This is likely the last beta for 2.5.4. I hope to release it on Dec 28 if no new issues are found.

What's changed in 2.5.4b8 (392)

  • The behavior for "contains words" has been improved: A search term is considered a word if it appears with no surrounding letters (or digits if the search is for a number). For instance, searching for the word "a", a file name "1a2.txt" will be a match because there are no letters immediately around the "a" in the name.
  • Fixes some search issues with voidtools.com's Everything program.
  • Improves help texts for some search rules, e.g. when using "any of".

Please note: If you find issues with FAF's translations (Spanish, French, Japanese etc.), you can now suggest corrections online at https://simplelocalize.io/suggestions/?id=8288105bbff249b3b65394b31017e26a.

What's changed in 2.5.4b6 (389)

  • Adds fast search support on Windows servers through the program Everything from voidtools.com. Contact me for details.
  • New menu command Show Icon Preview in the View menu, mirroring the Finder's option.
  • Prevents a few recently reported crashes.
  • The "Slow" option in the Special Folders window has a changed meaning: It now only prevents the use of the CatSearch function (mainly for AFP server mounts) but still allows the user of other fast search methods in the Pro version.
  • The "Minimum item count.lua" script has been updated on the Scripts webpage.
  • Made a change to the "contains words" rule handling so that words concatenated by ".", "-" or "_" are seen as separate words.

What's changed in 2.5.4b4 (387)

  • Brings back "Show results early" behavior (got broken in previous beta).
  • Fixes another issue around refreshing the Finder's selection when FAF gets re-activated.
  • The "Duplicates.lua" script won't freeze up FAF any more at the end. The script on the web page has been updated, too.
  • New matching script: "Has Extended Attribute.lua".

What's changed in 2.5.4b3 (386)

  • Fixes issues starting a search with "in Finder selection" right at launch of FAF, e.g. by opening a .faf file or using "Find All".
  • Selecting 1000s of files, as well as then right-clicking on them, especially on slow (network) volumes, won't take longer than a second any more. At worst, some information will be missing, such as the total size of all selected items or the name of the application that can open all the items.
  • Extends the wait time for Spotlight to find all items on slower network volumes. If you experience that a Spotlight-assisted search on your file server won't find all items, please contact me.

What's changed in 2.5.4b2 (385)

  • Changes the detection of file servers slightly. Please go into the File Server Settings and refresh all of your listed servers, making sure it still works.
  • New: When viewing results in Preview mode, you can now resize them with cmd-plus and cmd-minus keys.
  • New: When viewing results in Preview mode, you can choose to view them unsorted. This is useful while results are coming in, because it adds new found items to the end of the list instead of resorting them constantly.
  • New (experimental): When viewing results in List mode, and with the Preference set to see results early (i.e. during the ongoing search), you can have the list remain unsorted, so that new items get added to the end of the list. To sort them later, you'll have to click on a list title. To enable this mode, issue this command in Terminal.app: 
    defaults write org.tempel.findanyfile "Flat results start unsorted when showing early" -bool YES
    (It won't appear in Prefs Editor unless you explicitly add this option).
  • An ongoing search can now be stopped in the Results window by typing cmd-period.
  • Fixes a recently introduced issue where right-clicking on a selection with many items takes a long time before the pop-up menu appears.
  • Fixes a long standing issue where the count of found items in the Find window is incorrect (i.e. too low).

What's changed in 2.5.4b1 (384)

  • Doesn't search hidden Time Machine snapshots any more when searching "all disks" or "local disks".
  • When adding only any of the "… are exclusively shown" rules, the Find button gets enabled reliably.

What's changed in 2.5.3 (383)

  • (Fixed once more) Won't open an extra window any more when using "Find All".

What's changed in 2.5.3b3 (381)

  • Won't crash any more after the program Clean My Mac modified FAF by stripping unused language files.
  • Won't open an extra window any more when using "Find All".
  • The Open With command lists now the same default app as Finder does.
  • The Open command in the Results window now shows the app that'll open the selected file.

What's changed in 2.5.3b2 (380)

  • Won't crash any more on macOS 15 Sequoia if access to Local Network is denied by user.
  • Selecting an item in the Results window in Icon preview mode won't scroll the content any more.
  • Closing a Find window that was opened from a .faf file won't ask to save any changes any more unless you set the hidden preference "Closing Find windows with unsaved changes asks to save" to YES.
  • The hidden preference "List Font Name" is now visible in the prefs.
  • Fixes a rare crash when searching for content with RegEx.

What's changed in 2.5.2 (378)

  • Fixes another possible crash at the start of a search.

What's changed in 2.5.1 (377)

  • Fixes two crashes introduced in v2.5.

What's changed in 2.5 (376)

  • This is the final v2.5 that I will release to everyone as soon as Apple releases the version in the App Store.

What's changed in 2.5b8 (374)

  • Fixes a problem detecting the type of NAS in some cases, which made Spotlight searches fail.
  • Holding the Option key with the search location popup menu open will now also show the System and Data members of bootable volumes. If you choose a "(Data)" volume as the search destination, it'll skip the original files installed by Apple, making the search faster. If you're searching only for files you created, this is a useful method to speed things up.
  • When loading a recent search or from a .faf file, the frontmost Find window will now be re-used instead of opening a new window.

What's changed in 2.5b6 (372)

  • Fixes some issues around server detection (spaces in volume name, "home" folder, new volumes appearing only after activating SSH).
  • Removes the "Use SI units" setting from the Preferences window because it's hardly used any more. Still available as a hidden pref.
  • Updates the manual with all the latest changes.

What's changed in 2.5b5 (370)

  • The "Name contains" rules were incorrect in Japanese. If you understand the language, please report back whether the menu reads correctly now ("を含ま" should mean "contains", i.e. the entered words in the input can occur in any order in the file name, whereas "次の文字を含む" should mean "contains phrase", i.e. the text needs to appear in that order in the file name).
  • Adds an IAP (Internet Access Policy) so that Little Snitch can explain to the user which web servers FAF contacts for which purposes.
  • Fixes a potential crash while detecting mounted file servers.
  • Adds verb "doesn't match RegEx" to the "Name" and "Text content" rules.
  • Renames verb "contains" into "contains phrase" for the "Text content" rule because that's how it behaves.

What's changed in 2.5b4 (369)

  • Adds menu commands for changing the Font size in the Results window (with cmd-plus and cmd-minus).
  • The Purchase menu can now be made visible with the Option key, even if the app is already registered.
  • Fixes a crash when using "Name matches Regex".
  • Fix: A single click on a folder in the Path Bar at the bottom of the Results window now opens the folder in Finder, just like it happens in Finder's windows.
  • Fix: Pressing the Esc key in the Preferences window won't crash any more.
  • Fix: Moving the focus around multiple rules with the Tab key now works more reliably.
  • Fix: If a file name contains a Carriage Return (CR) character, it's now displayed as "␍".
  • Fixes several issues with using the `find` tool (only with Pro license).

What's changed in 2.5b3 (368)

  • We're back to v2.5 (some things are out of my control).
  • Fixes the "date within …" rules. Lots of files outside the specified time range were incorrectly found in recent betas.
  • The rules for Invisible, Package and Trashed items will now remove those items from the results instead of just hiding them.
  • Several minor fixes.

What's changed in 2.4.2b10 (367)

  • Fixes an issue where, after trashing a folder with matched items inside, their new state being in the Trash was not correctly recognized.
  • The info window about searching File Servers will not appear any more immediately upon detection of mounted server volumes but only when a search on them is started.

What's changed in 2.4.2b9 (366)

  • Adds "Name without Extension" rule.
  • Removes the hidden "Name Ends With includes extension" preference since there are now a specific rule for including or excluding the extension in the search.
  • Changes "Contains Words" rule: It does not consider an underscore ("_") as part of a word any more.
  • Adds expert rule Use 'find' tool (only useful with a Pro license).
  • Fixes an issue with the Open With command.
  • Results now show the total file size when more than one item is selected.
  • Shift-Copy ("Copy Columns") in Tree view now adds a "depth" column, indicating the indentation level of each row.
  • Adds new scripting features, like a new function to run shell commands asynchronously.
  • New scripts for searching EXIF tags and finding duplicate (identical) files.
  • Improves detection of Synology NAS systems.
  • Simplifies the "File Server Settings" window if no Pro license is present. (The hidden preference "Show Pro options" can force showing the SSH options in the window.)
  • Fix: Renaming a file is not cancelled by automatic updates to the results any more.
  • Fix: When adding files to Results from clipboard, leading and trailing whitespace is now removed from the paths.
  • Fixes some issues around items not hiding correctly when changing the filters in the Results window.
  • Fixes State Restoration (i.e. restoring search from last time FAF was quit), which got broken in the previous beta.

What's changed in 2.4.2b8 (365)

  • Adds some new script features, allowing to use the new "Duplicates" script, for instance.
  • Licenses can now be purchased from inside the app (currently only possible if there's no "FAF-Registration" file in the AppSupport folder – you may remove the file temporarily to test this).
  • When searching for file sizes, matching packages (bundles) are now shown if they're known to Spotlight and Spotlight results are included (see Preferences).
  • Fixes some issues around file server type detection.
  • Sorting entries in the Find window's popup menus is now accomplished with the cmd key.
  • Fixes a potential crash.

What's changed in 2.5b2 (364)

  • Searching with Spotlight on network volumes works again (got broken in 2.5b1).
  • Too-long path names shown in the Results are not truncated in the middle instead of at the end.
  • Some fixes around the use of the "find" tool with the Pro version.

What's changed in 2.5b1 (363)

  • New "File Server Settings" window for managing NAS and other network volumes.
  • Lots of bug and crash fixes.

What's changed in 2.4.2b7 (362)

  • The popup menus for Kind and Label work again.

What's changed in 2.4.2b6 (361)

  • New: Can now search on NAS and *nix server much faster by running the "find" command remotely. Requires a Pro license for testing. Contact me if you like to test this.
  • New: FAF now remembers the opened Find windows and restores them at the next launch. If you want to reload the saved default search instead, see the File menu for the shortcut to "Restore Default Search".
  • Volumes can now be hidden from the locations menu. See Hidden Volumes.
  • The popup menus for the search location, Kind and Label can now be sorted by holding down the Shift key.
  • The popup menus for the search location and the rules can now show the hidden (expert) items by holding down the Option key.
  • Fixes a few crashes and freezes and a case where the search would never end.

What's changed in 2.4.2b5 (360)

  • Fixes Open With to open the correct version if there are multiple of the same application.
  • When FAF is relaunched as root, it will bring itself back to the foreground (didn't work on macOS Sonoma).
  • When switching from Flat List view to Tree view, an existing selection is fully preserved and the selected items are all revealed in the folder hierarchy.
  • No more flickering of the results when files get updated in the background.
  • When found files get deleted, the selection and the "filtered" count are properly updated.

What's changed in 2.4.2b4 (359)

  • When a previously disappeared volume reappears, FAF should no longer freeze and should rediscover all found items on that volume again.
  • Saved .faf files do not add a "\" to every "/" any more (only on macOS 10.15 and later, though).
  • Folder size calculation is more reliable.

What's changed in 2.4.2b3 (358)

  • Changed behavior: FAF now remembers what you last entered into the Find window, and will open any new Find windows with the same input. You can still load the (saved) Default Search from the File menu or by typing cmd-option-O.
  • FAF has many advanced (hidden) preferences, which are now documented here.
  • Enables "Browse with BBEdit" menu item now only if selection includes text or plist files.
  • Adds Kind "Executable".
  • Now shows a cloud symbol for offline files (i.e. those in iCloud).
  • It's now possible to install matching scripts from the website. To test this (it's still off by default until FAF 2.4.2 is released), use this link to view the scripting page. Remember: You can always re-visit these Release Notes from FAF's Help menu.
  • The first time a search on a QNAP NAS is performed, a browser window is opened with the link to https://findanyfile.app/qnap.html.
  • Adds new expert rule "Spotlight" to determine whether to include or exclude Spotlight.
  • Updates the included manual with all recently added rules and some other new details.
  • Resolves some issues when searching with Spotlight on Synology NAS (it could happen that the first search didn't find all items, while subsequent searches did).
  • Fixes an issue on macOS 14 (Sonoma) when searching for text content on iCloud offline files: FAF did download those files, which shouldn't be happening.
  • The expert rule "File Type UTI" works again.
  • Fixes the hidden "Tie Results window to Find window" preference.
  • Fixes a potential crash in Text Content search when using RegEx.
  • Now FAF detects when its app got moved and relaunches itself from the new location in order to avoid a crash later.

What's changed in 2.4.2b2 (357)

  • Fixes several issues around searching on Synology and Qnap NAS volumes with FAF's Spotlight option enabled. See these Synology and QNAP pages for details.
  • Improves Spotlight search speed - no more 2-second delays before the search is finished if it has finished quickly.
  • Improves VoiceOver labels for the items in the toolbar of the Results window.
  • Fixes a freeze that occured when searching a folder that contained more than 1000 matches at its top level.

What's changed in 2.4.2b1 (356)

  • Fixes an obscure crash in dealloc that plagues a few users frequently.
  • Adds better error reporting for a rare crash when searching for text content.
  • Adds "AppleScript" to the Kind rule.
  • Makes the "Scripts" rule visible without expert mode.
  • Improves Japanese translations.
  • Now uses Miguel Beijoca's Squircle icon as the default Dock icon for Big Sur and later.

See here for Release Notes for all previous versions.