There are only a few apps I can’t think about life with out, however on the prime of that brief checklist is Every little thing. I’ve used it for over a decade, and it’s an integral a part of my Home windows expertise.
What Is Every little thing?
Every little thing is a Home windows freeware file search software created by programmer David Carpenter in 2008. We shared Every little thing with our readers for the primary time shortly thereafter, and a few of us, like yours actually, have been utilizing it ever since.
The only most notable factor about Every little thing is the pace—which is why we give it a shoutout at any time when we discuss looking out Home windows quicker.
Should you’ve ever used Home windows file search and even some third-party file search instruments, essentially the most memorable factor concerning the expertise is how lengthy it takes
Even in spite of everything these years, Home windows file search is agonizingly sluggish. Actually, it’s agony. In an age of cheap SSDs with on the spot booting and on the spot program loading, ready thirty seconds for Home windows to grind by way of a search looks like torture. It doesn’t matter when you’re nonetheless utilizing Home windows 7 or upgraded to Home windows 11, Home windows search has by no means been speedy.
Every little thing sidesteps the shortcomings of the Home windows file search by doing one thing that was novel when the applying was first launched and stays novel: it faucets proper into the file desk on the file system stage for lightning-fast search.
How briskly is it? It’s so quick that when you create a brand new file, by the point you open up the Every little thing search field a second later, the file is immediately within the index. It’s unlikely you possibly can create the file and get to the search field quick sufficient to beat the almost instantaneous addition of the entry into the Every little thing index.
The one draw back to Every little thing is that it really works off the file desk and the file names and doesn’t index the contents of the information. Should you want a software that may look deep into paperwork and show you how to discover key phrases, this isn’t it. However when you’re simply looking for the place, precisely, you place that 2022 Johnson Farms Drilling Proposal Rev.A.pdf file or your tax returns from 5 years in the past, it’s nearly magical in its pace and effectivity.
And Right here’s Why I Discover Every little thing Indispensable
I titled this piece “I Can’t Think about Utilizing Home windows With out the Every little thing App,” and I say that and not using a little bit of hyperbole. I’ve used Every little thing each day because it got here out and throughout a number of variations of Home windows—Home windows XP all the way in which to Home windows 11—a number of laptop upgrades, and on each Home windows machine I’ve owned.
It’s an ideal software for someone like me. I’ve an enormous variety of information, throughout an enormous variety of folders and drives. However so long as I title information and folders sensibly as they arrive in, it doesn’t matter the place they find yourself. They may very well be on the C drive, the G drive, and even buried in a community drive hosted down in my basement (you possibly can allow community drive search within the Every little thing settings).
Regardless of the place the information are, I can discover them if I keep in mind even a fraction of the folder or file title. Previous taxes, work varieties, Photoshop initiatives, comedian books I hoarded 5 years in the past, you title it. If I need it, I can churn it as much as the floor with a number of key phrases.
For instance, Nintendo just lately despatched a stop and desist letter to the Web Archives to tug their large archive of outdated Nintendo Energy points. Naturally, as a lifelong beginner archivist, that made me say, “Didn’t I squirrel scans of Nintendo Energy away someplace?” and positive sufficient, I did. I might need forgotten the place they have been, however Every little thing didn’t.
It immediately powered by way of 3,558,139 information and folders on my laptop and the connected drives to seek out precisely what I wished after I wished it.
Now you won’t have 3.5 million information. And also you won’t have random outdated information from a decade in the past that you simply wish to discover. However even for information from final month, it’s an unbelievably time saver. Should you can keep in mind something concerning the file—a part of the title, the file extension, the basis listing it could be deeply buried in—you possibly can dig it up with a number of keystrokes.
Even on my laptops, the place the information are positively not stacked ten terabytes deep like on my most important computer systems, I nonetheless set up Every little thing instantly. I simply can’t stay with out that on the spot file search, and I definitely don’t wish to be caught ready for Home windows search to sift by way of the information on the charge of a folder a minute.
In actual fact, after penning this veritable love letter to the app, I’m going to go donate to the undertaking, and I hope you obtain the app and possibly shoot a couple of dollars their manner too.
And hey, when you’re on the fence… it’s freeware. Obtain it. Strive it. Really feel the unbelievable thrill of looking out, properly, Every little thing, in your laptop immediately.
