OFF2000: Overview of Find Fast Indexer

ID: Q205289

The information in this article applies to:

SUMMARY

The Find Fast Indexer is a utility that builds indexes to speed finding documents using the Open and Open Office Documents commands in Microsoft Office programs, including Microsoft Outlook.


MORE INFORMATION

The Find Fast utility is installed to the Control Panel when you install Office. Unlike the previous version of Office, Find Fast does not automatically create an index for each drive after it is initially installed. You must run Find Fast from the Control Panel to create indices. Find Fast can create indices for files on local, shared, or networked drives. These indices contain words, titles, and OLE properties for each file on that drive. The indices help speed up finding and opening files when you use the Advanced Find and Open commands in the Office programs. Although you can directly use Find Fast in the Control Panel, Find Fast indexes Office documents automatically when you use the Open or Open Office Documents commands and requires no user interaction.

You may create multiple indexes on a single drive, especially on shared or network drives, but you cannot create indexes that overlap. For example, if a Find Fast index exists on the root of drive C (C:\), you cannot create an additional index for files in the My Documents folder on drive C. To create an index of My Documents, first delete the index for drive C through the Find Fast Control Panel.

Description of the Index Files

Find Fast index files are located in the folder in the topmost level in the hierarchy of indexed folders. For example, if you index an entire drive, the index file is located at the root of that drive. Find Fast index files are hidden files. These index files and their functions are listed in the following table. 

   File Name             Type of File
   ---------------------------------------------------------

   Ffastun.ffl           Document list
   Ffastun.ffx           Index
   Ffastun.ffo           Cache of document properties
                         (for example, the author and title)
   Ffastun0.ffa          Status file
Because you create and maintain index files through Find Fast in the Control Panel, it is not necessary to work with these files directly.

NOTE Do not attempt to copy, move, or change the attributes of these file types. If you must delete or move a set of indexed folders, first delete the index through the Find Fast Control Panel, and then recreate the index after you move the folders.

Index files typically require about 7 percent of the space of the text portion of the documents that are being indexed, or about 1 to 3 percent of the total document size.

Files That Can Be Indexed

When you specify the type of documents to index in Create Index, Find Fast includes the document types that are listed in the following table. 

Document type                  File name extension
-------------                  -------------------

MS Office and Web Documents    All the Microsoft Excel, Microsoft
                               PowerPoint, Microsoft
                               Project, and Microsoft Word document types
                               listed in this table. Microsoft Binder
                               (.odb, .obt) and Microsoft Access (.mdb)
                               files. Note that in .mdb files, only
                               document properties are indexed.

Word documents                 .doc (document),
                               .dot (template), .ht* (Hypertext Markup
                               Language document), .txt (text file), .rtf
                               (Rich Text Format) files, Excel workbooks
                               .xl* files
 
PowerPoint                     .ppt (presentation), .pot (template), .pps
                               (auto-running presentation) files

Microsoft Project files        .mpp, .mpw, .mpt, .mpx, .mpd files

All files                      *.* files
In addition to the Office document types that are listed in the table, Find Fast can index the following document types if the associated conversion filters are installed and support minimal RTF mode: 


   Lotus 1-2-3 version 2.x - 4.0
   RFT-DCA
   Microsoft Works version 3.x for Windows
   Word version 4.x - 5.x for the Macintosh
   Works version 4.0 for Windows
   WordPerfect version 5.x
   WordPerfect version 6.x
   WordStar
NOTE When you click All Files in the Create Index, Find Fast excludes file types that do not contain text, such as .bmp, .com or .exe files.

Creating An Index

You can specify the file types to index only when you create an index. You cannot change the indexed file types for an existing index; you must delete the index, and then recreate it. To create a Fast Find index, use the following steps:
  1. Click Start, point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.


  2. Double-click Find Fast.


  3. On the Index menu, click Create Index.


  4. Under In And Below, select the drive or folder that contains the documents you want to index. This location is also where the index files are stored.


  5. In the Of Type list, click the file types you want to index.


  6. Click OK.


Deleting an Index

To delete a Fast Find index, use the following steps:
  1. Click Start , point to Settings, and then click Control Panel.


  2. Double-click Find Fast.


  3. On the Index menu, click Delete Index.


  4. In the In And Below box, click the location of the Find Fast index you want to delete.


  5. Click OK.


For additional information about disabling Find Fast, please see the following article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
Q199787 OFF2000: How to Disable the Find Fast Indexer

Additional query words: OFF2000 findfast 


Keywords          : kbtool kbdta 
Version           : WINDOWS:2000
Platform          : WINDOWS 
Issue type        : kbinfo

Last Reviewed: May 13, 1999