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Archivarius

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m_s:
Archivarius

I have tried most of the mainstream desktop search tools, starting with blinkx and the first beta from Google.  I especially liked Copernic, and that was the one I ran for the longest period.  When Google launched their latest version, I decided to give it another try, tempted by some of the nice interface design work going on over at aqua-soft.org (especially the Getchoo project).  Then I installed NOD32, and stumbled upon the documented incompatibility between these two products (read Google websites and you’ll learn it’s NOD’s fault, read security websites and you’ll learn it’s Google’s fault).   That was a drag, but not enough to convince to change desktop searcher again.  But then I changed my email over to The Bat!, and it was only yesterday that I realised GDS was no longer indexing new mail.  A bit of research turned up a plugin for GDS, but that was described as buggy (and I would still have the draggy NOD/GDS problem); so I decided to look around.  There is an excellent comparative chart of the various Desktop Search tools over at: http://www.goebelgroup.com/desktopmatrix.htm  I hadn’t heard of the only program listed there that indexed The Bat!, Archivarius 3000, so I decided to give it a try – and I really like what I found.

Like most of the other tools in its class, Archivarius is a small download (3mb) – you’ll find it over at www.likasoft.com.  I found it a very straightforward install, and it indexed my 35,000 documents and emails in a matter of minutes.  In creating an index, you start by choosing exactly what you want indexed, either by selecting common items or choosing specific files, folders, or data types.  So you’re completely and easily in charge of what is and isn’t archived, right from the start.  If you choose, for instance, to index your The Bat! email, you then go on to select which folders should and shouldn’t be indexed.



Next, you can choose morphological options (!), which simplifies searching in a multi-language environment.  I don’t need this facility, so I’ve not looked into it much.  Archivarius apparently understands natural language queries; according to the Likasoft website, ‘While searching, the program automatically generates all forms of words, which provide full-text documents search in 16 languages.’  These languages are: English, German, Spanish, French, Czech, Dutch, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Swedish, Bulgarian, Danish, Ukrainian and Belarusian.



Next, you get to choose which document types are indexed – it really is an exhaustive list, from common word-processing formats (MS Word, Write, and Works; WordPerfect, RTF) through Excel, PDF, ICQ chat files, and many more (including Zinio Reader magazines, which is new format to me, and looks fun and useful). 

Then you choose file extensions to be indexed, then document encodings, then whether or not to extract documents from archives (which is done with a built-in archiver, so no external software is needed).

All of these settings, after the first step of choosing what you want to index, can be set in Program Settings and inherited from there – and the default settings are probably going to be fine for most users (and certainly for me!).

When you’re done with all this, you can choose when the index is created – either immediately, or at a later time – and you can get an estimate of how big the index will be: on this machine, it comes to most of a whopping half-a-gigabyte, but disk space is cheap, and the lightning fast search results are well-worth that impact to me.

So, once it’s finished indexing, you can just click on the ‘Search’ button and enter your query, and within moments – it tells you how many moments in the bottom right corner of its window – the results are there, previewed with each of your search terms highlighted.  I put my boss’s name in (this is the machine I use as his secretary), and up come more than 20,000 results in just over 12 seconds.  Double-click any one of those and you open the hit in a simple text viewer (which, according to the website, can deal with very large files); again, each of your search terms is highlighted. 



Or you can switch to list view, which simply lists file titles, folders, dates, without previews.  You can also choose from a number of different headers in this list, so it’s highly customisable.

You can also index and search remotely, as well as on removable media.  All this, and it’s running at just 16mb of memory while open, and at less than 10mb when it’s running in the system tray. 

Unlike the other Desktop Searchers I tried, you can specify when it does its indexing, so you’re always in easy control. 

I like Archivarius – it’s simple and straightforward, but it doesn’t sacrifice any flexibility or control.  It’s a powerful indexer and searcher – and it indexes what I consider to be the best email client around.  It does what it says on the box, reliably and plainly, and it’s just what I need in my work.

Of course, I’m just getting to know it, and what I’ve said here is really a beginner’s enthusiasm in getting to know a new program – there are so many features I haven’t even looked into yet, but I’ll recommend it very highly based on my experience so far.


[I embedded the images by simply uploading them to https://www.donationcoder.com/Forums/userup/ - mouser]

Carol Haynes:
Interesting - let us know how you get on with this.

For future reference the only way I have found to embed images in the message body is to upload them to the web somewhere and then insert the image via a URL (there is an image button above the message wrtiting window).

If you haven't got easy access to webspace you could sign up for free space at Yahoo.com (just sign up for a free email account and then go to your user profile and set up a free Geocities account). I don't really like Geocities as a webhosting solution (too many ads on the pages) but as a repository for graphics it is fine ;)

mouser:
fantastic review!!!  :up: :up: :up:

really nice to hear the background also about what drove you from the mainstream tools.

i tend to agree with your desire to have a search tool that you have real control over which doesn't index stuff unless and until you tell it to, which is another reason i liked archivarius as well.  plus the fact that it indexed .chm files.


i will see if i can't find a way to reference images attached to posts - seems like it should be possible..

you can always email me pics and id be happy to upload them to https://www.donationcoder.com/Forums/userup/ where you can easily link to them.

clif_notes:
I agree, excellent review. This is yet another one I'd like to host in an upcoming newsletter. Does that sound ok to you M_S?

It would be hosted at http://freewarewiki.pbwiki.com/index.php?wiki=ClifsCurrentNewsletter and later filed in the archive.

You'd get full credit and a guest page if you want it. I'd also provide a link back to this forum.
Guest pages are usually a short bio or other information the guest reviewer wishes to share.

clif_notes:
Hi all,

Carol and Mouser both just mentioned hosting pics.
I use the following free image hosting services and have never lost a pic. All three encourage hotlinking and even provide the code for direct links, indirect links, thumbnails, forum bbcode links, etc.
Arranged in order of the favorite to least favorite. Some are better at some things than others.

Photobucket http://www.photobucket.com
ImageShack http://imageshack.us
ImageCave http://www.imagecave.com

You would be happy with almost any one of them for posting in a forum.

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