Other Versions
Find Any File is Shareware
You may try it out without buying first. Simply download it.
If you keep using it you are expected to pay for it, though.
Find Any File (FAF)
Key Features
- Convenient folder and icon views for results
- Can search in other users' home folders ("root" mode)
- Queries can be saved for easy re-use
- Can be launched with a self defined keyboard shortcut
Links
New in version 2.4:
- Scriptable rules for powerful and complex searches.
- File content search now finds text inside zip files, including .docx (Word) and .xlsx (Excel) files
- Support for Default Folder X and BBEdit.
- Many more improvements.
Find Any File 2 Beta Testing
Welcome to the public beta test of Find Any File 2 (FAF 2)
FAF 2 is a complete rewrite, which took two people 500 hours of work so far. You might not notice much of this, though.
The goal of this first version of FAF 2 is to make it as close to FAF 1.x as possible, and nothing more.
So, don't expect much new in this beta version. Basically, it should work just like version 1 did. Maybe with a slightly better performance and a more modern look.
If you find anything that does not behave as well in FAF 2 as it does in FAF 1.9, please let me know.
This Update Will Be Free
Despite the high investment (I spent about a year's revenue to have someone help with me with this rewrite), I do not plan to charge for the update to version 2. Instead, I hope it will draw in new customers, and thereby increase my sales.
I also think about making a separately sold "Pro" version that will have some extra features for power users, such as AppleScript support, pre-caching for faster results, faster search on network volumes (NAS), improved content search, and more. Some of these features became only a realistic possibility because of this rewrite.
Known Differences Between FAF 2 (v2) and FAF 1.9.3 (v1)
New features
- In the Preferences there's a new option Show Results Early. When checked, the results will appear as soon as the first items are found. Closing the window will abort the search. Let me know what you think of this.
- New search rule: File Type UTI Conforms To for searching images, music files and alike. See the help text at the window’s bottom when choosing this rule.
- Copy JSON Format (cmd-ctrl-C) creates a JSON text in the clipboard, describing most of the selected files' properties. Possibly useful for post processing in other programs. Let me know if you find this useful. There are also hidden settings to fine tune its output, e.g. for the date format.
Improvements
- v2 is a 64 bit application and therefore runs fine on upcoming macOS 10.15.
- Searching in "slow" mode (i.e. when searching a subdirectory instead of an entire disk) should be faster in v2 than in v1. Definitely not slower.
- The Filter field at the top right of the results window offers the option to search in Any Shown Column. Also, when filtering dates, the month and weekdays can be spelled out (such as "april").
- Deleted items remain in the list, shown with a line (strike) through them. I like your opinion on that. You can disable this option in the Results menu, and also remove all deleted items through it.
- The default and recent searches are not stored on disk as .faf files any more but in the app's preferences.
Changes
- v2 runs only on macOS 10.11 and later (v1 supports 10.6 to 10.14).
- In the Results window, when "List View" (cmd-1) is chosen, there is no second list at the bottom any more for showing the parent folders of the selected item. Instead, the very bottom of the window shows a so-called Path bar, in which all the folders are listed, and which can be double or ctrl-clicked on.
- When choosing a folder in an APFS volume to search, it won't show "(slow)" because recursive search is hardly slower than searching the entire disk using the "fast search" operation (which is, sadly much slower than searching on HFS formatted volumes).
Known Issues
- Menus and messages may be incorrect or missing in languages other than English.
- Content Search algorithms have changed. More or even less may be found (if less than in v1, please report).
Things to Pay Attention to:
- Do your saved .faf files from v1 still open correctly?
- Does FAF 2 play well with Finder extensions such as PathFinder?
- Does searching in root mode ("Find All") work right?
I Need Help With:
- Localization - Some things have not been translated, yet. (If you know how to edit the embedded .strings files, I appreciate your contributions.)
- A new Icon would be nice - please contact me first if you like to help me out with that, as to avoid that you'd do it in vain if I already have a great one coming.
Download
Note: This beta version of FAF is called "FAF 2 Beta.app" and uses its own preferences and hot key settings. This means you can keep running FAF 1 alongside, e.g. in order to compare results from both programs.
The new application will tell you that it's not registered and you need to Purchase it. You can activate v2 the same way you did activate v1 (using the instructions on the linked web site). If you don't remember how, please search your emails for "Find Any File" or contact me.
In the Preferences of the app, the checkboxes for checking for updates and beta version are always enabled. You cannot change them, which would defy the purpose of this beta program.
And now, download FAF 2 Beta