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Question

What software can I use to index and search PDF documents?

Sep 27, 2011 4:33AM PDT

I have thousands of PDF documents on my laptop's harddrive. When I search for information on these files, I do not want want to open all of the documents in order to search for the information I require.

What software can I use which can index my PDF documents and which will be able to choose only the relevant files based on the search criteria I enter?

Please advise me

Discussion is locked

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Answer
At first I thought "Google Desktop Search"
Sep 27, 2011 4:36AM PDT

But then I read your second requirement and thought "I wonder if they need to have a programmer write an app for them?"
Bob

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Answer
If this is Windows
Sep 27, 2011 5:16AM PDT

If not then I pass.

But if so, then I was thinking about Windows own Indexing Service. Most users turn this off but I wondered if it would work for you.

The difficulty I saw was that you want to search through PDF files so I did some checking.

It seems that Adobe's PDF Reader has a filter they call iFilter that will work in conjunction with Microsoft Indexing to make searching through PDF files easier. More about it here;
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=2611

You may have to configure the Indexing Service itself though. I have a link full of guidance about that here;
http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/window-on-windows/configure-windows-xps-indexing-service-the-right-way/2156

Scroll down to "Adding file types" where PDF files are mentioned.

Hope that helps.

Mark