Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes

  • Last Modified: July 28, 2008
  • Article: HT2409
  • Old Article: 301562

Summary

Want to re-index a folder—or even an entire volume—for Spotlight (part of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger)? Just do this:

Products Affected

Mac OS X 10.4, Mac OS X 10.5

  1. From the Apple menu, choose System Preferences.
  2. Click Spotlight.
  3. Click the Privacy tab.
  4. Drag a folder or even an entire volume (your hard drive) to the list.
  5. Remove the item or volume you just added.

Spotlight will re-index the contents of the item you initially dragged to the list.

Additional Information

Note: You can only add folders or items to the Privacy tab that you have ownership permissions for. For more information about ownership and permissions, see this article and this one.

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