Mac open file dialog – “search” function – does not show all matching files

findersearch

When considering the contents of the /shared directory – and specifically the files whose names begin with driversLicense:

16:12:48/shared $ll driversLicense.*

-rwxrwxrwx@ 1 steve  staff  567710 Aug  1  2011 driversLicense.pdf
-rw-r--r--@ 1 steve  staff    6476 Aug 27  2013 driversLicense.2013.jpg
-rw-r--r--@ 1 steve  staff  314030 Nov 10  2014 driversLicense.jpg

Then in Finder I type in first few letters – specifically driversLicense: here is the screenshot of the result (I have done this a half dozen times to ensure it were repeatable):

enter image description here

Why is it that "driversLicense.2013.jpg" appears but not "driversLicense.jpg and driversLicense.pdf" ??

Best Answer

Typing directly into a Finder window doesn't generate a 'search' as such; there is no filter generated, it merely selects the first match to your typed string.

So, if your folder is sorted by anything other than Name, then it will find the first match, yet not necessarily the first alphabetically - in your case it should find the newest match.

Setting the sort to Name, the same string will find & select the first match alphabetically - the others will be directly beneath it, unselected.

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