Spotlight inaccurate

[geraldfleck]

I'm having an issue with Spotlight that someone here can perhaps explain:

Problem: When searching for a (Word) document in Spotlight, I get only all of the .pdf matches even though there are as many (Word) document results to be found, as well. For example, searching "Lecture 1" brings up a host of .pdf files that have "Lecture 1" at some place in the text (though not in the title), but not the Word document specifically called "Lecture 1 - ..." (or any Word documents, for that matter).

I do have Documents prioritized ahead of PDF Documents in Spotlight preferences. When I unselect "PDF Documents" and do a Spotlight search, then all of my Word documents show up in the spotlight search.

But, ideally, I'd like to be able to see some of each in the Spotlight search. Would re-indexing perhaps help?

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

 

[GGJstudios]

I do have Documents prioritized ahead of PDF Documents in Spotlight preferences. When I unselect "PDF Documents" and do a Spotlight search, then all of my Word documents show up in the spotlight search.

Spotlight isn't going to show you all the search results that are available. Use Finder for searching.

 

[Weaselboy]

But, ideally, I'd like to be able to see some of each in the Spotlight search. Would re-indexing perhaps help?

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

With a standard Spotlight search I can see both MS Word DOC files and PDFs. Only thing I can think of is a reindex like you mentioned. Do you have any folders in Spotlight's privacy pane that might be mucking this up?

 

[geraldfleck]

Just reindexed, problem persists. I have no folders listed in the privacy section of Spotlight preferences, so that can't be it.

I realize that a Finder search is more accurate, but this seems like something basic enough that even Spotlight should be able to get it.

It seems like something is buggy. There are certain search terms that pull up BOTH Word documents and .pdfs. Other search terms (even the exact file name of a Word document) only pull up .pdfs. In those cases, if I uncheck "PDF Documents" in Spotlight preferences, then I see the correct Word documents in the results.

Any other suggestions?