DocFetcher Developer: http://docfetcher.sourceforge.net/en/index.html 4  /  12 Reviews 7,144 Downloads

Java: Performance and portability: One aspect some people might take issue with is that DocFetcher was written in Java, which has a reputation of being "slow". This was indeed true ten years ago, but since then Java's performance has seen much improvement, according to Wikipedia. Anyways, the great thing about being written in Java is that the very same portable

Comparison To Other Desktop Search ApplicationsIn comparison to other desktop search applications, here's where DocFetcher stands out:Crap-free: We strive to keep DocFetcher's user interface clutter- and crap-free. No advertisement or "would you like to register...?" popups. No useless stuff is installed in your web browser, registry or anywhere else in your system.Privacy: DocFetcher does not collect your private data. Ever. Anyone in doubt about this can check the publicly accessible source code.Free forever: Since DocFetcher is Open Source, you don't have to worry about the program ever becoming obsolete and unsupported, because the source code will always be there for the taking. Speaking of support, have you gotten the news that Google Desktop, one of DocFetcher's major commercial competitors, was discontinued in 2011? Well...Cross-platform: Unlike many of its competitors, DocFetcher does not only run on Windows, but also on Linux and OS X. Thus, if you ever feel like moving away from your Windows box and on to Linux or OS X, DocFetcher will be waiting for you on the other side.Portable: One of DocFetcher's greatest strengths is its portability. Basically, with DocFetcher you can build up a complete, fully searchable document repository, and carry it around on your USB drive. More on that in the next section.Indexing only what you need: Among DocFetcher's commercial competitors, there seems to be a tendency to nudge users towards indexing the entire hard drive — perhaps in an attempt to take away as many decisions as possible from supposedly "dumb" users, or worse, in an attempt to harvest more user data. In practice though, it seems safe to assume that most people don't want to have their entire hard drive indexed: Not only is this a waste of indexing time and disk space, but it also clutters the search results with unwanted files. Hence, DocFetcher indexes only the folders you explicitly want to be indexed, and on top of that you're provided with a multitude of filtering options.

DocFetcher requires that you create so-called indexes for the folders you want to search in.

DocFetcher is an Open Source desktop search application: It allows you to search the contents of files on your computer. — You can think of it as Google for your local files.