40 years of using Macs and never done this! As usual an excellent, content and presentation wise, video. Thanks.

Gary, a never cease to be amazed about you knowledge of the Apple OSX. I for one can't keep up with you when you are explaining how stuff works. Probably because at 82 years of age my brain is a little slower than most. Nonetheless, thanks for providing these videos. Some are helpful, as long as I can keep up with them. Cheers

I've been using the same feature for iTunes for years. It's so nice having a Most Played, Long Songs, Most Recent etc. playlist set up with ease.

the "option/click" on the plus button was just what I needed! Now my search folders are incredibly useful! Thank you.

Oh very cool, Gary. I didn't understand what a Smart Folder was until I watched you very informative tutorial. Thank you very much for all the practical guidance you give all of us new and experienced Mac users. Much appreciated.

So much useful information, if you own a Mac, you need to visit here often. Great work Gary, you are the best Mac resource on KZfaq.

using Macs since 2012, I had no clue these were searches, never used this before, I added saved searches folder to finder side bar

I didn't even know the possibility of option-clicking the „plus“ exists. This is sooo helpful, I have been looking for a way to do these more specific types of searches forever. You are amazing, thank you!

Amazing, using Mac for decades and didn't know any of these features and combinations. Thanks for sharing!

You, my friend are an absolute legend 👍

For someone coming from Windows, your tutorials on how one can improve her productive are a great help, Gary. Thank you.

Never used smart folders. I thought that they’d move files from folders into the smart one, which I really didn’t want to do. Now I see that they are really saved searches yielding active links. What have I been missing. Inspiring ideas as ever. Brilliantly presented. I’m off now to get started making some on my Mac ❤🎉 Thanks (again !!!) You are the best.

Wonderful!! Thanks!

Most informative. Thank you.

Thank you as always Gary! very helpful

So useful! Amazing video as usual. Always looking forward to them as a new-ish mac user.

As usual great stuff. I use Smart Folders but never knew about all the other options under other. Thank you!

Thank You very much, Gary!

This is so useful! Thank you! 👏

This Saved search is a Blessing, I always have problems finding files I have been working on

Excellent advice

Thank you, Gary. This was such a useful video.

Hi Gary! You are so easy to understand but on this one with so many steps I will have to watch it a few times before I get the hang of it. I'm a slow learner sometimes. Thanks for doing what you do! I count on you alot.

Excellent!

Thanks! I have been wanting a recent folder shortcut. Now I have one. This video demystified Smart Folders. Now I'm shocked with how powerful it can be.

Very helpful 🙏

Really useful content. Thanks.

Epic, epic stuff here man. Thank you for this!!

Finally, I now know about smart folders. Thanks.

Thanks a lot man

Thanks Gary! I've been an Apple user for almost 30 years, but you still teach me new things.

Your videos are impressive and helpful. Thank you so much.

Very informative! The large files criteria will help me to keep storage low. Smart folders is one of my favorite features. I use a Smart Folder search to gather custom tags to gather my current project files. I then plop those smart folders on my dock (which is otherwise empty of all other apps & files, save for trash and open apps). I create a dummy application with automator that gets tagged and serves as the docked smart folder's cover. Took awhile to set up, but my productivity has skyrocketed since doing this last year!

Wonderful !!

Very helpful 😊

Came here for "Smart Folders" . But learnt what is the essence of Mac OS itself !

Some great ideas, thanks! need to explore if this could be used to efficiently tag photos. Btw, the option-clicking on the plus sign is definitely discoverability problem, not sure if it's accessible either.

Thank you, Garry.

Thank you.

Thanks bunches

Awesome!

aqui é minha referência, simplesmente assistirei a todos os vídeos. Thank you so much!

I’ve watched every Trek series and episode and this is it’s finest franchise.

Excellent

very intriguing

Thanks very much, Gary, for this super useful video! The search capabilities in Finder never cease to amaze me,

whoa! Do many really know what a smart folder is let along how they work. Now we do. Thnx.

Been using it for years. Very interesting, that you need to press alt to show more options though.

Mac user since May 1984, I discover this feature 👍

The My Apps tip was genius!

A very useful and informative video tutorial today! Thank you, Gary!👏❤️

BRAVO

It´s a good idea of database behind all indexing spotlight does. Or filtering a huge Excel sheet. Servus

I have set up a smart folder in my sidebar which I use a lot. In my documents folder search for documents created within the last 7 days, edited within the last 14 days or has the tag of Pinned. Pinned is for those I know I will have to return to but not sure when. To drop it from this folder, remove the tag.

Your videos are truly the best, Gary. Thank you so much.

I need a similar video for smart folders in Apple Mail. Have you done that one ? ....I've tried to figure it out but no dice .

I just wanted to say, that I am very-very greatful to you, because I 've learned so much from you, considering all of your videos. Again, thank very-very much, ⭐👍⭐👍⭐👍⭐👍⭐👍⭐👍⭐👍⭐

Hi Gary, Thanks a lot again. How can we delete a smart folder ? Removing it from side bar is good enough?

This is great, but you might have mentioned that the (quote) folder contains search results as "pointers", not copies of the actual files. Keep up the good work!

I have so happy I found your videos. If I need to know something I try you first. I have learned to use more of the options on my mac❤

Thanks Gary. I’m persisting with Smart Folders, despite its limited popularity, which I think is due to its poor interface. I like that you can set up a search criteria for tagged files that will retain their integrity despite name changes and file movements. However, IMHO until Apple simplify the whole procedure, it will be made redundant at some future point which would be a shame

Hey Gary! Could you please explain how to exclude subfolder when creating smart folder? Thank you!

Cool

Thank you! In my attempt to keep my files organized I've struggled to decide how to organize my graphic design files....content or application. I can do both! This will save me much time.

Really, really helpful, Gary! Thank you!

I was never really aware of this option. Thanks - Am I missing something, or can you only search on the internal drives? I'd like to search across attached external drives. Hope I can get some guidance on this as an option.

Thanks from a new apple user

Without your newsy emails, I'd be less productive on my Mac! Thanks Gary! I have confused me, however. I have told my Smart Folder to search on ANY: date created, or modified or added within past 5 days, but I am getting MANY results that are months old! What have I missed? PS: My Smart Folder opens to several folders. When I click on a folder, I see many very old files, not the ones I expect to see that I've touched in the past 5 days. Maybe buried in those busy folders is a file that matches criteria? I sure don't want to go browsing to find it, though! UPDATE: My problem was related to: the 1st line of my search had the search criteria of ANY, which apparently brought in system files. I deleted the Smart Folder, re-did and the ANY doesn't appear and the search works fine. Wondering how that ANY got in there..... I can't replicate it. Is there a way to specify a slightly more complex search using OR and AND?

You have so much knowledge. I’m excited to look at this feature. Thank you.

Question if you are done with the Smart Folder can you just delete the Smart Folder and the contents won’t get deleted?

I'm wondering what the best utility is for these smart folders, as they seem to be much better than standard folders and I think this would be a good way to organise your files and find duplicates. I am wondering though, do the smart folders actually store a copy of the files, or just a link within the smart folder. So if I used spotlight, would 3 versions show up like smart folder, folder, icloud drive?

Should've explained the advanced raw query which enables you to search same parameters in different folders, circumventing the need to save multiple smart folders.

Hi Gary thanks for an useful video. Is it possible to exclude folders from searchresult, since its files i'm looking for I dont need both the file and the folder in which it reside to come up in the result

Excellent tutorial. Very useful information. Many thanks!

And again a very useful video!! Thanks!

great concept, explained greatly👍

Thanks Gary! Will start using this feature now. Never realised Smart Folders is so useful.

Folderol app stopped working awhile ago and I am looking for a replacement app or way to color folders. Do you have any solutions?

Excellent video!! Every time I watch your videos I learn something new. Thank you!!

Great video. Thank you. Question. Is a Smart Folder a repository? Meaning… does it move my folder from its original location and places it in the Smart Folder?

Weird that your 7M keynote file was included in the list of files greater than 10M.

Wow. Such a powerful tool, which I never used so far☺️

Very useful and detailed video. Can you help me with this? We have a shared drive from a Windows PC server, and after adding that server to my Mac, when I create Smart Folders and search pdf. It does not show any results. I believe I am not catching the correct search criteria to search from Windows Shared Server. Please help me with this 😞 .

Excellent information. I use the search a lot, but I should save the results more frequently. By the way, for future reference, "criteria" is plural. Its singular is "criterion."

Very interesting Gary. I am trying to figure out how to incorporate smart folders with my desktop "madness". Of course desktop already has a feature, STACKS, that sorts file types into stacks of similar file types. I also try to keep stuff that I want quick reference to in folders on my desktop, but within another folder called "desktop quick" so that the desktop itself is not so cluttered with tons of folders. Of course the potential problem with doing this is using up hard disk space. I do have an external drive that I use for time machine, but that has a partition for files just like this that I have already moved from my main hard disk.

Great information, as usual. Thanks, Gary. Is there a way to update old pages files? Or, does that matter.

Do you personally use any smart folders? Are smart folders searchable by spotlight or Alfred?

I’m using smart folders for basically managing all my files on icloud , I rarely use the normal folders, I have smart folders for all my files by different criterias like Authors, publishers,subjects,priorities,Type . It’s faster than Tags . Tags sometimes will just stop working for me but smart folders get updated automatically. And I was wondering like how the hell I do more than on criteria at a time so thx Gary ur vids also hep me . One issue I have on my iphone or ipad I can’t open these smart folder , it’s just displayed as files and without the purple color and I can not open them , plz help😢.

How to see Video Clip Dimention in finder?

You've reminded me of a real macOS annoyance. Why is "Recents" in Finder broken? It is woefully out of date and inaccurate. Mine is months out of date. My 3 most recently opened files are only one a day ago, and the next two are from February. Next 2 are January then it jumps to last year. Frequently it fails to show me a file that is actually open right in from of me in an App.

Is there a shortcut to create a Smart Folder or a way to customize the toolbar to include a Smart Folder icon instead of going through the menu items.

One frustration is that only Finder understands smart folders. For example, if I navigate to a smart folder from Photos's Import command or Microsoft Word's Open command , smart folders are grayed out. Is there a way to convince applications (besides Finder) to work with smart folders? (I understand it makes no sense to create a file in a smart folder but it makes sense to access an existing file in a smart folder.)

With SmartFolders it's apparently not possible to exclude files from the search, or is it?

Re: File size - What's the difference between physical size and logical size?

I don't find the function is not in file extension or file format. For example I what to find all files containing "beer" in the name, except the .xml one

How do I get my password on my Mac M1 onto my other 2 notebooks using iCloud?

Super useful as always. Two gripes (not at you); 1) for the life of me I can't understand why they won't add [is not] when you use "Kind"?! 2) why won't they let you add a column header of [File Path] so you can see where all the files are at a glance?! (no fun clicking on each one repetitively to look at the path bar and wondering if it's the same as the first one etc...)

My smart folder doesn't do what your doing.

huh?

Hi Gary, thank you for this informative video i have made a smart folder/search to filter all my dng-files, however it also shows the dng-files on my cloud storage (onedrive in this case) i have tried the following but it does not work: www.michelpyck.be/macmost/smartfolders.jpg