How to search PDF files???

I have about 4 gig of PDF files. I was using Copernick to seach them and find articles and such in the files. I am needing to find another PDF search program (maybe free) that will search PDF files to find articles in the PDF file.

Would someone have any suggestions? Thanks.

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JT (alabama24)

Does windows not do this natively? (Mac does).

I will point out that search will be limited. You will need exact matches to words.

xnman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1285096#Comment_1285096

Does windows not do this natively? (Mac does).

I will point out that search will be limited. You will need exact matches to words.

Windows does not do this natively that I know of.

David Thomas

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1285098#Comment_1285098

Win11 does

xnman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1285099#Comment_1285099

Win11 does

Maybe I wasn't clear or don't know how to do it.... but I have a folder with about 4 gig of PDF files in it. I want to search all the files for an article named "Paul's Life in Corinth".

How do I do that in Windows 11??? Thanks

Yasmin Stephen

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1285106#Comment_1285106

Maybe I wasn't clear or don't know how to do it.... but I have a folder with about 4 gig of PDF files in it. I want to search all the files for an article named "Paul's Life in Corinth".

How do I do that in Windows 11??? Thanks

You can follow David Thomas's example (but put quote marks around the phrase: "Paul's Life in Corinth") and it should find the article if the phrase is exactly the same as in one of your PDFs. You can also just go directly to the folder with the PDF files and put the phrase in the search bar (once again, with quote marks; without quote marks, you'll get a hit on every instance of Paul, Corinth, life etc). This will only work on text-based PDFs.

I put my reading material (books, articles etc, not personal documents) in Calibre; the more advanced query syntax in the full text search is excellent at hunting down stuff.

Dave Hooton

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1285106#Comment_1285106

How do I do that in Windows 11??? Thanks

Google will tell you to run the search in File Explorer for Win 11

Mike Childs

Some PDF files are made of text, and other PDF files are just pictures of text. That is likely what you have. There is no way to search the specific text of a PDF file that is basically pictures of text. You would first have to run an OCR program on the PDFs, and transform the pictures of text to actual text first. This is true for Windows or Mac.

On the other hand, if your PDF is actual text, the free Acrobat Reader will search it. Also, a free program like Calibre will convert the PDF into a many formats that are easily searchable.

But I suspect you have PDF's that actually pictures of text because they are easier to make and less expensive. You cannot search the text in those.

Rosie Perera

I have about 4 gig of PDF files. I was using Copernick to seach them and find articles and such in the files. I am needing to find another PDF search program (maybe free) that will search PDF files to find articles in the PDF file.

Would someone have any suggestions? Thanks.

I'm not sure why you can't keep using Copernick.

I use XYplorer, which is a file manager for Windows that has a very powerful, fast, and flexible search feature. There is a free limited functionality version, or you can buy the pro version for $34.95 (license is for one person, multiple computers, never expires). Well worth it IMO.

But as Mike mentioned, if the text in your PDF files is images, i.e., not selectable text, then they can't be searched.

Bernhard

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1285190#Comment_1285190

On the other hand, if your PDF is actual text, the free Acrobat Reader will search it. Also, a free program like Calibre will convert the PDF into a many formats that are easily searchable.

Calibre now supports full-text-search across the whole library. It should also be able to index PDFs (as long as they have a text layer, you should be able to find a way to OCR PDFs in bulk, obviously text recognition will never be perfect).

xnman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/1285200#Comment_1285200

Thanks to everyone for you suggestions and help. The reason I don't want to stay with Copernic is that it charges a monthly fee. I guess I'm of the old school... pay once for a program and use it forever... or else I'm too cheap!

Calibre looks interesting. I will look into it.

I did look into Windows 11 File Explorer. It does work.

I have downloaded XYPlorer and will play around with it. It looks to be the closest to Copernic...

Edit: I also started a program to "roll my own"... I'll work on that when I have time.

Thanks again! [8-|]

Edit again: A friend sent me a copy of "AnyText Search". She gave it 5 Stars. I installed it and it looks exactly what I'm looking for and it's free!

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