When you don’t quite remember where your files are—or what exactly they were called—your best strategy is often to begin broad and narrow as you go. HoudahSpot excels at this workflow. It gives you powerful tools to incrementally refine a search based on what you see in the results.
This post walks through a highly effective technique: start with a flood of matches, then prune and shape your search using what you learn from those results. Along the way, we’ll use drag-and-drop shortcuts, location pruning, and Find by Example to quickly zero in on the files you want.
Start Broad: Let the Results Flow In
Begin by typing a few words into the main search field.
These might be:
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Terms you expect in file names
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Words likely to appear in text content
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Keywords that “should” narrow things down—but maybe not enough
Hit Return and watch the results roll in. HoudahSpot will typically return thousands of matches. That’s fine—we want this. The next steps are all about sculpting this mass of information into something manageable.
As the results come in, use:
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Metadata columns to sort and surface patterns
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Quick Look preview to confirm visual relevance
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Text preview to check keyword context
You’re not trying to find the right file yet. You’re scanning for clues.
Continue reading Iteratively Refining Searches in HoudahSpot
