Top Customer Issues


  • General Questions
  • Limitations
    HoudahSpot is based on Apple's Spotlight technology. It finds only what Spotlight can find. Apple chose to exclude some select system directories from the Spotlight index. By setting your privacy preferences you may have excluded some more.

    Spotlight relies on importer plug-ins to index file content and metadata. Such importers are provided either by Apple or by the respective application authors. If you can't find a file by contents, you may lack the appropriate importer. Try searching for the file by name.


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  • Known issues

    Cannot preview audio files


    QuickLook is a private API which Apple recommends against using in third party applications. Thus no support is available. It so happens, that the audio plug-in is compiled for another memory management technique than what is used in HoudahSpot. Both being incompatible, that very plug-in is not loaded.

    For now, HoudahSpot users will have to resort to using "Reveal in Finder" and invoke QuickLook from there.

    Rebuild Spotlight index


    If you are seeing odd results in both Spotlight and HoudahSpot, you may have a corrupted Spotlight index. You should rebuild it:

    1. Open System Preferences
    2. Go to the Spotlight pane
    3. Select the Privacy tab
    4. Click the Add button
    5. Select your boot drive (typically called "Macintosh HD") an click the Choose button
    6. Select the boot drive from the list in the Spotlight Privacy pane
    7. Click the remove button
    8. Spotlight will re-index the hard drive. This will take some time
    9. Repeat for other affected drives


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  • Can you help me get started?
    Sure. There is a quick start guide included with the built-in Help.

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  • Will there be a Windows version?
    HoudahSpot is a Mac program at heart. Houdah Software specializes in quality Mac software. Consequently no Windows version is planned.

    Let this be another good excuse for switching to the Mac. Not that you needed any.

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  • What are the requirements?
    HoudahSpot requires Mac OS X Leopard 10.5.1 with Spotlight enabled.

    Tiger users may download HoudahSpot 1.5.1: Tiger Edition.
    This legacy version is available as freeware.


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  • Specific Questions
  • How is HoudahSpot different from Spotlight?
    HoudahSpot builds upon the powerful Spotlight engine. It aims to provide a front-end that is both more convenient and more potent than Apple's offerings.

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  • How can I hide HoudahSpot from the Dock?
    You may want to keep HoudahSpot running in the background and yet hide it from the Dock and the application switcher.

    In order to disable the Dock icon, you may proceed as follows:

    1. In the Finder, right-click the HoudahSpot icon
    2. Choose "Show Package Contents"
    3. Open the Info.plist file
    4. Locate the following lines:

    <key>LSUIElement</key>
     <false/>
    5. Replace with:

    <key>LSUIElement</key>
     <true/>
    6. Relaunch HoudahSpot

    Please be aware that the HoudahSpot menu bar will no longer be available after removing the Dock icon. It is thus suggested you configure the preferences before disabling the icon. In order to keep access to templates, you may want to enable the global menu item.

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  • Troubleshooting
  • Why does HoudahSpot keep showing a "Stop" button?
    HoudahSpot shows a spinning progress indicator while searching for files. Once it is done the query stays "live": the list of results is updated as files are created, modified or deleted by other programs. You may stop this and return to the query form by hitting the red "Stop" button.

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  • Why does HoudahSpot not find my file?
    HoudahSpot builds upon the powerful Spotlight engine. It can only find those files Spotlight knows about. Apple chose to exclude some select types of files and locations from the Spotlight index. By setting your privacy preferences you may have excluded some more.

    You may force Spotlight to index otherwise excluded locations by issuing the following at the command line:
    mdimport /path/to/the/location

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  • Why does HoudahSpot not see the contents of my file?
    Spotlight relies on importer plug-ins to index content and file metadata. Such importers are provided either by Apple or by the respective application authors. If you can't find a file by contents, you may lack the appropriate importer.

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  • Why does HoudahSpot list that many folders?
    Spotlight seems to consider a folder as modified if any of its contents is modified. HoudahSpot thus list both the modified file and its parent folder. You might want to exclude folders from your query. Use a "Kind" criteria embedded in a "NONE" group to do so.

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HoudahSpot - Spotlight Enhancement