Visual quick removal of volumes and folders from Search Edit expressions

[Thy Grand Voidinesss]

Lets assume a user has volumes C, D and E


So it is possible for user to search on all of the drives by using filtering expression like

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C:\;D:\;E:\ .123

in order to find all 123 files in that file format on all the volumes



But would it be possible to be able to use something like

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C:\-;D:\;E:\ .123

to perform the same search everywhere with the exception of volume D? I know that this would work

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C:\;E:\ .123

but what if user has 20 volumes and is looking for errors in nomenclature, some left overs and wrongly located backups [true story]? If a user could piece-by-piece add temporarily something like just the minus sign then user could visually see where at what exact point such volume-by-volume "reverted" / subtracting search is


Being able to do this with volumes should not be hard to implement. But the more advance version would also allow for something like

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C:\;D:\;E:\;-\Music .123

in order to search [in my imaginary example set-up] everywhere with the exception of folders named Music [if they are on these volumes]


And if this do get implemented and with the usage of minus sign, then maybe also the plus sign should do exactly what semicolon does now [but leaving the semicolon's functionality also]?

[NotNull]

Visual quick removal of volumes and folders from Search Edit expressions ?

Temporary Omit!

[Thy Grand Voidinesss]

[...]
Temporary Omit!

Its quite inconvenient to omit just one path from many present in Search Edit and then bring it back and deactivate some other for a while. But a minus sign before a letter+colon+slash would make it stand out more; just as a minus+slash combination instead of just slash


So for example instead of

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C:\Edits\2013;D:\Edits\2013;E:\Edits\;W:\Edits\2010s;"X:\Edits Raw\2010";Z:\Edits;"C:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New";"E:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New" .123

see and use temporarily

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-C:\Edits\2013;D:\Edits\2013;E:\Edits\;W:\Edits\2010s;"X:\Edits Raw\2010";Z:\Edits;"C:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New";"E:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New" .123

and after it see

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C:\Edits\2013;-D:\Edits\2013;E:\Edits\;W:\Edits\2010s;"X:\Edits Raw\2010";Z:\Edits;"C:\Edited New";-"D:\Edited New";"E:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New" .123

and then jump two steps / paths to quickly using

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C:\Edits\2013;D:\Edits\2013;E:\Edits\;W:\Edits\2010s;-"X:\Edits Raw\2010";Z:\Edits;"C:\Edited New";-"D:\Edited New";"E:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New" .123

[and so on] would be in my opinion a more user friendly. [And please mind that this is still a simple example cooked up by me to demonstrate visual advantages of such ability; the example is made up but scenario itself is nevertheless driven from my experience of using Everything]


And if also my visual aids propositions would become implemented [viewtopic.php?p=55903], then such excluded path would become even more visible:

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C:\Edits\2013; -D:\Edits\2013;E:\Edits\;W:\Edits\2010s;"X:\Edits Raw\2010";Z:\Edits;"C:\Edited New";-"D:\Edited New";"E:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New" .123

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C:\Edits\2013;D:\Edits\2013;E:\Edits\;W:\Edits\2010s ; -"X:\Edits Raw\2010";Z:\Edits;"C:\Edited New";-"D:\Edited New";"E:\Edited New";"D:\Edited New" .123

[NotNull]

Why not use the NOT operator (!)

!\thisfolder\ excludes all paths with a folder named thisfolder
!\*thisfolder*\ excludes all paths with a folder that has thisfolder in it's name
!C;;E: excludes all on C: and E: drives

[Thy Grand Voidinesss]

You are telling me to - or are you suggesting to @void to consider using

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!

instead of

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-

proposed by me?

[NotNull]

Yes.

Try

!C:

and check the resultlist.

[Thy Grand Voidinesss]

Something as basic as

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!M:\

seems to work A-OK, but e.g.

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M:\ ; !"M:\Music Out"

also seems to work by showing all items from volume M except from folder Music Out - except it reports in overall only 15 000 files instead of 120 000 and 1 folder instead of 7 000

[NotNull]

The ; in your search query will limit the results to files/folders with a ; in their name. Remove it and you are good.

[Thy Grand Voidinesss]

So I have to use this

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M:\ !"M:\Music Out"

and it works. But If try to expand it to this

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C:\ M:\ !"M:\Music Out"

then it shows nothing. But if I write it like this

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C:\;M:\ !"M:\Music Out"

then it works, but its hard to read and hence it is easy to make mistake when adding more paths to it. But I can replace it with

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C:\|M:\ !"M:\Music Out"

which is doubtfully better in terms of visuals. But, as I presume, the best / clearest / reed-through-able way is to use

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C:\ | M:\ !"M:\Music Out"

as >>|<< is an illegal character - thus it is not possible to show up in names of items like >>;<< sign. Right? But then again, after replacing it with

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C:\ ; M:\ !"M:\Music Out"

I get nothing


So: I would argue that semicolon should have its separator function disabled - if not by default then at least by choice by a conscious user who has a lot of semicolons in names of items because uses them in personal naming scheme. And even most users do not use semicolons by themselves- they never know where and when they will e.g. download some files with them it their names


And also: this

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C:\ | M:\ | !"M:\Music Out"

does no filter anything unless I remove the separator before the operator, i.e. use the already presented above form

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C:\ | M:\ !"M:\Music Out"

And so I would also argue that both of these two forms should work - or [to the contrary of current behavior] just the first one

[NotNull]

Don't use spaces around ;. A space in Everything means AND, giving you C:\ AND ; AND T:\
And there are no files that are on T:\ AND on C:\ at the same time. Let alone ones with a ; in their name.

[Thy Grand Voidinesss]

Don't use spaces around ;. A space in Everything means AND
[...]

Thus, when trying to maintain clear readability of filtering expressions containing multiple paths it is unwise to use semicolon at all - hence in my opinion

[...]
semicolon should have its separator function disabled
[...]

so that other [new] users from repeating the same journey as mine when trying out what works and what does not

[NotNull]

The main purpose for using the ; is within functions.

Instead of size:1MB | size:2MB, you can use: size:1MB;2MB

That becomes even more useful for long function names, combined with search modifiers, like startwith:alternate-data-stream-name: