Find e-mail and files faster

Of all the feedback we’ve gotten on the 7 Tips for Managing Your Files Better and 4 Ways to Keep Control of Your E-Mail Inbox, the most frequently asked question we get is how to find lost files and e-mail messages. You’re not alone. Despite my best efforts to stay organized I often have to search for older documents or e-mail messages that contain important information. The Search feature in Microsoft Windows XP and Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 can help, but they don’t always find what I need. Instead, I use the MSN Search Toolbar with Windows Desktop Search to find files and e-mail messages on my computer.

Windows Desktop Search, when installed, adds a search box to your Windows XP taskbar. You can use it to search for files on your computer and e-mail messages in Outlook. It’s fast and—most importantly—it works great. I’ve used Windows Desktop Search for three months and it’s helped me find dozens of e-mail messages and files. In one instance, I found an obscure document that was more then two years old.

What I really like about Windows Desktop Search is being able to choose the type of results I see—everything, files or specific file types, or e-mail messages.

Start searching
To get started, you have to download and install the MSN Search Toolbar with Windows Desktop Search. After you install it, Windows Desktop Search will take a couple of minutes to create an index of all the files and e-mail messages stored on your computer. You’ll know it’s done when a pop-up window shows up in your System Tray (in the bottom right corner of your computer screen).

Now you can start searching. Type a search query into the Windows XP taskbar and then click the green Search Desktop button or the green arrow button on the right side of the search box. All of your results will be shown in a Windows Desktop Search Results dialog box. It’s that easy.

Jason Kozleski