AJOE  Wow, this is an amazing application. I have been looking for a fast local search tool that provides live previews and FoxTrot does the trick.

I often have to search thousands of pages of developer references to find answers and this is the only search program I have found that is worth keeping open on my desktop.

Using FoxTrot 2 on Mac OS X 10.5.4 (Intel)  
(Version 2.0.2)

LEV  The new FoxTrot Professional beta is promising, although at €99 it's pretty steeply priced. BUT... it can't index Mail.app emails. Just ignores them. And if you index them with FoxTrot 1.5 and then upgrade the index (automatically) to 2.0 beta, it's unable to preview them, which rather kills the point.

Hopefully this is a beta bug. If not, it obliterates FoxTrot, which would be a shame.

I'd have filed a bug reported, but their website -- perhaps the worst developer's site I've ever seen, so bad it makes me want to demolish the internet -- has no means of doing so. Perhaps they just don't want to know bad news. Perhaps it's some Swiss secrecy thing. Who knows?

The skinny: stick with 1.5 for the time being.  
(Version 2.0b3)

MACMARIA  It's been now more than three months using FT. I must say I'm very happy with it. It has been very stable, including the indexing process. I really love its capability of searching inside packages. That makes all the difference.

My only cons is the price. It's a bit pricey, however it was the only app that did all that I wanted/needed...  
(Version 1.5)

MACMARIA  I have to say that I don't agree with Anon Bud at all.

I knew of FoxTrot for the first time in a user's forum of a different application (DEVONthink). Someone said it made an amazing job on searching files and contents, including metadata. (For instance, it finds pdf contents that are inside a DEVONthink database without it being open.) Since I don't like Spotlight capacities (or lack of them) I decided to give it a try.

Version 1.1 indeed made a fine job on searching (and indexing). Its capacities are great. However, it crashed from time to time. So, while on trial mode, I reported this to the developers. They were fast and very competent on their reply. More so for two weeks they asked me to try several builds and report the crash logs to them.

I got today a final build (already on 1.2) made specially for me. I'm thinking: "Wow! These people really care about users. Even when they are still trying their application."

It has not crashed so far. I'll give it some more use and if the great behaviour continues, I'll buy it. Then I'll make my review here.

I must say that on terms of support I can already give this application *5 stars.* I wish all developers would behave like them. :)  
(Version 1.2)

ANON BUD  This is my final two words on FoxTrot: Doesn’t work.

After some bugginess reported earlier and fixed, or so I thought. This latest version brings back the buginess. Indexing takes forever; updating the index takes forever; and then, it can’t even find what I am searching for. What Spotlight was able to find in less than five seconds...Foxtrot worked on for over ten minutes. I got tired of waiting and quit the app.

Now I’m going to trash it and consider that my money has just gone down the drain!  
(Version 1.2)

ANON BUD  Well, the developer did respond about some erratic behavior I‘d been having. Things are working now.

I like that I can have a real time view into the docs I’ve searched and plug-ins from various apps really helps this (i.e. Mellel, VooDooPad, etc.)

I’m upgrading the rating a bit, but just hope that all bad behavior has stopped.....  
(Version 1.1)

ANON BUD  Been using for about a year and when it’s working, it’s great.

After a crash while updating the index, I have not been able to get it to working again. I just keep getting the spinning beachball and have to force quit!

Due to this erratic behavior, I cannot recommend the purchase.  
(Version 1.1)

SHERMAN  Incredibly powerful and useful. If you're thinking "Yeah, I have Spotlight, and it was free" then think again. FoxTrot is instantaneous. It lets you do those good boolean searches that Spotlight makes impossible to do (or to remember how to do). I can't believe how fast it finds Mail messages, and then shows me the subject line, mailbox location, and the full text of the message in preview.

One drawback -- it doesn't automatically keep the index up to date. Hope that gets added soon!  
(Version 1.0.9)

DAVE BURBANK  When I gave FoxTrot Personal Search a first look, I had some difficulty making it work properly. It crashed during the indexing phase. I posted my findings online here.

I am delighted to report that the good people at CTM Development contacted me almost immediately. They were anxious to help turn my experience with FoxTrot into a positive one.

Since that time, CTM Development helped me understand that my problems were not with FoxTrot itself, but with the third party MDImporter file called "Ziplight.mdimporter". They have added a new feature to the program (in version 1.0.6) so that users can disable specific mdimporter files as needed.

My current impressions of FoxTrot are:

It is elegant, stable, fast, fun, and it keeps getting better. FoxTrot finds what I'm looking for VERY fast. I have turned SpotLight off and rely on FoxTrot for my searching needs.

I am extremely impressed with the people at CTM Development. They are responsive and clearly work hard to make their products better.  
(Version 1.0.8)

GREGORY  I use this software with OS 10.4. It works like Spotlight only many times faster, it sorts the results more logically, and best of all it provides previews of the results. This is far and away more accurate and useful than Spotlight. Maybe Apple should include Foxtrot as an improvement in OS 10.5!  
(Version 1.0.1)