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JONMARWIL's avatar
JONMARWIL
Explorer | Level 3
9 months ago

Large PDF files not being found using search (contents)

Hi, I’m currently evaluating Dropbox as a tool to store PDF files for easy access using content search (keywords etc). At the moment, I’m just using a number of test documents to assess the suitability

I will mainly access on iOS devices, using the Dropbox apps.

Overall, it seems good, however it refuses to find large PDF files (800 pages) despite the keywords being in the document. For ref, documents have been loaded for over 24 hours

If I open the file and then search within, the key words are easily found and highlighted, so I’ve no idea why the documents can’t be found

I’m not having any issues with smaller documents .

If it helps, the same document loaded to OneDrive, can be easily found using search. It can also be easily located using other apps such as PDF Expert.

Hope someone can help

J
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  • Hannah's avatar
    Hannah
    9 months ago

    Hey JONMARWIL, sorry to jump in here.

     

    Extremely large files (e.g.: a 250 page PDF) will not have all words indexed for search, so likely they won't appear in the search. 

     

    We've shared this feedback with our team, and we'll keep you in the loop with any updates on here. 

     

    Thank you!

  • Jay's avatar
    Jay
    Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
    9 months ago

    Hi JONMARWIL, thanks for messaging the Community!

     

    Could you clarify approximately how many words you have in those large PDF files?

     

    For the smaller documents you mentioned, how large are they?

     

    This will help me to assist further!

    • JONMARWIL's avatar
      JONMARWIL
      Explorer | Level 3
      9 months ago
      Hi Jay

      Thanks for replying.

      Exact word counts are tricky, however estimates are

      Large 806 page doc, around 600K words

      Smaller docs (1 to 20 pages), range from around 500 to 15K words

      Hope this helps

      J
      • Hannah's avatar
        Hannah
        Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
        9 months ago

        Hey JONMARWIL, sorry to jump in here.

         

        Extremely large files (e.g.: a 250 page PDF) will not have all words indexed for search, so likely they won't appear in the search. 

         

        We've shared this feedback with our team, and we'll keep you in the loop with any updates on here. 

         

        Thank you!

  • John Z.15's avatar
    John Z.15
    New member | Level 2
    6 months ago

    I'd say stay away from dropbox. I will switch as soon as I find a cloud that can search all documents, regardless of the size. a half baked solution, searching less than 250 pages, is not much help. 

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