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Forum Discussion

rthrech's avatar
rthrech
Helpful | Level 6
4 years ago

Advanced search based on key phrases

I seriously need advanced searching.  Dropbox used to have these features (like search exact phrase) in 2015, but somehow removed them.  So how can I do advanced searching in dropbox? Like:  ...
Desktop and Web
Searching
View
Website
  • rhut's avatar
    rhut
    2 years ago
    Hi Dropbox community!  I'm a product manager at Dropbox working on the search experience on dropbox.com.
     
    We took your feedback to heart and are happy to announce that we're adding a few new operators to help you retrieve your files/folders more quickly:
    • title:(new lead) => See results with only the specific words in title of the file
    • title:"new lead" => See results with exact phrase match in title of the file.  Note that quotes only work with title searches and can't be used to match on content
    • type:image => Filter results by a certain types like image, video, document, spreadsheet, etc.
    • type:jpg => Filter results by a certain types like file extension like jpg, png, docx, etc.
    • before:2022-01-01 => Allows you to see all content before a certain date.  Uses YYYY-MM-DD format.
    • after:2022-01-01 => Allows you to see all content after a certain date.  Uses YYYY-MM-DD format.
    • lead AND new => AND operators will show results that contain both words.
    • lead OR new =>  OR operators will show results that contain either words.

    To use these operators, login to Dropbox.com, click on the searchbox at the top, and start typing your query.  You can learn more about our operators on our help center article here:  https://help.dropbox.com/view-edit/search

     

    Note that there are some limitations:

      - This feature is Web only (for now)

      - Searches may return inaccurate results for contents of a file, certain images, and Paper docs if you're using the old release of Dropbox Paper.

      - Quotes will only work on file titles, not matches on content (for now)

     

    Try it out and let us know what you think!

     

    Thanks for your patience as we ship new features to improve your overall Dropbox experience!

     

    Rhut

SearchIsWorthless's avatar
SearchIsWorthless
Helpful | Level 5

I don't even want "advanced" search or booleans - I just want search! Today I searched for "died". I got every file that has the text "di" in it. E.g. thousands of files. Completely worthless.

thibautbenkei's avatar
thibautbenkei
Helpful | Level 6
2 years ago

Is it possible to have feedback on this issue? You should be ashamed of your search engine.

Come on, a simple search feature on file names with booleans operators. That's the minimum you can do.
I'm sure Chatgpt can write you a code in a minute for that !

  • Nancy's avatar
    Nancy
    Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
    2 years ago

    Hi everyone!

     

    Since there’s a relevant idea about this here, please take the time to vote for it and post there, as it’s easier for our team to see your comments and gather more feedback on this.

     

    Thanks.

    • j4m1eb's avatar
      j4m1eb
      Helpful | Level 6
      2 years ago

      you are joking right? You want us to vote for an idea from 2019.

       

      Just implement proper search like every other cloud service!!!.

    • LeslieL's avatar
      LeslieL
      Helpful | Level 5
      2 years ago

      Nancy,

       

      I found in reading this community forum that there was a vote on this already and it appears Dropbox did NOTHING to resolve the issue.  Have you looked at your prices recently? They are NOT cheap and your paying customers do not have time to scroll and scroll looking for answers only to discover there are a bunch of others who are having the same issues and the problem still exists . . . .unresolved!

       

      Why is Dropbox not reading these issues or acting on them?  I found threads going back to 2017 where your customers had asked for a decent search engine.  

       

      Please don't be surprised when your Dropbox executives are sitting around their conference room table scratching their heads wondering where their customers have gone . . .  your customers are speaking and being ignored.  Voting seems to be a total waste of time as its been proven in this community previously.

       

       

       

       

       

       

      • j4m1eb's avatar
        j4m1eb
        Helpful | Level 6
        2 years ago

        They do nothing - sync has been broken on mac for a year now, If you open and indesign file it no longer download linked files and this has to be done one by one. They even have a warming when you move files online telling you it doesn't work anymore, just fix it, one drive and google did. If it wasnt such a hassle I would have moved all my companies files to another service.

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