windows search not able to search content of pdf when search more

sam9 · 05 May 2017

Windows search is not able to search the content of pdf files when searching more than 4 digit number. I have pdf files in a folder when I try to search a content eg 7349, it shows the files which are having this number but if I increase the digits to one more e.g 73495, the result is blank. I have already indexed these files. There is no problem if text files are searched. Please advise.

I am not searching in open files. I am searching the folder of pdf files.

Add_ It is a domain pc. Is it possible that it could be some policy.

dalchina · 06 May 2017

Hello, I'm not absolutely sure which you mean. However- I think you need the solution shown at the end of this post.

1. I think you mean if the text in the pdf file contains 4578, then that text can be found, but 45783 cannot?
And when you do this, is your search string 4 or 5 characters?

2. How are you searching - are you using search in file explorer, or the Cortana search field?

Please note your post (and the other one) are marked as 'Solved' for some reason.

My initial observation (noting the ifilter in the screenshot below):
Using file explorer search on a text-based pdf I would agree that numeric strings do not seem to be found as you'd expect. For example, of the string 765 which I added to a file, and which was indexed, 76 was found, but not 765. (I also added 7654 and 76543).

However, when I converted that pdf to txt, the strings were found correctly.

Similarly, text (which could be found in the file when open in an editor) was not found correctly by Windows search. E.g. Amb was found, but not Ambassador, whereas a windows search of the txt file worked.

How I fixed this:
I downloaded a pdf ifilter:
Adobe - Acrobat : For Windows : PDF iFilter 64 11.0.01
and installed it

sam9 · 06 May 2017

dalchina said:

Hello, I'm not absolutely sure which you mean. However- I think you need the solution shown at the end of this post.

1. I think you mean if the text in the pdf file contains 4578, then that text can be found, but 45783 cannot?
And when you do this, is your search string 4 or 5 characters?

2. How are you searching - are you using search in file explorer, or the Cortana search field?

Please note your post (and the other one) are marked as 'Solved' for some reason.

My initial observation (noting the ifilter in the screenshot below):
Using file explorer search on a text-based pdf I would agree that numeric strings do not seem to be found as you'd expect. For example, of the string 765 which I added to a file, and which was indexed, 76 was found, but not 765. (I also added 7654 and 76543).

However, when I converted that pdf to txt, the strings were found correctly.

Similarly, text (which could be found in the file when open in an editor) was not found correctly by Windows search. E.g. Amb was found, but not Ambassador, whereas a windows search of the txt file worked.

How I fixed this:
I downloaded a pdf ifilter:
Adobe - Acrobat : For Windows : PDF iFilter 64 11.0.01
and installed it

Thanks for taking pain in a solved thread. Actually, I marked it solved because there were some confusions going in my mind. The solution provided by you was already applied by me and it worked in win 10 64 bit. But when I tried to install the mentioned filter in win 7 32 bit, it was incompatible. My win 7 has Adobe DC. while googling I came to know that this problem was because of Adobe DC. When Adobe DC is installed, it removes the ifilter which is already included in Adobe 11 and for 32 bit there is no stand alone ifilter provided by Adobe. Today I uninstalled Adobe DC from my win 7 32 bit and installed Adobe 11 again and wow now no problem in searching more digits. I hope this information may help others also.

: I was searching in file explorer