro uses the CPU.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

88 FileLocator Pro

Concurrent threads

By default FileLocator Pro searches or indexes files using a single thread for each CPU core,
which is usually the most efficient configuration. However, it is possible to specify a different
number of search threads by choose 'Custom' and specifying the maximum thread count.

Warning: If a machine has a single slow hard drive increasing the number of search threads may
slow FileLocator Pro down since the concurrent searches could cause the hard drive to
continually seek between the different file disc sector locations. More often than not file searching
is I/O bound rather than processor bound.

Process priority

FileLocator Pro can be instructed to change its process priority depending upon the current state
of the application:
· Foreground - the application has current user input focus.
· Background - the application does not have current user input focus but has not been
minimized.
· Minimized - the application has been minimized.

By default the priority for all states is 'Normal', which is the standard setting for Windows
applications. The alternative priorities are:
· High - the application process is given a higher priority than Normal processes but the priority
is still below processes with real-time priorities.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 89

· Low - the application process is given a lower priority than Normal processes but still receives
a reliable time-slice from the CPU.

2.4.6 XSLT Processor Settings

Save Results provides an option to run an XSL transform to provide custom formatting.
FileLocator Pro uses MS XML Core Services to provide the transform functionality but the actual
DOM Prog Id can be configured here.

2.5 Extensions

By default FileLocator Pro opens files in their raw binary format. While this works well for text
based formats other formats, such as ZIP files or MS Office files, do not work as well. Extensions
help FileLocator Pro in processing non-text based formats so that their underlying data is
correctly retrieved and searched.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 90 FileLocator Pro

Extensions are organized by:

· IFilters - filters based around Microsoft's indexing service filter specification.
· UTF-8 Default Format - file types that should, by default, be treated as UTF-8.
· Compressed Document Formats - file types that are stored as ZIP files.
· Application Extensions - filters based around Mythicsoft's in house filter specification.

2.5.1 IFilters

Microsoft Indexing Service uses filters, much like application extensions, to interpret given file
types into easily searchable text. FileLocator Pro can use these indexing service filters, without
the need to run the indexing service, to help convert files into easily searchable text.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 91

The list of currently installed IFilters is shown in the IFilter settings tab. To use the IFilter activate it
via the Enhanced File Search settings in the Options tab

A list of free IFilters can be found using a simple Internet search.

By default IFilters for HTML/XML based file types are not used because many users want to be
able to search the tags within an HTML document not just the text. However, if you want to search
just the text of HTML/XML files you can include the IFilters by checking the Include IFilters for
HTML/XML based file types.

The IFilter Search Priority determines which type of extension should be used for processing a
file if both an IFilter AND an application specific processing extension are registered. By default
IFilters are Secondary, ie they will only be used if an application specific extension is not found
or could not load the given file.

2.5.2 UTF-8 Default Format

If FileLocator Pro is unable to detect a file's encoding (through the BOM or XML header) it needs
to estimate the best encoding to try.

Auto detect UTF-8 files

With the auto-detect feature active FileLocator Pro will read the first 2KB of the file to see if any
specific UTF-8 character sequences can be found. If they are found it reads the file as UTF-8
otherwise it defaults to reading the file as ASCII text. However, it is possible to override this
behaviour and specify UTF-8 as the default format for given file types.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 92 FileLocator Pro

2.5.3 Compressed Document Raw Data Reader

When a document extension, such as DOC, is not active FileLocator Pro still tries to read the raw
data of the file. Some file types, however, such as Microsoft Office and Open Office use ZIP to
compress the document's data prior to storage, which requires FileLocator Pro to first unzip the
document file before searching the raw data.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 93

2.5.4 Application Extensions

Extensions help FileLocator Pro in processing non-text based formats so that their underlying
data is correctly retrieved and searched.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

94 FileLocator Pro

The screenshot shows the configuration for the ZIP extension, which is used to read files in the
ZIP format. The configuration shows that the ZIP extension should be used for all files with a .zip
or .jar extension but could be changed to include any other zip based formats.

Safe Mode

An extension is normally run in the same process space as FileLocator Pro since it is the fastest
way for FileLocator Pro to communicate with the extension. However, running the extension in the
same process space does mean that if the extension has a catastrophic failure it can crash
FileLocator Pro. To avoid crashing FileLocator Pro troublesome extensions can be run in 'Safe
Mode', which causes them to run in their own process space, but it does mean that using the
extension may cause FileLocator Pro to run slightly slower.

Indexing Service Filter

While FileLocator Pro provides extensions for some well known file types, e.g. DOC, XLS etc, it
is sometimes faster to use Indexing Service Filters if they are available. The 'Use Indexing
Service Filter' check box instructs FileLocator Pro to try and find an Indexing Service Filter and
use that instead of the FileLocator Pro extension if one exists.

Note: Using an indexing service filter does not require the indexing service to be switched on
merely that the filter is installed on the machine.

Exclude file type from content searches when not active

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Configuration 95

Some file formats, such as ZIP, do not include useful searchable binary data within them so there
is little point in searching through the file if the extension has not been activated. To avoid wasting
time searching through such file formats set the 'Exclude' flag.

Custom Extensions

User defined extensions using an external program to convert a given format into text will also be
listed. Instructions on how to add user defined extensions can be found in the Custom Extensions
topic.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

Advanced features

Part

III
 Advanced features 97

3 Advanced features

More information on advanced features:

· Command line
· Expression types
· Boolean Expressions
· Scripting
· Look In
· Persistent Search Filters
· Unicode Support
· Search within Search
· Outlook PST Archive Searching
· MSG File Searching

3.1 Command Line

FileLocator Pro's start up values can be altered through information passed in the command line.
If an output file is specified then the actual User Interface is not displayed and the results are
streamed directly to the file. Alternatively, there is also a console version of the program which
displays information on the console instead of through the Windows user interface.

Windows application:

FileLocatorPro.exe [saved search] | -o [output file] | -oa | -oc |

-ol [num] | -oe? | -of? | -ofr:? | -ofrs:? | -ofxslt [XSLT file] |
-os | -r | -d [folder name] | -c [containing text] | -f [file
name] | -cm | -fm | -s | -fd | -fx | -cr | -pa | -po | -ma
[datetime] | -mb [datetime] | -a? | -view [file] | -idxname
[name] | -idxpath [path] | -h | -?

Console application:

flpsearch.exe [saved search] | -o [output file] | -oa | -oc | -ol

[num] | -oe? | -of? | -ofr:? | -ofrs:? | -ofxslt [XSLT file] | -
os | -d [folder name] | -c [containing text] | -f [file name] |
-cm | -fm | -s | -fd | -fx | -cr | -pa | -po | -ma [datetime] | -
mb [datetime] | -a? | -idxname [name] | -idxpath [path] |
-h | -?

Parameters:

-a? Attributes: -aa=Archive, -ac=Compressed, -ae=Encrypted, -ai=Index, -

af=Folder, -ah=Hidden, -ao=Offline, -ar=ReadOnly, -asys=System, -
asp=Sparse
-c Text to search for in specified files (i.e. the Containing Text field)
-ce? Contents expr type: -ceb=Boolean, -cex=Regular Expression, -cexl=Multi-line
Regex, -cee=Plain Text, -ceh=Boolean RegEx, -cew=Whole Word, -cefh=File

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

98 FileLocator Pro

Hash, -cez=Fuzzy
-cf Contents expression spans file (only valid with Boolean expressions)
-cm Match case when contents searching
-d Directory(s) to search (i.e. the Look In field), use -dw for current working
directory
-f File names to search for
-fe? File name expr type: -fed=DOS, -fex=Regular Expression, -feb=Boolean, -
fee=Plain Text, -feh=Boolean RegEx, -few=Whole Word, -fez = Fuzzy
-fm Match case when comparing file names
-fx File name shows the file names to exclude
-le? Look In expr type: -leb=Boolean, -lex=Regular Expression, -lee=Plain Text
-idxname Name of index to search - case sensitive.
-idxpath Path of index to search
-ma Modified after date value, pass "now" as the date to use the current date and
time
-mb Modified before date value, pass "now" as the date to use the current date and
time
-o Output filename (runs the search without showing the user interface, streaming
results directly to the file)
-oa Append to output file
-oc Output content lines
-oe? Output encoding: -oea=ASCII, -oe8=UTF-8, -oeu=Unicode, -oe8nb=UTF8 (no
BOM), -oeub=Unicode (big endian)
-of? Output format: -oft = Text (default), -ofc = CSV, -ofb = Tab, -ofbs = Tab
(Spreadsheet), -ofx = XML, -ofh = HTML, -oflsx = Search Session
-ofr:? Output format report: -ofr:files, -ofr:contents, -ofr:keywords, -ofr:file-keywords, -
ofr:errors
-ofrs:? Output report style: -ofrs:standard, -ofrs:tabulated
-ofxslt Output custom format XSL Transform
-ol Maximum number of found lines per file to output
-os Output surrounding lines of text
-pa Always use command line parameters when creating new or opening existing
searches
Note: This option can be used to force a criteria value to be preset to a certain
value whenever the user creates a new search, regardless of the previously
used value.

-pc Overwrite configuration with configuration stored in saved search criteria file.
Note: Configuration settings, such as active compressed file types (e.g Zip) or
character processing settings, are not normally loaded from the SRF file. This
option forces the loading of the configuration settings from the SRF file,
effectively setting FileLocator Pro to the identical state it was in when the SRF
file was saved.

-po Override values from file when loading from file AND specifying command line
parameters
-r Start search immediately (implied by -o option)

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 99

-re? Regular expression type: -rep=Perl syntax, -rec=Classic syntax

-resetui Resets the user interface to the default size and position, ie toolbars, menu,
docked windows etc. are reset to the installation defaults.
-s Search subfolders
-view Open a file in the Internal Viewer (use -viewline and -viewcol to specify line and
column)

-h or -? Show the help dialog

To switch an option off append 'n' to the flag, e.g.

FileLocatorPro.exe -fmn Switches OFF match case when comparing files

When performing an index search using the -idxXX flags only the -c flag is used to further restrict
the search. Other search criteria such as -a, -f, -ma etc. are ignored.

Examples:

To launch FileLocator Pro with the Look In field pre-filled with "C:\Documents and
Settings\user\My Documents" the command line arguments would be:

FileLocatorPro.exe -d "C:\Documents and Settings\user\My

Documents"

To run a search looking for files that match *.sys in the folder C:\WINDOWS without
launching the usual user interface but instead streaming the results directly to an output
file the command line arguments would be:

FileLocatorPro.exe -d "C:\WINDOWS" -f "*.sys" -o "c:

\temp\results.txt"

To launch FileLocator Pro with Search subfolders switched off and Match case on
contents searching switched on the command line arguments would be:

FileLocatorPro.exe -cm -sn

Indexing Utility

Indexes can be created, updated, or recreated via the console application:

flpidx.exe -name [index name] | -path [path to index store] | -recreate | -update | -create | -cf | -
d [locations] | -ds | -f [file types] | -fd | -fm | -fma | -fnc | -remove | -delete | -verbose | -help

-name [index name] Name of the index to perform the operation on.
-path [index path] Path to the location of the index store.
-addref Add a reference to an existing index to the list of indexes

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

100 FileLocator Pro

-list Print the list of indexes

-recreate Re-create the index
-update Update the index with changes found
-create Create a new index

-cf Enable case-sensitive searching

-d [locations] Semi-colon list of locations to index
-ds Index standard document locations
-f [file types] File types for indexing (e.g. *.doc;*.docx;*.txt)
-fd Index standard document files types
-fm Index Outlook PST/MSG files
-fma Index email attachments
-fnc Include file names for non-content file types
-i Index the files now

-remove Remove the index reference from the configured index list (use
with -delete to delete the index files)
-scheduler Start the scheduler process.
-help Show help information
-verbose Show detailed information of files being indexed

Examples:

To update the 'Emails' index the command line would be:

flpidx.exe -name "Emails" -update

To recreate the index stored in 'C:\Indexes\Shared' the command line would be:

flpidx.exe -path "C:\Indexes\Shared" -recreate

To create a new index stored in 'C:\Indexes\New' the command line would be:

flpidx.exe -create -name "New Index" -path "C:\Indexes\New"

-ds -fd -i

Note:

Since flpidx.exe is a console application when you run it you might get an annoying console
window popping up. To prevent the console window from displaying you can run flpidx.exe via the
IndexManager.exe application using the -exec flag, e.g.

IndexManager.exe -exec -name "Emails" -update

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 101

3.2 Expression Types

FileLocator Pro supports the following expression types:

· Boolean
· Boolean RegEx
· Whole Word
· Fuzzy
· Wildcard
· Exact match
· Regular expression
· File Hash

Boolean Expressions

Boolean expressions combine individual search phrases using the AND, OR, NOT, LIKE and
NEAR operators. For more information see Boolean Expressions.

Boolean RegEx Expressions

Boolean RegEx expressions are a special type of Boolean expression that allow regular
expressions to be combined using the AND, OR, and NOT operators. For more information see
Boolean Expressions.

Whole Word Expressions

Whole Word expressions match the search phrases exactly as typed ignoring partial word
matches. Since Whole Word expressions are a special type of Boolean expression individual
search phrases can be combined using the AND, OR, and NOT operators. For more information
see Boolean Expressions.

Fuzzy Search

Fuzzy search expressions match the approximate search terms, in exactly the same way as the
LIKE operator for Boolean Expressions . Since Fuzzy search expressions are a special type of
Boolean expression individual search phrases can be combined using the AND, OR, and NOT
operators. For more information see Boolean Expressions.

Wildcard Expressions

Wildcard expressions are usually used to specify groups of files. Use a semi-colon to specify
multiple groups, e.g.

The expression *.cpp;*.h searches for files that end with .cpp or .h

The characters '<' and '>' can be used to match the beginning and end of a file name, e.g.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 102 FileLocator Pro

The expression <file* only matches files that begin with the term file and NOT files
that simply have the term file in them.

For more information see Wildcard Expressions.

Plain Text

Plain text matching will match the text as entered (ie literally).

Regular Expression

FileLocator Pro can be configured to use Perl compatible regexp syntax or the Classic syntax in
the Options tab. Basic regular expression can be built using the Expression Wizard

Classic syntax

FileLocator Pro's classic regexp syntax is based on the most commonly used regular expression
elements, more information can be found in the Quick Start section.

Perl compatible syntax

Perl compatible regexp syntax is based around the Boost regular expression engine and includes
not only the functionality of the 'classic' regular expression engine but also additional Perl style
expression enhancements detailed here: http://www.boost.org/doc/libs/release/libs/regex.

File Hash

If the content type is set to File Hash then each file is put through a number of hashing algorithms
(as defined in the File Hash Settings). The resulting hashes are returned as lines in a text file with
each hash on a new line. The specified Containing text value is matched against each hash in the
list.

3.3 Boolean Expressions

FileLocator Pro's Boolean expression engine supports Web style search expressions using the
AND, OR, NOT, NEAR, REGEX, and LIKE operators. FileLocator Pro can be configured to
match the expression across the whole file (default) or on a line by line basis in the Options Tab.

Line by Line example

The expression work AND document searches for lines that include the words work
and document. Since FileLocator Pro implicity assumes an AND the expression can
alternatively be written as work document.

The expression work OR document searches for lines that include either 'work' or
'document'.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 103

The expression work NOT document searches for lines that include 'work' but not
'document'.

Whole file example

The expression work AND document searches for files that include the words work
and document. The words can occur on the same line or on different lines throughout the
file.

The expression work NOT document searches for files that include work but not
document anywhere in the file.

Note: the operators AND, OR, and NOT must be written in capital letters otherwise they are
assumed to be search terms.

Quotes can be used to search for literal phrases, e.g.

"work document" searches for the exact phrase work document.

Brackets can be used to specify phrase grouping, e.g.

The expression work AND (document OR letter) searches for lines that include
work and either document or letter.

LIKE Operator

If the spelling of the search term is unsure, or possibly misspelled in the search text, the LIKE
operator can be used to specify an approximate search term. For example,

LIKE necessary

will find necessary but also slight variations such as neccessary. The scale of the
approximation can be changed in the Configuration settings.

NEAR Operator

To specify that two search terms should be near to each other in the search text use the NEAR
operator. For example,

work NEAR document

will only match the two terms if they are within a certain number of characters of each other (the
default maximum character distance is specified in the Configuration settings). The maximum
distance can be specified as part of the expression, e.g.

work NEAR:20 document

would search change the default maximum distance to 20 characters.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

104 FileLocator Pro

REGEX Operator

To specify that a term is a regular expression use the REGEX operator. For example,

work AND REGEX "\d{5,6}"

will match any document that has the term work and the regex \d{5,6} (ie. a number with 5-6
digits) in it. To specify that terms should always be treated as regular expressions, ie without the
need to use the REGEX operator, use the Boolean RegEx expression type (see below).

LINES Operator

The LINES operator limits the lines that are searched for the following expression. For example,

LINES:3-5 (tower AND london)

searches only lines 3, 4, and 5 for the expression tower AND london.

LINES:10+ (tower AND london)

searches all lines from line 10 and higher.

FILELIST Operator

The FILELIST operator loads the specified file as a File List. For example,

work AND FILELIST "C:\TermList.txt"

Note: Since the use of the FILELIST operator is explicit the functionality will work regardless of the
File Lists settings.

Boolean Sub Expressions

Boolean expressions are comprised of sub expressions. The sub expression type will depend on
the Expression Type chosen

Boolean Each phrase is matched exactly as typed but will match against partial
(no wildcards1) words.
e.g.
fish will match against the words fish, fishing and selfish.

Boolean Allows wildcard characters '*' and '?'. '?' will match any single character
(with wildcards1) and '*' will match zero or more characters until the end of the word.
e.g.
fish* will match against the words fish, fishing, and selfish.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 105

The wildcard setting also allows word boundary matching using the '<' and
'>' characters to specify the beginning or end of the word, e.g.

<fish> will match against only the whole word fish and not fishing
or selfish. Similarily fish> would match both fish and selfish but
not fishing since the word must end with fish.

To search for the literal text fish* or fish> put the search term in
quotes, e.g. "fish*" or "fish>"

Boolean RegEx Each phrase is treated as a regular expression. If the regular expression
includes spaces or parenthesis use quotes to group the expression
together.
e.g.
trout.* OR "fish(es|ing)"

Whole Word Each phrase is matched exactly as typed.

e.g.
fish will match against only the word fish and not fishing or
selfish.

1
The wildcard setting is specified in the Options tab (the default is to allow wildcards).

Example: Boolean RegEx

By using the Boolean RegEx expression type regular expression searches can be combined
using the operators AND, OR, and NOT. The regular expressions are evaluated on each line but
the behaviour of the Boolean combination of those regex results, ie line by line or across whole
file, is defined by the Boolean Expression settings in the Options Tab.

Line by Line example

The expression [0-9]+ AND document searches for lines that include both a number
and the word document.

The expression "[a-z]+@[a-z]+" NOT "\.(com|net)" searches for lines with

email like text but not including .com or .net. Note the use of quotes to show the regular
expression grouping (otherwise the brackets would have been treated as a boolean
grouping).

Whole file example

The expression "([0-9]+\.){3}[0-9]+" AND error searches for files with an IP

address and the word error somewhere in the file but not necessarily on the same line.

Quotes are used to identify parts of the expression that are regular expressions.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 106 FileLocator Pro

Note: Due to the complex nature of the Boolean RegEx expression type searches using it are
usually slower than with the other expression types. Therefore use of Boolean RegEx is only
recommended when its specific capabilities are required.

3.4 Wildcard Expressions

Wildcard expressions use the familiar wildcards * and ? to specify groups of files, e.g. *.pdf to
specify a group of files with the PDF extension. However, FileLocator Pro extends the normal
Wildcard functionality with some additional special characters:

Character Description Example

* Matches zero or more characters Tower*London - file/folder
with Tower followed by London
in their name.
? Matches any single character *.as?x - files with a four letter
extensions that begin with AS
and end X, e.g. Page.aspx or
Home.ascx.
< Start of file indicator <New - file/folder must begin
with New, eg. New York
Trip.txt but not My New
Recipes.
> End of file indicator LA> - file/folder must end in LA,
eg. Parks in LA OR
Details.SLA but not LAMP.
; Expands search by adding another *.pdf;*.txt;*.doc - files
allowable name/group with PDF, TXT and DOC
extension.
: Restricts search to only those with a *.pdf;*.doc:London -
specified name/group PDF or DOC files that have
London in their name.
NOT: Excludes a name/group from the search NOT:*.dll;*.exe;*.sys -
all files except DLL, EXE, and
SYS files
| Concatenate multiple search expressions *.pdf:London|
*.txt:Tower - PDF files with
London in their name OR TXT
files with Tower in their name.
" Used to either quote semi-colon ';' character "LA" - file/folder with the word
or specify word boundary LA in their name, eg. LA
Flight details.txt but
not LAMP.txt.

Note: In earlier versions of the product Wildcard expressions used to be referred to as DOS
Expressions.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 107

More Examples

Searching For Wildcard Expression

Files/folders without any extension *.
Only files/folders with the specific name Area <area>
PNG, JPG, or BMP files with the word France in them *.png;*.jpg;*.bmp:Fran
ce
MP3 files with the word Rolling AND Stone in them *.mp3:Rolling:Stone
PDF files with either the word London OR Tower in them *.pdf:London;Tower
All files that are not EXE or DLL files with the word Flower in NOT:*.exe;*.dll:Flower
the name
Any TXT file with a semi-colon in it "*;*.txt"

3.5 Scripting

FileLocator Pro supports Active Scripting to customize the search engine's file name and
contents matching algorithms.

When the user starts a search FileLocator Pro:

· Looks to see if any script is active
· Creates the Active Scripting engine for each script as specified by the Prog Id entered in the
'Engine' field.
· Loads the script into the scripting engine.

Once the script is loaded FileLocator Pro will then call a specific function inside the script
depending on the script type:
· If the script is a 'File Name' script the function called is 'isValidFileName' and is passed the file
path and name as parameters.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

108 FileLocator Pro

· If the script is a 'Containing text' script the function called is 'isValidLine' and is passed the line
number and text as parameters.

Scripts are only called if the other search criteria is satisfied, i.e. file name or containing text
expressions. The functions should return a boolean true or false value to indicate if the file or line
is valid or not.

Examples:

Note: Please see the "Sample Scripts" sub-folder of the FileLocator Pro's installation folder for
some provided sample scripts.

Read-only script

The following example shows a sample file name script to limit the files returned to those that
have the Read-Only attribute specified. Note: Other attributes could be used, e.g. use the '32'
instead of '1' to find files with Archive attribute specified.

var objFSO = new ActiveXObject( "Scripting.FileSystemObject" );

function isValidFileName( strPath, strFileName )

{
var bIsValid = false;
try
{
var objFile = objFSO.GetFile( strPath + strFileName );
bIsValid = ( objFile.Attributes & 1 );
}
catch( e ) {}
return bIsValid;
}

Note that try...catch blocks have been used to prevent exceptions being thrown back to the
search engine. If an exception occurs and is not caught by the script the search will stop.

Folders only script

Another example shows how to locate only folders.

var objFSO = new ActiveXObject( "Scripting.FileSystemObject" );

function isValidFileName( strPath, strFileName )

{
var bIsValid = false;
try
{
bIsValid = objFSO.FolderExists( strPath + strFileName );
}
catch( e ) {}
return bIsValid;
}

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 109

NOT expression script

Here's an example of how to implement NOT when contents matching using JScript's own regular
expression engine (the NOT expression to be matched is entered in the 'Containing text'
CustomParm field on the Scripting tab):

// An example of a NOT expression, this time using JScript's built in

Regular Expression object.

var regExp = new RegExp( SearchParms.ContainingTextCustomParm );

function isValidLine( nLineNum, strText )

{
var bIsValid = true;
try
{
bIsValid = !regExp.test( strText );
}
catch( e ) {}
return bIsValid;
}

Note how the regular expression object is created outside of the function body so that it is only
created and compiled once for any given search, although it may be called many times.

Excluding directories

Another variation of the NOT expression (see above) is for excluding certain directories from a
search. For example, to exclude the Windows directory from a search the NOT expression on the
path is simply 'C:\\Windows'. Here's an example of how to implement a NOT when path name
matching (the NOT expression to be matched is entered in the 'File name' CustomParm field on
the Scripting tab):

// An example of a NOT expression on a file's pathname

// using JScript's built in Regular Expression object.

var regExp = new RegExp( SearchParms.FilenameCustomParm );

function isValidFileName( strPath, strFileName )

{
var bIsValid = true;
try
{
bIsValid = !regExp.test( strPath );
}
catch( e ) {}
return bIsValid;
}

Note the use of two '\\' to represent a single '\' in 'C:\\Windows' since the backslash character is
the special escape character in regular expressions.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

110 FileLocator Pro

Search Parameters Object

Scripts can access almost all the other search criteria through the object 'SearchParms'. For
example, the isValidFileName script could use the Custom Parm value entered in the Scripting
tab like this:

var strCustom = SearchParms.FilenameCustomParm;

SearchParms provides access to the following criteria:

CurrentFileName (String) - Currently being processed file name.

CurrentFilePath (String) - Path of currently processed file.

ContainingText (String) - Value entered in the 'Containing text' field..

ContainingTextCustomParm (String ) - Value entered in the 'Custom Parm' field for containing
text script.

ContainingTextRegExp (Boolean) - Indicates if the regular expression on Containing text has

been switched on.

EOLUnix (Boolean) - Indicates if EOL Unix option has been switched on.

EOLMac (Boolean) - Indicates if EOL Mac option has been switched on.

Filename (String) - Value entered in the 'File name' field.

FilenameCustomParm (String) - Value entered in the 'Custom Parm' field for file name script.

FilenameExcludeExp (Boolean) - Indicates if the 'Specifies NOT expression' has been switched
on.

FilenameRegExp (Boolean) - Indicates if the regular expression on File name has been switched
on.

LookIn (String) - Value entered in the 'Look in' field.

MatchFilenameCase (Boolean) - Indicates if the match case option for file name has been
switched on.

MatchContentsCase (Boolean) - Indicates if the match case option for the containing text has
been switched on.

ModifiedAfter (Date) - Value entered in the 'Modified After' field.

ModifiedBefore (Date) - Value entered in the 'Modified Before' field.

SearchContents (Boolean) - Indicates if the search is searching contents of files.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 111

SearchOnePhase (Boolean) - Indicates if 'One Phase Searching' has been switched on.

SearchSubFolders (Boolean) - Indicates if the 'Search Sub Folders' has been switched on.

SizeMoreThan (Integer) - Value entered in the 'Size More Than' field.

SizeLessThan (Integer) - Value entered in the 'Size Less Than' field.

3.6 Look In

Often the Look In field simply specifies a single folder to search through. However, the Look In
field can accept much more than just a single folder location.

Types of values accepted in the Look In field:

Single folder e.g. c:\work\doc

Expression Expressions can be specified for individual parts of the folder paths, i.e. The
expression is not on the whole path but the path parts, e.g. the regular
expression
c:\usr\dev\.*\release

would match all folders called "release" two levels down from the "c:\usr\dev"
folder.

Single file e.g. c:\work\doc\file.txt

Multiple Multiple entries are separated with a semi-colon, e.g.

files/folders c:\work\doc;c:\work\email;c:\work\logs\special.log

Exclusion An exclusion location is identified by an exclamation sign, e.g. to exclude the

files/folders audit sub folder
c:\work\doc;!c\work\doc\audit

Location filters Filters are expressions applied against the folder for each search item to
allow groups of items to be easily targeted. A filter starts with either a plus or
minus sign, e.g. to exclude all the Subversion source control sub folders
(named '.svn')
c:\work\source;-.svn

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

112 FileLocator Pro

or, to include only the accounting sub folders while still excluding the
Subversion sub folders
c:\work\source;+account;-.svn

Lookup Lists A lookup list is a list of locations to search, each one put on a new line,
retrieved from an external file. A lookup list is identified by an equal sign, e.g.
=c:\lookup\accountsource.txt

and the contents of the accountsource.txt file could be something like:

c:\work\source
c:\work\tools
+account
-.svn

Macros Macros identify common locations on a Windows machine. The macros are
evaluated for the host system each time the search is run, which is useful if
creating search criteria that may run across a number of different machines.

$(AdministrativeTools)
$(AllLocalDrives)
$(ApplicationData)
$(ApplicationDataDrive)
$(CommonAdminTools)
$(CommonApplicationData)
$(CommonDesktopFolder)
$(CommonDocuments)
$(CommonDocumentTemplates)
$(CommonFavourites)
$(CommonMyMusic)
$(CommonMyPictures)
$(CommonMyVideo)
$(CommonProgramFiles)
$(CommonProgramsGroup)
$(CommonStartMenu)
$(CommonStartup)
$(DesktopFolder)
$(DocumentTemplates)
$(Favourites)
$(Fonts)
$(InternetCache)
$(InternetCookies)
$(InternetHistory)
$(LocalApplicationData)
$(MyDocuments)
$(MyDocumentsDrive)
$(MyMusic)
$(MyNetwork)
$(MyPictures)
$(MyPrinters)
$(MyVideo)

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 113

$(Profile)
$(ProgramFiles)
$(ProgramsGroup)
$(Recent)
$(SendTo)
$(StartMenu)
$(Startup)
$(SystemFolder)
$(WindowsFolder)
$(WindowsInstallDrive)

Application specific macros for identifying the folder and drive of the
application EXE:

$(FileLocatorAppFolder)
$(FileLocatorAppDrive)

Environment Any environment variable set up for the computer/application can be used in
variables the Look In field, e.g.

%TEMP%;%CLASSPATH%

could be used to search all the folders indicated by the TEMP and
CLASSPATH environment variables setup for the computer.

Persistent Search Filters

When a filter is so common that it should be used for every search, such as excluding source
code meta data files, it can be setup as a persistent search filter.

A persistent search filter can be any valid Look In value and when active is appended to the Look
In value for every search. More information is available on the Persistent Search Filters page.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 114 FileLocator Pro

3.7 Persistent Search Filters

Location filters are often used to include or exclude certain search locations for a given search.
Some filters are so common that they are desired for every search, e.g. excluding source code
meta data folders. Persistent Search Filters allow the definition of such common search filters
which (while active) are applied to all searches.

When one or more persistent search filters are active a check mark is shown on the filter button:

Clicking on the filter button opens the Persistent Search Filters dialog showing the list of filters
and their active status:

To change a filter double-click on the filter or to add a new one click the 'Add...' button.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 115

A search filter can be either for the File name, e.g. exclude all .dll or .exe files, or it can be on a
location, eg exclude the recycle bin.

A search filter is normally a location filter, such as -archive, but can actually be any valid Look
In value. Multiple values can be semi-colon separated, e.g.
-.svn;-archive

All active search filters are appended to a search's Look In value at time of search.

3.8 Unicode Support

File System Unicode Support

FileLocator Pro is built with the Windows Unicode libraries and therefore supports searching of
the file system with full Unicode support.

Content Searching Unicode Support

Content searching of files processed by extensions (such as IFilters) supports Unicode searching
if the underlying format supports Unicode.

Text file searching supports Unicode if the file can be identified as Unicode, either by a Byte
Order Marker (BOM) or an XML encoding declaration at the beginning of an XML file. The
Unicode types supported are UTF-16LE, UTF-16BE, and UTF-8.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 116 FileLocator Pro

Binary searching of non-identifiable file types, such as EXE etc., is carried out using an ASCII
search unless otherwise specified in the UTF-8 Default Format settings.

3.9 Search within Search

Sometimes it is preferable to limit subsequent searches to the result list or a subset of the result
list. FileLocator Pro supports searching file subsets through two menu options:

File - Search Result List Searches all files listed in the result list.
File - Search Current Searches all files that are currently selected in the result list.
Selection

Search within search works by creating a new search and pre-filling the Look In field with all the
files to be searched.

3.10 Outlook PST Archive Searching

FileLocator Pro is able to search through all PST archives from the older Outlook 97 right up to
the latest versions. Also, since FileLocator Pro 'understands' the actual underlying file format it
doesn't require Outlook to be installed and can also bypass the password protection and
encryption present on most PST files. However, since FileLocator Pro is not dedicated to
searching only PST files it can appear a little confusing as to how PST searching works. The
overwhelming temptation is to use the file name field to identify the PST archive, e.g. *.pst,
instead of the item within the PST archive, such as an email, that you are looking for.

FileLocator Pro basically treats each individual Outlook item, ie an email, contact, calendar item
etc., within a PST file as a separate file. The 'file name' for each item is dependant on the item
type, e.g. for email messages the email's subject is used as the file name. So to search a PST
file follow these steps:

1. Specify the location of the PST files (or a specific PST file) in the 'Look in' field

The location can include Outlook folders within the PST files.

2. Switch on PST Searching in the Options Tab

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 117

Without the PST format switched on the PST archive is treated as a normal file and simply
searched using its binary content. If the 'Search attachments' option is checked then the
attachments for each email are also searched, otherwise only the main email body is searched.

3. Use the 'File name' field to search by email subject and 'Containing text' to search by
email content.

Each result is shown as a text file, which can be copied or dragged to another location. The
results can also be explored using the Internal Viewer just like normal results.

Searching multiple PST files

The above example shows how to search through a single PST file but FileLocator Pro can
search multiple PST files in a single search. Instead of specifying a single PST file in the Look In
field simply specify the folder (or the root of the sub-tree) where the PST files are located. To
ensure that only pst files are searched add the location filter +.pst, e.g.

C:\Folder\Email;+.pst

To export the email and/or attachments to separate files you can copy/paste or drag/drop the
required files to a location in Explorer or use the Bulk Copy feature.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 118 FileLocator Pro

Invalid Characters

Not all characters that appear in the subject are valid characters for the file name. When such
characters are found they are replaced according to the table shown below:

Invalid Replacement
\ -
/ -
" '

3.11 MSG File Searching

MSG file searching is activated through the Options tab.

To export the email and/or attachments to separate files you can copy/paste or drag/drop the
required files to a location in Explorer or use the Bulk Copy feature.

Example 1: Searching MSG files by Subject and Contents

The example below shows how the 'File name' field is used to search the email Subject while the
'Containing text' field is used to search the email body. The 'File name' field is matching all .msg
files AND those which include the phrase 'tech support' in the name, whilst the 'Containing Text'
field is looking for the words 'excellent' and 'eval'.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 119

Example 2: Searching MSG files for image attachments

If the 'Search attachments' option has been checked each attachment will appear as a subfolder
to the MSG file (the .msg file itself represents the email body).

This example uses the 'File name' field to search for attachments that are either PNG, JPG, or
BMP files. Note the use of a Location Filter to restrict the results to only those files that are
attachments of .msg files, ie

...;+.msg

Important: Make sure that Search attachments has been checked in the Options Tab.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 120 FileLocator Pro

3.12 Thunderbird Searching

Thunderbird file searching is activated through the Options tab.

When activated FileLocator Pro treats MBOX files and other Thunderbird mailbox files as
containers of other files, ie. the files become 'virtual' folders.

To export the email and/or attachments to separate files you can copy/paste or drag/drop the
required files to a location in Explorer or use the Bulk Copy feature.

Important: Since the default Thunderbird mailbox file has no extension and treating all files
without an extension as MBOX files would be an expensive search operation the product uses the
Thunderbird Profile configuration to determine where files without an extension are read as

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 121

MBOX files. If you need to search through Thunderbird mbox files outside of the Thunderbird
profiles either add the location of the mbox files to the Thunderbird configuration or give the mbox
files a .mbox extension.

Example 1: Searching MBOX files by Subject and Contents

The example below shows how the 'File name' field is used to search the email Subject while the
'Containing text' field is used to search the email body. Note that the File name field has been
switched to Boolean search for more flexible searching.

Example 2: Searching MBOX files for image attachments

If the 'Search attachments' option has been checked each attachment will appear as a subfolder
to the MBOX file (the .eml file itself represents the email body).

This example uses the 'File name' field to search for attachments that are either PNG, JPG, or
BMP files. Note the use of a Location Filter to restrict the results to only those files that are
attachments of .eml files, ie

...;+.eml

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 122 FileLocator Pro

Important: Make sure that Search attachments has been checked in the Options Tab.

3.13 Export Results

For exporting results FileLocator Pro provides both the Reports functionality and the File ->
Export Results menu option. The Export functionality as three main sections:

· Bulk Copy
· Export Search Results
· Save Session/Workspace

Bulk Copy

Bulk Copy allows the user to copy found files to a folder or a ZIP file.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 123

There are various options that effect how the files are copied:

Files to All files All files currently in the results are exported.
copy
Selecte Only the currently selected files are exported.
d files
only

Folder Flat All files are copied to the same folder without any folder structure.
structu
re
From Files are copied into a copy of the source folder structure taken from the root
root folder for each file.
From Files are copied into a copy of the source folder structure taken from the first
first common folder for all files.
commo
n folder

Existin Overwrit Overwrite any files that have the same name in the destination folder.
g file e
Append Do not overwrite existing files, instead append a sequence number to the file
with to give it a unique name in the destination folder.
sequenc
e
number

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

124 FileLocator Pro

Don't Don't copy the file if an existing file with the same name is already in the
copy destination folder.

Email Copy Copy each item from the results as separate individual files.
items only
individu
al found
items
(applie Copy If an item in the results is a child item of a message (e.g. an attachment) this
s only parent option forces the parent MSG file to be copied instead of the found child item.
to MSG If multiple child items have the same parent MSG file only one file is copied.
emails) file

Copy Copy the file attributes and file times.

file
attribut
es

Export Search Results

The Export Search Results option allows the results, ie the file names and/or the found text, to be
saved either to the clipboard or to a specified file.

The results can be saved in a variety of formats:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 125

Comma separated (CSV) Comma separated table of results (best format for saving
results for subsequent opening in Excel).
HTML HTML formatted results, designed to look similar to the Hits
tab view.
Tab separated For content searches the information is grouped by file, similar
to Hits tab. The Tab character (ASCII 09) is used to separate
values.
Tab separated (spreadsheet) Tab separated table of results, similar to CSV but using the
Tab character (ASCII 09) to separate the columns (best format
when saving to clipboard and then pasting into Excel).
Text Text based format designed to look similar to Hits tab view.
XML XML formatted results.

Custom formatting

For advanced formatting XSL transforms can be used to customize the output format. XSL
transforms are a text based language for defining data transformations and can be used to
convert FileLocator Pro's XML data into a desired format. Sample transforms are included in the
Sample Transform subfolder and include:

Contents_NoLineNumbers.xsl Exports just the found contents with no other information

included, such as file data or line numbers.
FileName_Only.xsl Exports just the file name without any path information, each
file is exported on a separate line.
FullName_FileSizeBytes.xsl Exports the full file name (ie with path) along with the size in
bytes of the file.
Hash_Separated.xsl Exports the file name information separated by the '#'
character.
Hits_Only.xsl Exports just the hits found in a search, i.e. without any file
information or extra found text information. Useful for regular
expression searches to output text that matches a given
expression, e.g. extracting telephone numbers, or email
addresses. This transform differs from Unique_Hits_Only.xsl in
that it will output all hits of the found text, ie it will output
duplicate hits.
HTMLTransform.xsl Exports the data in a format very similar to the standard HTML
export.
Unique_Hits_Only.xsl Exports just the hits found in a search, i.e. without any file
information or extra found text information. Useful for regular
expression searches to output text that matches a given
expression, e.g. extracting telephone numbers, or email
addresses. This transform differs from Hits_Only.xsl by only
outputing the unique hits, i.e. it only outputs the value of the hit
once regardless of how many times it may actually be found.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 126 FileLocator Pro

xcopy.xsl Generates XCOPY statements to copy from one drive to

another preserving folder structure.

For each file an XCOPY command is generated with only the

drive letter replaced in the source path. e.g.
C:\folder1\folder2\filename1.txt

generates:
xcopy "C:\folder1\folder2\filename1.txt" "E:
\folder1\folder2\*"

NOTE: The XSL file needs to be edited to change target from

E: to desired target drive. Does not work with UNC paths. e.g.
\\server1\folder1\folder2

Save Session/Workspace

The session/workspace saving option is another method of saving Sessions and Workspaces.

3.14 Custom Extensions

While FileLocator Pro can search many popular formats there are many other niche formats that it
doesn't know how to convert to text format for searching. However, FileLocator Pro does provide
a way to integrate a external programs for converting given formats into text.

Example

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Advanced features 127

Say, for example, a company called ThirdParty has a program that converts files of type .ABC to
text, and is run:

"C:\Program Files\ThirdParty\SomeApp.exe" "E:

\Files\intro.abc" "E:\Out\intro.txt"

To enable FileLocator Pro to use the program to read .ABC files follow these steps:

Step 1. Create an XML file to add the format

Using an editor, like NotePad, create an XML file using the format shown below, replacing the
highlighted entries with the appropriate values, e.g.

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<InterpreterConfig xmlns="http://www.mythicsoft.com/FileLocator">
<displayname>ABC</displayname>
<uniquename>http://www.mythicsoft.com/abcformat</uniquename>
<progid>Extensions.ConvertToTextCommand</progid>
<setup>"C:\Program Files\ThirdParty\SomeApp.exe"
"$(InputFile)" "$(OutputFile)"</setup>
<filetypes>abc</filetypes>
<interpretertype>textconverter</interpretertype>
<active>no</active>
<safemode>no</safemode>
<useisfilter>no</useisfilter>
<nonreglibrary>extensions.dll</nonreglibrary>
</InterpreterConfig>

Save the file, e.g. abc.xml.

Note: The available macros for use in the <setup> element are:

Macro Description Example

$(InputFile) The full path of the file to be C:\Folder\Filename.abc

converted
$(InputLongPathFile) The full path of the file to be \\?\C:\Folder\Filename.abc
converted in long path format
$(OutputFile) The full path for the text C:\TEMP\flt_ab123cd.tmp
conversion
$(InstallFolder) The progam's installation folder C:\Program
Files\Mythicsoft\FileLocator Pro

Step 2. Copy the XML file into the plugin_cfg folder

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

128 FileLocator Pro

Step 3. Activate the extension

Make sure Office/PDF documents is checked in the Enhanced/PDF documents section of

the Options tab.

Step 4. Test the extension

Run a simple search using a small group of test files.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

Wizards

Part

IV
 130 FileLocator Pro

4 Wizards

To help the user with some of FileLocator Pro's complex features two wizards are available:
· Search wizard (Basic interface only)
· Expression wizard (Advanced interface only)

4.1 Search Wizard

Search Wizard walks the user through entering the basic search criteria with examples and
performance tips.

The user is presented with three pages asking for the following pieces of information:
· Name of the file.
· Contents of the file.
· Location of the file.

On the final page if the 'Start the search automatically' check box is checked the search will begin
when the user clicks Finish.

4.2 Expression Wizard (Expr Wiz)

Expression Wizard walks the user through creating a basic regular expression. The Expression
Wizard can be used for building expressions to search for either the file name or the file contents.

Note: The term 'string' is used as a generic term referring to either the file name or file contents.
Basically a string is any word or group of words which, if you think about it, is exactly what a file
name is.

First page (Introducing the Expression Wizard)

The first page of the wizard is just an introduction for the Expression Wizard with notes for the
particular type of expression being built (i.e. a note for file name and a different note for file
contents).

Second page (Create the Expression)

The second page is where all the work takes place. It should look something like this:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Wizards 131

Shown above is an example expression for a file name and will find any file name that includes
the phrase 'MyFile' followed by any character followed by any number and finally ending with '.txt',
i.e. a text file. Therefore it would find files such as 'Dave_MyFile54.txt' or 'MyFile_Num2.txt' but
would not find the files 'MyFile.txt', 'A_MyFile34a.txt', or 'MyFile34.doc'.

If you think back to how regular expressions work the layout of the Expression Wizard should
become apparent. A regular expression is built out of a number of 'entries'. There is one
beginning entry, multiple main body entries, and one final end entry. Each entry has a specific
type:
· Don't know. The value of the entry is unknown. e.g. The beginning of the file name may be
unknown.
· Any character. Matches to any single character.
· The character. Matches to a character entered by the user in the Text field.
· Any one of these characters. Matches to any one of the characters entered by the user in
the Text field.
· Any character except these. Matches to any character except the ones entered by the
user in the Text field.
· The phrase. Matches to the specific phrase entered by the user in the Text field.
· Space(s). Matches to a space.
· Any numeric character. Matches to any numeric character, i.e. 0-9.
· Any text character. Matches to any alphabetic character, i.e. a-z.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

132 FileLocator Pro

Once the user has specified the entry type and the text, if required for the entry type, then the user
needs to specify the number of occurrences of that entry:
· Zero or once. The entry type may or may not be there but if it is then it maps to one
occurrence.
· Zero or many times. The entry type may or may not be there but if it is then it can map to
one or more occurrences.
· Once only. The entry type must be there and is mapped to only one occurrence.
· Once or many times. The entry type must be there and can map to many occurrences.

The Expression Wizard does not currently provide all the functionality of regular expressions.
However, if the user knows how to construct their own regular expressions they can enter the any
part of a regular expression by adding an entry of type 'The phrase' and putting the regular
expression in the Text field.

The entries can be rearranged using drag and drop.

Third page (Warning: Special characters entered)

When the user has finished entering the regular expression the user can normally press Finish to
feed the regular expression back to the main search window. However, if the user has entered
any special characters (i.e. characters that have special meaning in a regular expressions) in the
Text field for any entry then the Finish button actually changes into a Next button and the user is
warned that special characters were entered. The user then has two choices, either to have
FileLocator Pro convert the special characters so that they will not be treated as special (default)
or to leave the expression as it is because the user specifically entered special characters.

In the screen shot shown above you can see that this is exactly what happened with the example.
The '.' in '.txt' is the wildcard character and therefore instead of a Finish button there is a Next
button. If you look at the resulting expression you'll see that the '.' has been prefixed with the '\'
escape character. This happened automatically because of the default action, which is to convert
the special characters so that they are not treated as special. This page (i.e. the third page)
allows the user to turn that default action off.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

Regular Expressions

Part

V
 134 FileLocator Pro

5 Regular Expressions

FileLocator Pro provides extensive regular expression support using either a Perl compatible
syntax or a classic syntax.

Perl compatible syntax

Perl compatible regexp syntax is based around the Boost regular expression engine and includes
not only the functionality of the 'classic' regular expression engine but also additional Perl style
expression enhancements detailed here:
Boost: Perl Regular Expression Syntax

Classic syntax

FileLocator Pro's classic regexp syntax supports the most commonly used regular expression
elements, which is the subject of this section. To continue go to the Quick Start section.

5.1 Quick Start

FileLocator Pro includes a regular expression engine as one of its Expression Types. Regular
expressions (some times shortened to regexp) provide a concise language to describe exactly
what to search for. In very basic terms you can split an expression into two parts:
- what you are looking for
- the number of occurrences you want to find of it.

Let's say I want to find all files named abc, abbc, abbbc, abbbbc etc. So basically I want to find all
files that begin with 'a' followed by one or more 'b' then followed by 'c'. The expression would be:
ab+c

Breaking that apart we read:

- find one occurrence of 'a'
- find at least one occurrence of 'b' (the '+' indicates 'one or more')
- find one occurrence of 'c'

The characters that specify the number of occurrences are:

+ one or more
* zero or more
? zero or one

So ab?c would find any file named abc or ac (i.e. there can be zero or one 'b').

A very important regexp character is the period '.' (the wildcard character) because it matches to
ANY character. So a.c would match to aac, abc, acc, adc, aec, afc, a1c, a6c etc. And if we
combine that with an occurrence character we can start producing some useful expressions:
dave.*vest

breaks down to:

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Regular Expressions 135

- find one occurrence of 'd'

- then one occurrence of 'a'
- then one occurrence of 'v'
- then one occurrence of 'e'
- then zero or more occurrences of ANY character
- then one occurrence of 'v'
- then one occurrence of 'e'
- then one occurrence of 's'
- then one occurrence of 't'

and so matches to 'davevest', 'dave vest', 'dave is wearing a vest'.

There are other regexp characters and tricks on the following pages. More detail on regular
expressions.

5.2 What is a regular expression?

A regular expression is a way of describing a group of words (referred to as a 'string'). It allows a

user to build a complex set of rules to describe exactly what characteristics the string should
have. While this documentation uses the word string you can think of a string as either a filename
when searching for a filename using regular expressions, or as text in a document when using a
regular expression to search the contents of files.

The simplest regular expression is a sequence of letters, numbers, or both. Such a regular
expression matches any string that contains that sequence. For example:

The regular expression `foo' matches any string containing `foo'. So if you wanted to find a
file with the letters 'fred' in it the regular expression would simply be 'fred'.

This is obviously a very simple example but you can express complicated rules. For example:

To find a file that begins with 'July' or 'August' followed at some point by 'Document' or
'Documents' followed at some point by a number and has a '.doc' extension the
expression would be: '^(July|August).*Documents?.*[0-9]+.*\.doc$'

This expression would find:

· JulysPrivDocuments_23.doc
· August Documents Num5a.doc
· etc.

Don't worry if the expression above looks confusing because it is. That is why FileLocator Pro
includes an Expression Wizard to guide you through building regular expressions using common
English terms.

For more information please read regular expression basics.

Note: You can test out your expression against the FileLocator Pro regular expression engine
through the 'Tools' -> 'Regular Expression Tester...' menu option.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 136 FileLocator Pro

5.3 Regular expression basics

Regular expressions use special characters (also known as regular expression operators) to
specify rules for strings. A summary of these characters are:

^ Beginning of string
$ End of string
. Any character
[ Start of character list
] End of character list
( Start of expression group
) End of expression group
| ORs two expressions
\ Escape character
* Preceding expression occurs zero or more times
? Preceding expression occurs zero or one times
+ Preceding expression occurs one or more times
{ Start of bounded repeat
} End of bounded repeat

5.4 *, ?, + (Occurrence characters)

Specifies the number of occurrences of the preceding character or group. In a regular expression
there are four possible choices when trying to specify how many occurrences the regular
expression should match to:

Zero or one, the '?' character.

Zero or many, the '*' character.
One or many, the '+' character.
Exactly one, the character itself not followed by any occurrence character.

For example:

If you entered the filename as the expression 'complaint ?doc' it would find all files that
had the word 'complaint' followed by zero or one space followed by 'doc'. Therefore it
would find files such as 'my complaint doc.doc' and 'mycomplaintdoc.txt', but would NOT
find files such as 'my complaint_doc.doc' or 'my complaints doc.doc'.

If you entered the filename as the expression '^my.*doc$' it would find all files that began
with the word 'my' followed by zero or more characters ending with 'doc' (note the use of '^'
beginning of string, '.' any character, and '$' end of string special characters). Therefore it
would find files such as 'my_note.doc', 'my_owndoc', and 'my_specialfile.doc' but would
NOT find 'my_note.txt', 'thisis_my_note.doc'.

If you entered the filename as the expression '_file[0-9]+' would find all files that had the
word '_file' followed by one or more numbers (note the use of '[' and ']' character list

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Regular Expressions 137

special characters). Therefore it would find files such as 'my_file245.doc' and

'the_file0023.txt' but would NOT find 'a_file_34.txt' or 'some_file 009.txt'.

5.5 \ (Escape character)

Escape character is used to suppress the special meaning of other special characters.

For example:

The expression 'Cost$' will match a string ending with 'Cost' whereas the expression
'Cost\$' will match a string that contains 'Cost$'. As you can see the escape character
suppressed the special meaning of the '$' end of string character.

The expression 'file.txt' will match a string that contains 'file' followed by any character
followed by 'txt, whereas the expression 'file\.txt' will match a string that contains 'file.txt'.
This time the escape character suppressed the meaning of the special character '.' any
character.

Finally, the expression to actually search for the '\' character is preceded with the '\', i.e.
suppress the escape character, e.g. to search for '3\4' use the expression '3\\4'.

5.6 | (Expression OR)

Use the | when either one expression or another will do.

For example:

Both the expressions '(stabilised|stabilized) condition' and 'stabili(z|s)ed condition' will

match 'stabilised condition' and 'stabilized condition'.

'(1|2|3) (person|people)' will match '1 person' and '2 people' and '3 people' but will not
match '4 people' (it will also match '2 person' etc.). Note: this expression could have also
been expressed using a character list.

5.7 (...) (Expression group)

Parentheses are used for grouping in regular expressions as in arithmetic. They are often used
with the '|' OR functionality to group alternatives.

For example:

The expression '12 Mar(ch)? 2000' would find the string '12 March 2000' and '12 Mar
2000'. Note the use of the '?' zero or more occurrence character.

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 138 FileLocator Pro

If you entered the filename as the expression '^myfile\.(txt|doc)$' it would find any file that
whose name was 'myfile.txt' or 'myfile.doc'. Note the use of the '^' beginning of the string
character, the '\' escape character to treat the '.' in '.txt' literally, and the '$' end of the string
character.

5.8 [...] (Character lists)

Specifies a list of characters that are valid in the string. Characters can be listed individually or a
range of characters can be indicated by giving two characters and separating them by a '-'. For
example, '[abc]' will match any of the characters 'a', 'b', or 'c'; this is the same as '[a-c]', which uses
a range to express the same set of characters.

You can match the characters not within a range by complementing the set. This is indicated by
using a '^' as the first character in the list (note: this is the same character as the beginning of
string character). For example, '[^5]' will match any character except '5'.

Multiple ranges are allowed. E.g., the list '[A-Z0-9]' is a common way to express the idea of "all
alphanumeric characters." To include one of the characters `\', `]', `-' or `^' in a character list use
the '\' escape character.

For example:

The expression '[0-9]+' will find any number in a string (note the use of the '+' occurrence
character).

The expression '[0-9]+/[0-9]+/[0-9]+' is a expression that could be used to search for

dates within a string. Although it does not check the validity of the date it is unlikely that
any other string would be match that pattern.

5.9 . (Wildcard character)

Matches any single character. It is used to specify an unknown portion in the string. Because the
period is used in almost all Windows file names it is very common to forget that it has a very
special meaning in regular expressions. If the user wishes to use the period literally in a search it
must be preceded by the '\' escape character. For example:

If you entered the filename as the expression 'mydoc.doc' it would find any file that had
'mydoc' followed by any character followed by 'doc'. Therefore although it would find
'mydoc.doc' it would also find 'mydoc1doc' and 'mydocXdoc'. If you wanted to just search
for 'mydoc.doc' the expression would be 'mydoc\.doc'.

Example:

If you entered the filename as the expression '^mydocument..\.txt$' it would find any file
that began with 'mydocument' followed by exactly any two characters and ended with
'.txt' (note the use of the '^' beginning of the string character, and the '\' escape character
to treat the '.' in '.txt' literally, and the '$' end of the string character). Therefore it would find

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Regular Expressions 139

files such as 'mydocument_1.txt' and 'mydocument1a.txt' but would not find files such as
'mydocument.txt' and 'mydocument_1a.txt'.

The expression 'my.*\.txt' would find any file that includes 'my' followed by any number of
characters followed by '.txt' (note the use of '*' to specify zero or more occurrences).
Therefore it would find files such as 'my_examples.txt' and 'this is my file.txt.doc' but would
not find files such as 'myfile.doc' and 'm_y_file.txt'.

5.10 $ (End of string)

Matches the end of a string (to match the beginning of a string use '^').

For example:

If you entered the filename as the expression 'complaint\.doc$' it would find all files that
ended with 'complaint.doc' (note the use of the '\' escape character for the '.'). Therefore it
would find files such as 'bank_complaint.doc' and 'my_complaint.doc' but would not find
files such as 'some_complaint.txt' or 'some_complaint_2.doc'.

5.11 ^ (Beginning of string)

Matches the beginning of a string (to match the end of a string use '$').

For example:

If you entered the filename as the expression '^win' it would find all files that began with the
name 'win'. Therefore it would find files such as 'winhelp.exe' and 'windows_questions.txt'
but would not find files such as 'Copy of winhelp.exe' and 'some_winfile.txt.

5.12 {n,m} Bounded repeats

Whereas the '+' or '*' characters will repeat the previous section as much, or as little, as required
it is possible to specify a specific number of required repeats using the '{' and '}' characters.

a{n} matches 'a' repeated exactly n times

a{n,} matches 'a' repeated n or more times
a{n,m} matches 'a' repeated between n and m times inclusive.

For example,

[0-9]{4,6} matches any number between 1000 and 999999

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 140 FileLocator Pro

5.13 Other Examples

AND

Although the regular expression engine does not directly support the concept of the boolean AND
operation it can, in a limited way, be simulated. e.g.

To search for a line containing 'error' AND 'log' the expression would be '(error.*log)|
(log.*error)'. Basically the different possible combinations have been combined, i.e. find
'error' followed by 'log' OR find 'log' followed by 'error'. While this works for a small number
of words it does become infeasible with a larger number of words.

Obviously the simplest way to specify an AND style expression is to use the Boolean expression
engine.

Email addresses

Regular expressions are great for validating or searching for patterns such as email addresses.
The following regular expression should match most email addresses:

\b[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}\b

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Index 141

Index - A-
Across whole file (Boolean expression) 13
-$- Active extensions 15
Active Scripting 107
$ (End of string) 139 Add index 45
Adding a new Favorite 36
Advanced interface 9
-(- Advanced location features 111
Allow Wildcards (Boolean expression) 13
(...) Group 137
AND (using regular expressions) 140
AND Boolean operator 102
-*- Any character 138
Archive attribute 14, 107
* (Occurrence character) 136 Attachments 68
Attributes
-.- Archive 14
Compressed 14
. (Wildcard character) 138 Encrypted 14
Folder 14
Hidden 14
-?- Index (FANCI) 14
Offline 14
? (Occurrence character) 136
Read only 14
System 14
-[- Attributes tab 14

[...] lists 138

-B-
-^- Basic interface 9, 22
Basic theme 75
^ (Beginning of string) 139 Basics of Regular Expressions 136
Beginning of string 139

-|- Begins with 130

Binary file exclusion 13
| (OR) 137 BOM (Byte Object Marker) 115
Boolean expression 101
Boolean expression (detail) 102
-+- Boolean expression configuration 76
Boolean expression span file setting 13
+ (Occurrence character) 136
Boolean RegEx 101
Boolean RegEx (detail) 102
-7- Boolean sub expressions 102
Boost regular expression 101
7-bit conversion 69 Bulk Copy 122
Byte Object Marker (BOM) 115

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 142 FileLocator Pro

Display settings 64

-C- DOS expression 101

DOS Expression settings 77
Cache Settings 19 DOS Expressions 106
Cache Text Option 13 Drop down list settings 63
Case sensitive settings (Advanced interface) 9 Dual core settings 87
Case sensitive settings (Basic interface) 22
Classic regular expression 101
Classic syntax setting 79
-E-
Clear history 63 Edit Index 51
Clear history on exit 63 Editor settings 80
Color Settings 73 Email (MSG files) 118
Column sort order 63 Email (Thunderbird files) 120
Command line 58 Email search (Outlook files) 116
Command line indexing options 97 Email searching (PST/MSG files) 13
Command line options 97 Email Settings 68
Command Separated (CSV) 122 Encrypted file attribute 14
Comments 60 End Of Line (EOL) settings
Compressed Document Raw Data Reader 92 Mac 69
Compressed file attribute 14 Unix 69
Compressed Files Tab 15 End of path display preference 64
Concatentation 137 End of string 139
Configuration 58, 62 Ends with 130
Configuration dialog 62 Environment variables in Look In 111
Configuration file location 85 Escape character 137
Configuration window 62 Event notification settings 72
Containing Text 9 Exact match 101
Contents view 27 Example escape character 137
Context menu 26 Example using $ 139
Context menu settings 70 Example using (...) 137
Convert to 7-Bit chars 69 Example using . 138
Copy Files 122 Example using [...] 138
Create Index 51 Example using ^ 139
Created date 14 Example using | 137
CSV format 122 Examples 8
Ctrl+F 70 Examples for occurrence characters 136
Custom format 122 Examples of Wildcard Expressions 106
Custom text extension 126 Exclude expression 58
Excluding binary files 13

-D- Excluding directories/folders 107

Excluding file types 106
Date searching 14 Excluding locations from all searches 114
Date tab 14 Exclusion locations 111
Date/Time Selection Dialog 16 Expansion buttons 27
Deep Search 13 Expert user 9
Deferred search 66 Export formats 122
Display end of path 64 Export PST items 116

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Index 143

Export Results 122 HTML export 122

Exporting MSG file contents 118
Expression Types 101
Expression Wizard 130 -I-
Extension settings 89, 93 IFilter settings 89, 90
External editor 27 Ignore case (Advanced interface) 9
External editor settings 80 Ignore case (Basic interface) 22
External text conversion application 126 Immediate search 66
Importing Favorites 36
-F- Index details 46
Index file attribute 14
FANCI file attribute 14 Index interface 22
Favorites 36 Index manager 45
Favorites file location 85 Index searching 22
File contents 27 Indexing Service Filter (if available) 93
File Hash expression 101 Indexing Service Filters 90
File Hashing Settings 80 Integrating external programs 126
File list view 26 Internal File Viewer 33
File lists 83 Internal viewer 27
File save 9 Internal viewer settings 80
FILELIST operator 102 Introduction 7
FileLocator Pro 7 Introduction to Regular Expressions 135
Filter settings 89, 90 isValidFileName 15
flpidx.exe 97 isValidLine 15
flpsearch.exe 97
Folder settings 85
Folders only atttribute 14 -J-
Followed by 130 JIT Search 66
Fuzzy search 101 JScript 107
Junction Points 86
-G- Just in Time Search 66

Getting started
Group 137
7
-K-
Keyword file 83
-H- Knowledge base 60

Hidden file attribute 14

Hiding contents view 27 -L-
Hiding/Showing menu 58 Last accessed date 14
Highlight Current 33 LIKE Boolean operator 102
Highlight Original 33 LIKE sensitivity configuration 76
History settings 63 Line by line (Boolean expression) 13
Hit count 66 LINES operator 102
Hits Tab 27 List of special characters used in Regular Expression
Hotkey settings 70 136
How do you use FileLocator Pro 7 Lists 138
Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.
 144 FileLocator Pro

Load last search on startup 63

Loading keywords from file 83
Location bar 33 -N-
Location filters 111 NEAR Boolean operator 102
Location lists 111 NEAR distance configuration 76
Location Macros 111 NOT 107
Log file location 85 NOT (Wildcard Expressions) 106
Long line display settings 64 NOT Boolean operator 102
Long line processing settings 69 Notification settings 72
Look and feel 75
Look In 9
Advanced features 111 -O-
Environment variables 111
Exclusion locations 111 Occurrence characters 136
Filters 111 OCR Settings 20
Look up lists 111 Office 2007 File Types 92
Macros 111 Office formats 13
Multiple locations 111 Offline attribute 14
Searching specific files 111 One Phase Searching 58
Look In Macros 111 Open Office File Types 92
Look up filters 111 Option tab (Basic interface) 22
Look up lists 111 Options Tab (Advanced interface) 13
OR 137
OR Boolean operator 102
-M- Ordered search 66
Outlook PST Option 13
Mac files 58 Outlook PST Searching 116
Macros 111
Main Tab 9
Match case (Advanced interface) 9 -P-
Match case (Basic interface) 22
Max End of Line settings 69 Perl regular expressions 101
MBOX file searching 120 Perl syntax setting 79
MD5 80 Persistent Search Filter 114
MDI user interface settings 75 Persistent Search Filter button 111
Menu (hiding/showing) 58 Plain Text 101
Mercurial .hg folder (how to exclude) 111 Printing 27
Microsoft Office 2007 Formats 92 Process priority settings 87
Microsoft Office formats 13 PST Archive (Outlook) 116
MS Core XML Services 89 PST Option 13
MSG file searching 118
MSG Option 13
Multi core settings 87
-Q-
Multi-phase search 66 Quad core settings 87
Multiple file types 58, 106 Questions 60
Multiple folders 9, 58 Quick start 134
Multiple search folders 111
Multi-processor settings 87

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 Index 145

SRF 58

-R- SRF file association 70

SRF files as Favorite 36
Read only attribute 14 Standard theme 75
Read-only attribute 107 Strict DOS 77
Recreate index 45 Sub expressions 102
Recreating index from the command line 97 Subversion .svn folder (how to exclude) 111
Reference existing index 56 Summary Tab 27
REGEX operator 102 Surrounding lines 27
RegExp 101 Surrounding lines settings 64
Regular Expression (Boost/Perl) 101 System file attribute 14
Regular Expression (Classic) 101
Regular Expression basics 136
Regular Expression Introduction 135
-T-
Regular expression syntax setting 79 Tab separated exporting 122
Relative date/time values 16 Tabbed search user interface settings 75
Remove HTML Markup 13, 68 Tags (Favorites) 36
Right click 26 Testing regular expression 58
Text Tab 27

-S- Theme settings 75

Thread priority settings 87
Safe Mode 93 Thread settings 87
Sample transforms 122 Thumbnails Tab 27
Save Results 122 Thunderbird file searching 120
Save Session/Workspace 122 Thunderbird folders 68
Saving 9 Truncation options 64
Scripting 107
Scripting example 107
Scripting Tab 15
-U-
Search as you type 66 Unicode Support 115
Search Filter 114 Unix End of Line settings 69
Search navigation 36 Unix files 58
Search navigation settings 63 Update index 45
Search within search 116 Updating index from the command line 97
Search Wizard 130 USB drive 85
Searching directly to file 97 Use attributes 14
Searching specific files 111 User defined extensions 126
SearchParms 107 User interface settings 75
Sessions 43 UTF-8 default encoding 91
SHA1 80
Shared indexes 56
Shell integration 58, 70 -V-
Single phase search 66 VBScript 107
Sounds/Alerts settings 72 Viewing file contents 27
Special characters 130 Visual Studio Editor 80
Special characters used in Regular Expressions
136

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.

 146 FileLocator Pro

-W-
Welcome 7
What is a Regular Expression? 135
What's next? 7
Whole Word 101
Whole word (detail) 102
Wildcard character (Regular expressions) 138
Wildcard expression 9, 101
Wildcard expression settings 77
Wildcard Expressions 106
Wildcards 106
Wildcards (Boolean expressions) 102
Windows Shell 58
WinKey+Alt+F 70
WinKey+Alt+F3 70
Word wrapping 58
Workspaces 43

-X-
XML format 122
XSL Transforms 122
XSLT 122
XSLT Processor 89

Copyright © 2021 Mythicsoft Ltd. All rights reserved.