Chapter 3. Using the Finder and Searching with Spotlight
Mac OS X contains two very powerful tools that enable you to manage and locate files stored on your Mac's hard disk. The first, an application called the Finder, is used to locate, adjust, and move files around the Mac OS X. Because the Finder application is the most commonly used tool in Mac OS X, we outlined it in Chapter 2 as an example of how menus, buttons, and windows work in a Mac OS X application. In this chapter, we examine the Finder in action and how it can be put to practical use.
The second Mac OS X feature we look at is called Spotlight. This technology was first introduced in Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and has revolutionized the way people interact with their Macs. Spotlight helps you discover files, folders, and information contained throughout the Mac OS X at blistering speed.
Searching with Spotlight can be either extremely simple or very sophisticated. Spotlight can search for files and folders by name, in much the same way that traditional search tools have operated on computers for countless years. It can also search for combinations of other attributes, such as a file's size, creator, modification date, and label color.
Where Spotlight starts to get clever is when it's searching through files themselves. Spotlight can look through the ...
Get Mac OS® X Snow Leopard™ Bible now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
