How to search inside PDFs with Windows Search?

Question

We have an iot-core UWP, headless app that runs fine (for months, hundreds of devices) when deployed directly from Visual Studio 2015 or as an App onto the retail iot-core distribution. In order to avoid over-air-update problems caused by recent automatic iot-core updates, we are trying to get a custom oem image/ffu built and deployed to the microsoft store. However, even after walking through the documentation/examples in detail, our app is still crashing when we deploy our oem image/ffu.

UPDATE

OK, no debugger still, but I found where it crashes, now is the question why the oem-ffu behaves differently from the side-deployed code (our code is identical) Since iot-core/UWP provices no way to get the board-UUID, I use the MAC of the primary network interface. To get this, I use this http://embedded101.com/BruceEitman/entryid/676/Windows-10-IoT-Core-Getting-the-MAC-Address-from-Raspberry-Pi which requires that a webserver be running, which it normally is, otherwise the console webapp would not work. However, on the OEM-Custom-Build-Version I get a crash in this routine. I don't know where since I can't debug, but it crashes, and I get a null back, which causes my azure storage connect to crash. I do not block processing since I have a retry loop... Anyway, what is the difference or what must we do to enable this code to also work in the OEM build?

The grass roots issue is: all I really need is a unique ID for the RPi board from somewhere... which does not seem possible via C#!? See How to get the processor serial number of Raspberry PI 2 with Windows IOT

So it looks like my MAC-Address solution above was the best we can expect at the moment, but doesn't work on the oem build. Why?

Solution 1

IFilters allow Windows Search to search within file contents.

Here are three popular PDF IFilters^†:

• Foxit PDF IFilter (commercial)
• TET PDF IFilter (free/commercial)
• Adobe PDF IFilter (32-bit / 64-bit) (free)

After installing one, you should be able to search within PDF files in the same way that you can for other types of files.

_{†:This article from 2009 has performance numbers, but they may not apply to current versions of the filters.}

Solution 2

An alternative way to search through PDFs is to use the search function of PDF-XChange Viewer. It does not need indexing neither. This is my choice.

You can install the portable version. Hit Ctrl Shift F to get the search dialog:

Solution 3

You can use Mendeley; it's free.

First, add your PDF files and index them. After that, you can search them with auto-complete search.

• You can also add notes on the PDF files with it.
• If you have a lot a lot PDF files, sometimes RAM overflows when you try to index if this happen, just decrease count of PDF files.
• Be careful, Mendeley actually is an academic program for reference system (yes, also you can use it for adding references to your Word document. I used it when I wrote my PHd Thesis; it was wonderful), so it will try to upload your PDF files to its server. If you want to work offline, change Mendeley's internet options and give it a wrong/offline proxy IP (like 127.3.0.1) . Then you can work with it off-line. NOT: You can also search in HTML or word files with Mendeley.

Solution 4

PDF XChange Viewer, which has a free version available, comes with a built-in iFilter.

Solution 5

Maybe little free tool Pasco from Microsoft Store?

Pasco is a software whose main task is to search for pages in a text (pdf) containing a specified phrase. As the software indexes ebooks, the search result is displayed immediately. Pasco is not only a search engine but also a convenient ebook reader.

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Comments

[Orion]

Not answering this old question, but I found DocFetcher useful.

[Admin]

Could you drop by in Ask Different chat about bounty on your question, please?

[Kuman]

I tried this but it did not work for me. I'm on Windows 7 Professional (64-bit), with Adobe Reader X. I installed the iFilter, added it to my PATH environment variable, restarted my computer, and waiting until Windows was indexing, but I still couldn't search within my PDFs. I did have to install under my PC's administrator account, which is a different user, I wonder if that affected it.

[Louis Waweru]

Did Windows finish indexing?

[Merger]

@emddudley, if you want the PDF contents to be indexed, you should ensure that in the above screenshot, "Index Properties and File Contents" is selected for PDF files. Also, if you're searching non-indexed files, you may have to prefix your search query with content:.

[myrrtle]

Thanks, I didn't know this feature existed in the standard Reader. Sure is dang slow though.

[dmarietta]

The above referenced MSDN article that @Louis refers to is actually talking about the speed of the content indexing. This is the speed at which the Windows Search (or Search Server) crawls through the content and adds it to its data. The speed of the search is not affected at all and is the same regardless of IFilter used. So unless you are needing to index a large number of new files quickly, the speed of the indexing probably does not matter for most people.

[slhck]

Are you affiliated with Debenu?

[Rahul]

No. I was facing a similar issue and had tried both the softwares. So, thought I will share the info.

[Bloke]

+1! Didn't know this. PDF-XChange Viewer is just awesome. Surprises me all the time.

[GGleGrand]

Thanks, yes, this is one workaround we have considered, but is still a workaround that may bite us back later. More detail now added to my post.

[JinSnow]

Works with single words but doesn't work for sentence apparently. (I tried with and without quotes) Any advice?

[Louis Waweru]

@Guillaume Not sure. I'm now on Windows 10 which is using a filter named "Reader Search Handler" which does well with sentences for me. I'm not sure where it came from. i.imgur.com/rVj1EhD.png

[Louis Waweru]

@Guillaume I think it's from Edge.

[JinSnow]

@Louis Thanks for the feedback. Good to know. Problem solved on windows7, we just need to wait (much) longer for the pdf results (I did close the search window before it appears).

[GGleGrand]

Jackie, wondering if there is a REG.exe command to enable access to the on-board ethernet's (LAN) MAC or even a reliable entry for this MAC in the REG that we can access?

[Avatar]

Best answer in my opinion. Portable and very fast, even with preview and word location when clicked on a search result entry. Thanks for pointing out this gem.

[sludge705x]

Am I missing something? I'd think that File Explorer would use iFilter to show the results itself, but from what I see, you have to see them through Foxit, as follows: . . . Open up Foxit Phantom, and click the yellow folder to the left of the "Find" cell. This will show the Search pane on the right side of the screen . . . Where would you like to search? "All PDF document in" . . . Select the location: Local Disk (C:) . . . What word or phrase would you like to search for? "your word"

[Valdemar]

Great option here, easy and very effective. Thanks

[WhySoSerious]

I don't know wether to thank PDF-XChange Viewer but I downloaded it and searched through my Pdfs on OneDrive and it fixed the windows search results to search through pdf contents. Thanks man.