Download 1 Full year trial!
Have instant access to all your files, up to 1 trillion per drive!
New in version 3
Now you can play media files, any file type VLC can play mysys can play, because it is using VLC.
Multi-select files to play them, including playlist files such as .m3u
View whole files in the View tab, you can choose Hex mode as well.
View HTML or XML files in the web browser tab, or search and browse the web.
New 08/2024 quickly update a single folder or drive! See https://github.com/tigros/updatedb
System Requirements
Any 64 bit version of Windows with .Net 4.5.1 and above installed.
5-10 GB free disk space depending on total number of files, about 5 GB per 15 million.
Getting started
The first thing mysys needs to do is create a database of all your files.
Great care was taken to make this process as fast as possible by scanning
separate disks simultaneously in a highly multi-threaded scheme.
If you have mapped network drives a popup will ask which ones to include in the
database. Those drives will take longer to index depending on the network connection speed.
CD/DVD/Flash drives will not be indexed, only Fixed drives and optionally Network drives.
Use the Schedule button to create a Windows Task Schedule so the indexing happens at
a time which is most convenient. To delete the task just click Cancel.
Once the database is created you are ready to find files, fast!
In the top left text box, type any filename and hit enter or click Search.
Wild cards are supported such as read*.txt.
You can use AND/OR/- like: this OR that
the - is to exclude like: this -notthat
Use double quotes like: "find this whole thing"
Use brackets like: (afoldername or anotherfolder) and (*.c or *.rc or *.h)
For that example you would check on the "Include folder names" option and probably the "Exact match" option also otherwise will find *.cs, *.css, *.hpp, etc...
Because this database is Full Text Search you need to know the first chars of the
file name, so if you're looking for filename.txt, *name.txt won't work! Without this limitation
we wouldn't be so fast! *.txt will work however. Possibly a future version will have an option for a slower
but more flexible search.
You can use the Containing text box to search within the files found. Contents are never
indexed but uses a fast highly multi-threaded algorithm.
File sizes, Dates and Attributes are all read live off the disk, these are not stored in the database.
A red tab icon means search is in progress, orange means file info being gathered in the background, wait until it's black before trying to sort by date/file size/type/attr.
You can have multiple searches by clicking the small empty tab on the right of the main tab, like Chrome or Firefox.
Use the Group checkbox to group by the sorted column, just click the column headers to change the grouping.
You can hover over image files to see a preview.
Double click on a folder name to open that folder in explorer, likewise double click file names to run or open them with associated application.
Right click files or folders to popup the system menu, the folder menu is not the same as a file menu.
Multi-select using shift or ctrl keys.
Use Drag and Drop to copy files from mysys to the drop zone.
Hints:
If you want to store the database on another drive, you can create a Directory Junction.
You can find the database in C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\mysys
So to create a junction move the mysys folder to the drive you want then from
a cmd prompt: mklink /j C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\mysys D:\foldername\mysys
Or to make it easier you could install this handy tool: http://schinagl.priv.at/nt/hardlinkshellext/hardlinkshellext.html
Each user on the same computer will have his/her own database for security/privacy reasons.
If you want to keep certain files hidden from mysys, there's a great piece of free software called VeraCrypt, see https://www.veracrypt.fr
Simply create an encrypted file container and hide them in there.
You can also use both of the above to encrypt the mysys database and document cache. Just use the junction steps above but with an encrypted drive.
This is useful if you have sensitive information in PDF, Word, Excel, etc which are converted to text and cached in ...\mysys\conversioncache when doing a text search, viewing MS Office documents also stores a PDF version of the file there. This folder does not get text searched if file names happen to meet your file name criteria, they will however show up if no text search criteria is given. There is no problem deleting these files apart from slowing down text searches and/or viewing when they need to be recreated. When the space used reaches 200 MB you will be asked if you want to delete them each time you exit mysys, it displays how much space is currently used too.
The recommended version of Foxit Reader is 10.1.0.37527, very stable, no problems to report.
For your convenience it is stored here: https://integritech.ca/files/FoxitReader10.1.0.37527_Setup.exe
June 2022: Just discovered a nice registry setting to have, "LastActiveClick", so you can click an app on the taskbar and will switch to the last active window, perfect for mysys!
From a command prompt copy/paste the following and reboot:
reg add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced /v LastActiveClick /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
To undo: reg delete HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced /v LastActiveClick /f
Command line
/CreateDB [network drive letter(s)]
Example: mysys.exe /CreateDB X Z
This creates a database including X:\ and Z:\ network drives.
/CancelDB
Example: mysys.exe /CancelDB
Cancels database creation deleting temporary files.
The exit code will be 0 if success, or 1 if an error occurred.
Revision History
Ver. 1.0 - 23 May 2018
Initial release of mysys.
Ver. 1.1 - 30 June 2018
Added ability to search within PDF's.
Minor improvements/bug fixes.
Ver. 1.2 - 23 November 2018
Can now search inside Word, Power Point, Excel, Open Office and Open Document files.
Other minor improvements.
Ver. 1.3 - 19 December 2018
Can now search inside eBooks (.epub, .mobi, .azw, .azw3, azw4)
Include and check MSVC redistributables.
Ver. 2.0 - 24 January 2019
10 times faster database creation, now reads MFT directly!
Ver. 3.0 - 9 April 2019
Added ability to view media thanks to VLC, many supported file types including playlists such as .m3u, multi-select to play several files.
Added View tab to view file contents.
Added Web Browser tab to view local HTML and XML files, or surf the web.
Ver. 3.1 - 29 April 2019
Added support for Cue Sheet (.cue) files.
Added minimize to tray by holding down Ctrl key and clicking minimize, or from right click tray icon menu.
Ver. 3.2 - 5 May 2019
Added search facility to View tab.
Ver. 3.3 - 1 June 2019
Added ability to view and extract archives using 7-Zip, many file types supported.
Keep track of viewer positions from file to file.
Ver. 3.4 - 6 August 2019
Added shuffle button to player.
Ver. 3.5 - 14 September 2019
Special handling of DLL files in the viewer, lists exports and their addresses.
Ver 3.6 - 12 October 2019
Removed all nags during trial period.
Fixed Windows 10 display issues.
Revamped command line DB creation method, there was an issue starting the interface if DB creation underway, related to the Web Browser tab.
Now there will be a tray icon which can be clicked to open the interface, otherwise mysys will close after DB creation completes and so will the tray icon.
Created qlaunch.exe to be used by the Scheduled task, it launches mysys and closes to assure the task status isn't kept in Running state
when mysys is left open (DB underway then tray icon clicked), otherwise the Windows task scheduler won't run the next scheduled DB creation until mysys is closed.
Ver 4.0 - 11 December 2019
Added ability to view PDF's in the Web Browser tab.
Requires Adobe or compatible PDF Reader to be installed.
On windows 10 the recommended PDF viewer is Foxit Reader https://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf-reader, it can coexist with Adobe but the default PDF viewer needs to be set to Foxit, this is because mysys needs to Run as Administrator which causes Adobe Reader to fail. Adobe is aware of the issue and hopefully they will fix it in the near future. Adobe works fine with Windows 7, 8 and 8.1.
If your PDF's do not display in the Web Browser tab please visit https://helpx.adobe.com/ca/acrobat/using/display-pdf-in-browser.html
Follow instructions for "Internet Explorer 8 and later". Use Ctrl-H to switch between Read Mode/Fit to Width.
Can now search within DJVU files, a somewhat popular E-Book format.
The Web Browser tab now accepts file/folder paths as URL, checks if it exists first.
Ver 4.1 - 21 December 2019
Large result set speed improvements.
Allow GIF's in Web Browser, convenient for animated GIF's.
Ver 4.2 - 11 January 2020
Fixed Aero peek problems.
Improved searching inside files.
Fixed arrow keys not working in Web Browser tab.
Ver 4.3 - 27 January 2020
It often happens that playlists, especially .cue files, point to non-existent .wav files because they were converted to .flac. Mysys will now play the .flac's when the .wav's don't exist.
Fixed a resource leak or two, improved stability.
Ver 4.4 - 30 July 2020
Fixes for 4k desktops and high DPI.
Resolved various Windows 10 display issues.
Switched audio visualization to something more interesting.
Fix youtube problem in Web Browser tab under Windows 10.
Some stability improvements.
Ver 4.5 - 25 October 2020
Can now view Word, Excel and PowerPoint files in the Web Browser tab. (Requires MS Office or WPS Office and an IE integrated PDF reader such as Foxit Reader)
To be precise the new file types are: .doc .docx .xls .xlsx .ppt .pptx .rtf .odt .ods .odp
Fixed an issue if a password is entered in the scheduled DB creation task allowing it to run when logged off.
Minor edge case fixes.
Ver 4.6 - 19 December 2020
Added subtitle support to the audio/video player.
Fixed issues with low res, width of 1280 is now the supported minimum. 8k remains untested.
Ver 4.7 - 22 April 2021
Got everything digitally signed.
Fixed protection issues with latest Windows 10.
Minor improvements.
Ver 4.8 - 31 July 2021
Changed trial period to 1 year. Right click top bar and click About to see remaining days.
Split long lines in PDF's for easier viewing in the View tab.
Updated VLC components to latest, v3.0.16.
Ver 4.9 - 4 April 2022
Added ability to zoom and pan images.
Image viewer now supports animated GIFs.
Improved text search to interpret tab characters (common in source code files, also tab delimited types) as 4 spaces, slightly slower but only used if the criteria begins/ends with a space or contains 4 consecutive spaces.
Ver 4.91 - 29 October 2022
Minor touchups.
Ver 4.92 - 2 March 2023
Added support for Markdown files (.md .markdown) in Web Browser tab.
Ver 5.0 - 15 July 2024
Added support for AsciiDoc, ReST, man, LaTeX and SVG files (.adoc .asciidoc .rst .man .1 .tex .svg) in the Web Browser tab.
Added full support for epub files, including images, etc.. in the Web Browser tab.
Added rudimentary support for Ebooks (.azw .azw3 .mobi .azw4 .djvu) in the Web Browser tab.
Switched markdown converter to pandoc.
Can now search/view opened and locked files.
Implemented F5 Refresh key.
Bypass audio fade-in when clip is less than 20 seconds.
Can now view text files (.txt .log) in the Web Browser tab, good for wrapping long lines.
Added ability to view various source code files with syntax highlighting in the Web Browser tab.
The full list: .abap .abnf .ada .adb .adl .adlf .adls .adlx .ads .agda .aheui .ahk .ahkl .als .androidproj
.appxmanifest .asm .atom .au3 .bas .bash .bat .bpl .bzl .c .cbl .cc .cfg .cjs .cl .classpath .clj .cljc
.cljs .cmake .cmd .cml .cob .collada .config .cpp .cr .croc .cs .csd .csh .csproj .css .cu .cuh .cxx .d
.darcspatch .dart .dasm .dax .dg .di .diff .dita .ditamap .docker .dpatch .dpr .dtd .dts .dtsi .duel .dyl
.dylan .ebml .eml .entitlements .eps .erl .es .escript .exw .f90 .filters .flo .frag .frt .fs .fsi .fsproj
.fsx .g .geo .glade .glsl .go .golo .gpx .gradle .groovy .gsql .gst .h .haml .hh .hlsl .hlsli .hpp .hrl
.hs .hsail .hx .hxml .hxsl .hxx .idl .ijs .ik .iml .ini .inl .intr .io .iosproj .itml .j .jade .java .jbst
.js .jsm .json .kid .kif .kk .kki .kml .ksh .kt .ktm .kts .less .lisp .ll .ls .lsl .lsp .lua .lvlib .lvproj
.m .manifest .mathml .mjs .mm .musicxml .nasm .ncl .nl .nsh .nsi .nuspec .oml .opf .pas .patch .peg .perl
.php .pig .pike .pl .plist .pm .pmod .pony .pp .prefs .prg .pro .project .prolog .properties .props .proto
.ps .ps1 .psm1 .psql .ptls .pug .py .pyi .pyw .q .qbs .qml .qrc .rb .rbw .rdf .reg .resw .resx .rql .rs
.rsl .rss .ruleset .s .settings .sh .sieve .siv .smil .soap .sol .sql .st .storyboard .swift .targets
.tcl .tcsh .thrift .tmx .tpx .ts .tsx .ttl .vala .vb .vbproj .vbs .vcl .vcproj .vcxproj .vert .vhdl .vim
.vimrc .voicexml .vsprops .vxml .wdiff .webidl .wgsl .wixproj .wlua .wsdl .x3d .xaml .xbrl .xcbkptlist
.xccheckout .xccurrentversion .xcscheme .xcsettings .xcworkspacedata .xdp .xenc .xfdf .xib .xjb .xlf .xliff
.xmla .xmp .xpl .xpp .xq .xql .xqm .xquery .xqy .xsd .xsdconfig .xsl .xslt .xul .yaml .yang .yml .zep
.zig .zsh