"Case Sensitive" option in Search

I would suggest that DEVONtech reconsider this. Case-sensitive technical and business terms are commonly spelled the same as other terms. For example, I work with a system named ART, and when I use the Search panel with that term, I only want ART-related documents in my databases, and not “art” or “Art” documents. DEVONthink should facilitate precise searching, not hinder it.

I’d propose that the Search panel have a comparison option for “Ignore Case”, which is checked by default so that case-sensitivity is not forced onto users and is an option. Unchecking the option box would make search results case-sensitive.

Unfortunately a case-sensitive search index (like the one of v1.x) requires much more memory and many users are still complaining about the memory usage :open_mouth: In addition, case-insensitive searches (probably most searches) would be slower too. Therefore a case-sensitive index is currently at least unlikely.

How about moving present DTPO features to DTP (keeping price unchanged :slight_smile: ) and create a “super” DTPO including:

  • Case sensitive database
  • Improved search functionalities
  • Multicore OCR
  • Database encryption? (maybe someone is interested, not me)
  • other … (see forum)

Of course SDTPO will require certain hw performance and obviously users must be also ready to pay an extra fee.

That’s very disappointing. Not even possible as an option, as suggested? How about a 2-pass search, without building a new index? There must be a creative algorithm you could apply – maybe you could mull this over a bit more more :wink:

+1

Option for case sensitive search would be very helpful, and with decision resting on user any slowness experienced in search would be expected and accepted.

possibly tilting at windmills, but I’m right now trying to find documents in a 300,000-document database that contain the acronym “DOC”. the ability to exclude “doc” would drastically reduce the number of results.

Old thread, I know, but I too am running into issues with lack of case-sensitive search. Similar to the other posters, I have many technical docs containing 2, 3, and 4-letter acronyms (many of which real words). A case-sensitive search option would be valuable to me. I can understand (some) of the issues pertaining to optimizing for memory, etc.—and am super impressed with DT 3.x’s memory footprint and search speed—but would (still) dearly love to have case-sensitive search for those times when it is truly needed.

Depending on what you’re doing, the RegEx in a smart rule’s Scan Text action in DEVONthink 3.5+ supports case-(in)sensitivity with the (?i) flag, like so…

Thanks for the rapid reply (and making me wonder if/when you ever sleep :slight_smile:). This will work as a stop-gap—if I’m truly stuck with a search I will create a regex-based smart group. Thank you.

You’re welcome.

and making me wonder if/when you ever sleep :slight_smile:)

I wonder that myself sometimes :thinking::stuck_out_tongue:

I am struggling with that case sensitive search i think Devonthink. I need to find the German word “Macht” in all my databases. The search has to be case sensitive as the German word “macht” means something totally different.
I have fiddled with RegEx as BLUEFROG suggested, but I have no idea how it works. I definitely would like to learn RegEx someday but right now I do not have the time.
I tried the nice little application EasyFind where you only have to undo a checkmark to make the search case sensitive. But EasyFind don’t highlight the found words in the document which makes it quite impossible to use when you want to find a few occurrences of a special word in a 100 page document!
Does the smart rule BLUEFROG mentions highlights the search results in the document?
Any suggestions how I find what I need? It would be much appreciated!
Happy new year, Per

Searching databases don’t support case-sensitivity.
Only in-document searching (i.e., Command-F or the Search inspector) supports it but that’s when a document has been selected.