Search for Box Drive content from Explorer/Finder Search
Roxie Shealy
shared this idea
We are currently not planning to implement this feature and will continue to prevent all Box Drive results from appearing in Explorer/Finder searches.
Box Drive does not download the all of the metadata (File name, folder structure, etc.) of your Box content. Instead, it is downloaded on demand and then evicted when it is no longer relevant. This eviction process is not visible to users and it is not easily predictable. This would cause the search results in Explorer/Finder to be inconsistent for users – sometimes they would find a file and other times they may not if the metadata and file were evicted.
We have chosen not to download all of the metadata (and then keep it up to date with changes) as this can result in a large performance, storage and bandwidth tax which is not scalable – especially in environments where users interface with millions of files/folders.
We will continue to improve the Box Drive Search experience as well as add in additional features in the future to help you access your Box content quickly!
66 comments
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Anonymous
commented
No excuse! Dropbox does it just fine.
And your search feature is worthless. No resizing, no details view, no hierarchy, NO NOTHIN!
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Anonymous
commented
I am disappointed, I still use BOX SYNC (I saved the installer ***), because BOX DRIVE is useless in WINDOWS SEARCH. I think that they should, at least, allow the possibility of downloading some folders, at least those marked on the cell phone for "offline access", or as it was called in BOX SYNC, "sync with computer"
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Anonymous
commented
The inability for Windows Search to index offline files is a complete show stopper from transitioning from Box Sync. We have a custom application that uses Windows Search SQL to query the index (metadata & content) of locally stored PDF documents.
If Box Drive is using junction points that prevents Windows Search unable to index these files then the whole application is rendered useless. FWIW we previously tried BoxSearchManager and it's very limited compared to Windows Search and also a *lot* slower making it an impractical replacement.
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Anonymous
commented
This is still not planned? I cannot switch to drive just to be told to use your search when its vastly inferior to native search on the mac. It feel like Box is trying run off none commercial users. Very frustrating.
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Jeffrey Arkoette
commented
This needs to re-prioritized and allowed. Not being able to have simple File Explorer Search is a significant obstacle that has hindered adoption within our user-base. It has also caused more users to migrate to Dropbox/OneDrive who offer such search capabilities and weakens our enforcement of a preferred cloud storage solution.
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Anonymous
commented
Please allow local search, even for only folders who's contents are available offline. I have been using box sync for the longest time because of these handicaps- I generate thousands of jpeg and .cr2 files and need to search based on partial string search and kept to a specific folder. Recently changing to Box Drive has handicapped me.
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Paying Enterprise Customer
commented
Microsoft OneDrive has a simple option 'Turn On Files On Demand' so the user can determine if they want caching or syncing. On the search results being inconsistent, how does Microsoft handle it? It seems like your decision to not download metadata is due to limitations in your design rather than what the user wants. This is a major miss in your design and should be rectified.
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Mikkel Larsen-Ledet
commented
I am frustrated that Box community moderator asks us to "Share our usecase" as if file search is such a weird request...? That this should even have to be a request and not an obvious must have feature for a desktop file access?!?!
I am baffled.I see this as a MUST have feature if I am to further roll out BoxDrive in our organisation.
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John Forsyth
commented
This should be a no-brainer for files that are available off-line.
Not user friendly
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Anonymous
commented
I am so confused about why this would be the direction Box would take with their software. I always liked Box over others even if the software always felt a step behind others. Now, this takes the software many steps back.
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Todd Stout
commented
Can you at least allow local (spotlight/windows search) searching for files & folders marked for Offline use?
Files marked Offline should work like sync files and actually be present in the filesystem not just in some encrypted cache. Having actual files would solve a bunch of other problems as well (like not being able to redirect Windows profile folders up to Box ).
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Robert Granholm
commented
Yes please, also need to be able to narrow by who has last updated
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Anonymous
commented
I am very surprised that the only way to search Box Drive ubfolders seems to be through a browser and returns results from our entire collection of documents. Searching through Windows Explorer is only useful if you know where something is located.
I found this location to submit feedback by way of a product forum thread that is over two years old at this point, but I guess this has been a problem for near three? This is a bit disheartening to see as a new user.
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Alexi Lynch
commented
This is killing some of us Box crew :-( The Mac Finder search process is far superior and many of our team are holding onto Box Sync because we don't want to lose it. For those who have moved it takes them much longer to search.
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Anonymous
commented
As a company that has gone paperless and uses Box for all aspects of business this is a needed feature.
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Anonymous
commented
We can't have different software just for searching files on our computers.
So that we don't pay people to "search" in our business!You should seriously consider implementing this function. We use box to simplify our lives. From the moment when this is no longer the case; we will go see the competition.
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Anonymous
commented
Being able to utilize Finder/Explorer/Recent Docs (e.g., smart folders) is an essential part of everyday workflow. At the minimum, this feature should be available for offline files. These files have the necessary data, therefore the reasoning for not including this feature is invalid.
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Anonymous
commented
After several years I have decided to start migrating my files away from Box.com because not being able to search for files by filename Finder is just too much hassle.
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Anonymous
commented
come on!! box sync was allowing this feature to work and you guys MADE me uninstall box sync ... and now i am locked out of my own files.
the box drive search is not intuitive and doesn't return the right things up top. PLEASE allow spotlifht to index box -
Anonymous
commented
Windows file explorer does not work because files are not local. A lot of my end users depend on a huge volume of simple files searches to perform their duties.
Not only is it more laborious to have to rely on a web portal, the search function in the web portal is slow. It is not as friendly an interface to use as file explorer, especially because there is no way to set "only search within this subfolder" as a default. That's an oversight; users shouldn't be forced to configure EVERY search. The search itself should be seamless.
Box excels at seamless synchronization between multiple users sharing ideas and data. But it lacks this valuable single-user feature. Thank you.