Accessing tagged files through an external hard drive that is usb networked through

[tbd464]

Hello,

We just started using tags to help sort files so that we can find them in different categories and not have to save the same file 2-3 times.

The tag feature seems great for what we are trying to do. The issue we are having is that we save the files on a Lacie that is networked via usb through an airport extreme.

We have multiple computers in the office and all of them need to find the files that are tagged.

Is there a way to search tags on an external hard drive that networked through Airport.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[yogi]

You should be able to find files tagged on the drive using spotlight search. Are they not appearing in the sidebar? You may need to check Finder preferences to see if the tags are activated.

Also see https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202754

 

[tbd464]

Thank you for the reply yogi. We have the tags on the sidebar and can get all of the tagged items that are in the actual computer to show up from a search. The problem we are having is getting the tagged files to come up from the external hard drive that is networked through the airport extreme.

We save the design files from 3 different computers and store them on the networked external hard drive so that all the users can access the files and so that we are not taking up space on the computers. I double checked the user preferences on the hard drive and all users are set to read and write so any user should be able to search for the tags but none will come up.

Ive tried a bunch of different settings with tags inside the external hard drive but have not had any luck so

 

[tbd464]

Accessing tagged files through an external hard drive that is usb networked through

Hello,

We just started using tags to help sort files so that we can find them in different categories and not have to save the same file 2-3 times.

The tag feature seems great for what we are trying to do. The issue we are having is that we save the files on a Lacie that is networked via usb through an airport extreme.

We have multiple computers in the office and all of them need to find the files that are tagged.

Is there a way to search tags on an external hard drive thats networked through Airport.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Ember1205]

How, exactly, are you adding tags currently? What scenarios do you find where using tags "works"? Tags are generally considered metadata (data about data) and are not stored directly within the file itself. Spotlight creates a tag "database" by indexing all of the content on your drive and then maintaining a mapping between the various tags / words and the files that contain them.

 

[tbd464]

How, exactly, are you adding tags currently? What scenarios do you find where using tags "works"? Tags are generally considered metadata (data about data) and are not stored directly within the file itself. Spotlight creates a tag "database" by indexing all of the content on your drive and then maintaining a mapping between the various tags / words and the files that contain them.

We use the tags for design files so that there are different ways to look up the files. ex. we have 10 specific design files that apply to motorcycles. All are named. So we can tag the name for each, then tag the bikes that each fit. We store everything in a customers folder under their name. When the files are named I can search for the artwork under the artworks name or look it up by the bike it fits. The only other way I can find to do this is to save each file in 3 different spots

 

[Ember1205]

I understand what tags are and why they're useful. I'm interested in understanding how you're adding them and how you're using them to determine files that match the keywords you've defined.

 

[pigoo3]

Threads merged. Please continue same conversation topic in one thread.

Thanks,

- Nick

 

[IWT]

@tbd464

I admit that I'm at the edge of my experience in the kind of system you have; but what I'd try is to force Spotlight to re-index the External Hard Drive (EHD).

I'm sure you know, but the way to do this is:

Go to System Preferences > Spotlight > Privacy.

Drag your EHD into the Privacy Box. Leave it for, say, 20 seconds. Then click-to-highlight the EHD and then click on the "minus" sign to remove it.

Spotlight will then re-index the EHD.

It's all I have to offer, I'm afraid; but it's easy to do, it's safe to do it, and it might work

Ian