Spotlight "Off"

[skunkworker]

I can reindex spotlight but it never returns results. I need Help to turn it back "On". Any Suggestions?

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

Did you specifically turn if "off?" What's in your "Privacy" list in the Spotlight System Preference pane?

 

[skunkworker]

Nope, i Never turned it "OFF". My HD filled up not to long ago because of a backup/disk write error. But now i have enough space for it to operate right. I have nothing in my "privacy" tab in Spotlight.Prefpane . And actually if i search for "apple" before i would get 53,000 results but now none.

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

Hmmm... what is the total size of your hard drive, and how much of that is free? If you have more than 80% to 85% of your hard drive filled up, that could be the reason -- HFS+ can potentially have problems with fragmentation and data corruption with hard drives that don't keep 15% or more free space available at all times.

If you have plenty of space, a la above, try adding your hard drive to the "Privacy" list, restarting, then removing the hard drive from the list. That will force Spotlight to reindex (is this how you were forcing a reindex before?) and may help.

 

[skunkworker]

The Total Size of my HDs are a 160 "Main" and a 250 (partitined to the equalivent of a 160, and a 90) My main HD has 75 gbs left, the patritioned 160 has 35gbs left and the 90 has 21gbs left. I did everything by the command line. Il try restarting after adding my main hd to the list. but usually it wont go on the list

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

Ah, plenty of free space.

If it won't go into the list, I would suspect some sort of permissions problem perhaps -- have you tried repairing the disk and repairing permissions?

 

[Decado]

if you have not already done it, add your hard-drive to the privacy list and then remove it from the list. this forces a reindex. helped on my fathers powerbook.

 

[skunkworker]

It still won't show up if you drag the disk to the spotlight tab

 

[ElDiabloConCaca]

I would suspect something else is awry then... have you done the disk repair and permissions repair?

 

[bobw]

Try trashing the 'com.apple.spotlight.plist' file and re-indexing.

 

[skunkworker]

Try trashing the 'com.apple.spotlight.plist' file and re-indexing.

Where?

 

[Lt Major Burns]

ha ha! spotlight it.....

sorry. it'll be in the library, either your home library or the system library, possibly under preferences or something. it is quite intuitive in there. once you've found one com.apple.etc you've probably found it. keep looking in potential places until you find it. or Bobw will point you in the exact direction, he's good like that.

 

[skunkworker]

I get this error whenever i try to do a mdfind. maybe something is wrong?

4300: Can't checkin with server named com.apple.metadata.mdserver, error 0x10000004
4300: Can't create query: 0x10000003

 

[bobw]

It's locater here;

user>library>preferences

 

[skunkworker]

It's locater here;

user>library>preferences

What locater for what? com.apple.metadata.mdserver? <- i don't have one maybe thats what the error is if you do can you zip it and help me install it?

 

[skunkworker]

whenever i try to index i get this: 918: Can't checkin with server named com.apple.metadata.mdserver, error 0x10000004
918: Can't checkin with server named com.apple.metadata.mdserver, error 0x10000004
918: Can't checkin with server named com.apple.metadata.mdserver, error 0x10000004
918: Can't checkin with server named com.apple.metadata.mdserver, error 0x10000004
918: Can't checkin with server named com.apple.metadata.mdserver, error 0x10000004
918: Can't checkin with server named com.apple.metadata.mdserver, error 0x10000004

 

[bobw]

Sorry, typo, should be 'located here'

located here;
user>library>preferences;

com.apple.spotlight.plist