Mac OS X 10.4.2 Special Report: Spotlight cannot find single asterisk filenames

MacFixIt reader Scott Rose has discovered a problem where Spotlight cannot find files and folders containing a single asterisk (*).

Scott writes:

"We have a folder on an external FireWire drive that contains movies (and also contains subfolders with even more movies). Most of these are .mpg movies & .mov movies.

"We have denoted our favorite movies by ending their filenames with 1 asterisk, 2 asterisk, or 3 asterisks.

"For example:

• skateboard#20*.mpg
• skateboard#21*.mpg
• skateboard#22**.mpg
• skateboard#23***.mpg

"However, whenever we do a search for the asterisk symbol (by simply typing a * into the spotlight search field), Spotlight only finds the files that have more than one asterisk in their filename. Spotlight does not find any of the movie files that only have one asterisk in their filename."

Spotlight can find a single asterisk in a file name as long as it is not at the end of the name or a word in the name without an asterisk at the beginning of the name.

MacFIxIt reader W.T. Fritts writes:

"For single word filenames the results were thus:

• *Filename* - found
• *Filename - found
• *File*name - found

• Filename* - not found
• File*name - not found
• File*name* - not found

Peter John Roberts adds:

"I did a test on files named as follows:

1. *XXXXX
2. XXX * XX
3. XXX*XX
4. XXXXX *
5. XXXXX*
6. XXXXX**

"Spotlight found (1), (2), (4), (6) and missed (3) and (5).

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