A while back, I posted a utility to search among all your databases for design elements with specified attributes or search terms in the code. This is a newer, better version.
I've been using this often myself, to find example code from some application I developed years ago or investigate applications developed by others, so I've been improving the tool as I went along. I've always had a list of the more things I needed to do before I let anyone have it, and now I'm done with that list, so it's time to release again, quickly, before I think of something else.
The main differences you'll notice from the previous version are:
- more design elements to select from, including new ones from version 8.
- an option to search for words in the DXL of the design notes, in case what you're looking for might be in a weird place we wouldn't recognize as code or rich text, like the name of a column or part of a CSS.
- the ability to display the context in which your search strings were found. This is enabled with a checkbox in the search parameters dialog -- lower left. The search terms are displayed boldface, with about 25 characters on either side, to help you decide whether it's an occurrence you're interested in.
- if you display context, the name of the containing entity (action, form event, subroutine...) is included. This doesn't work if you select the "All DXL" search.
And here's the application, which you may download and use:
Andre Guirard | 11 August 2008 05:15:00 AM ET | Man-Cave, Plymouth, MN, USA | Comments (13)
