Search v2.00b
by Thorbjörn Jemander.
1. Introduction
This add-on lets you search the contents of the files that you
have marked in the Tracker. It recursively descends down
into any marked directories and searches the conents of
the files present there.
There are two ways to specify the search string; the first
is to just use the contents of the clipboard, the second
is by explicitly enter the string in a by the program
provided text control.
There are several search options regarding case sensitivty,
wildcards and regular expressions.
2. Archive
The following entries are included in the package:
- Search.html (this file :)
- Search-S
- Drop Search-S Here To Install
- Art/ParameterWindow.jpeg
- Art/ResultWindow.jpeg
3. Requirements
Search v2.00 requires BeOS R3/x86 and Marco Nelissen's
layout library liblayout. It can be found in BeWare.
4. Installation
Drag Search-S to folder "Drop Search-S Here To Install".
5. Operation
5.1 The clipboard
Make sure that you have the text you want to
search for in the clipboard by copy it somewhere
e.g. in a editor, terminal or a text control
somewhere.
5.2 Invocation
Mark the files and folders you want to search
in the Tracker and choose the Search add-on in the
add-ons menu, or press Command-Option-S.
(The command key is mapped to Alt on most x86 keyboard
layouts.)
5.3 The Parameter Window

If the clipboard is empty when the add-on
is selected OR if you activate it (by pressing
the right command key while launching the add-on)
a window will appear where you can modify the
selected text and specify some search criteria:
- Ignore case - The search is case insensitive when set.
- Entire word - Only hits when the word is surrounded by white spaces.
- Use * and ? - * and ? are interpreted as common wildcards (?=1 unknown character, *=multiple unknown characters.)
- Regexp - The string is interpreted as a regular expression.
You also have a history menu of previous searches.
You can clear the history with the so marked button.
Start the search by pressing the Search button or hit enter
on the keyboard.
5.4 The Result Window

When the search has started, a window will open that
displays the files that are found to contains the
specified text. They appear on the list as the algorithm
finds the files.
The files can be double-clicked to be launched with its
preferred application. Holding down shift while doing it,
causes its parent folder will be opened in the Tracker. The
same thing can be accomplished by pressing the buttons
above the listview.
Below the list view there's a check box that determine whether
the full path should be visible or not. Default is on.
(The files can still be invoked when only the names are visible.)
When the search is finished, the first item (if any) in the list
will be marked and there will be a system beep.
6. Bugs
No that I know of. Enlighten me! :)
However, the regexp search is not tested very hard since I'm not
an expert on it myself. There could be a question
on how reliable the regexp search is over the 64k boundary.
It is not tested very good due to a limtied time and
experience. This software should be regarded as beta.
7. Limitations
The maximum size of the searched text is
currently 255 characters. The wildcard
extension is max 256 characters.
8. Performance
I have not done any timing, but the fastest
search is done with no options checked. The
buffer size is 64k and by using the BeOS API
that should guarantee a high speed. The case
insensitivity is slower and the regexp search
is considerably slower.
NB! It is not an good idea to make two searches
simultaneously, especially on IDE-based hardware. It
will kill the system in terms of performance and
the searching speed becomes utterly slow.
9. History
- v.1.00 Initial release
- v.1.10 Bugfix.
- v.1.11 Bugfix. Release
- v.1.12 Enhancement: The listview. Release.
- v.1.13 Enhancement, the ending alert.
- v.1.20 Recompilation for AA:DR9. Release.
- v.1.21 Recompilation for PR. Release.
- v.1.50 Scrollbars, double click invocation. Intel and PPC version.
- v.2.00.b. Case insensitivity, entire word search, wildcards, regexp,
inovocation buttons, full path option, history menu.
10. Thanks...
... to Rainer Riedl who came with valuable
suggestions and source code, and to you
all other that encouraged me. Thanks also goes to
Marco Nelissen for providing the nice liblayout
library. And to those at Be. And to BeDevTalk
participants. And to...
11. Legal stuff
I do not take any responsibilities what so ever
for any consequences caused by, or even remotely
associated with this program. You use it entirely
at your own risk and I do leave no guarantees that
this program will work 100% as stated here.
You may copy, redistribute and modify it as much as
you want as long as you (or another person, company
foundation or similair) does not make commercial
profit on this program and if this archive is
distributed intact.
12. Contact info
Comments, bug reports, feature requests etc,
are grately appreciated and can be sent to:
thoan@ifm.liu.se
Enjoy!
Late September 1998
Thorbjörn Jemander