Ever liked to watch those sci-fi bio-horror movies? Where parasitic organisms latch (or embed) themselves onto people and unify themselves so deeply with their hosts' body and systems, that they can never be safely removed? I get this feeling from time to time as I work with Microsoft products.
Honestly, I think Microsoft's Windows Desktop Search is a good thing. Never has it been so easy for me to index and search for items in my Outlook PST folders or filesystem. The thing that is not so good, is the (wrongfully) repeated mantra of designing things simple and easy to use; to the point of overdoing it and leaving a feature-poor implementation. WDS lets users specify which filesystem and Outlook locations should be indexed, and the indexing service will tirelessly churn in the background keeping track of all the joke and work-unsafe links to fall into one's Inbox. In my case, that is 2.6GB worth of indexes. Nope, I do not receive unsavoury content in my mailbox - I get 300-400 technical-related emails a day from way too many mailing lists, accumulating over 4GB worth of discussions over the years.
And, God forbid the Use Case scenario of people wanting to purchase complete new computers to replace their aging hardware, and in effect having the desire to migrate their existing data/files over to the shiny and aromatic machine. For WDS does not cater for the situation that I move the PST files to the other machine and quit using Outlook on this one. What is left behind is that 2.6GB block of index that points to nothing (now), and WDS having nothing to reference that data with, completely ignores it in its rebuilding exercises; it just works on the existing selection of locations that the user wants to index. Er huh, real smart ain't it? No easy option to drop the entire index.
I consulted the neighbourhood holy priest on the matter, and considered the advice of uninstalling WDS altogether. But, a BIG BUT,
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Uninstaller Error
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An error occurred while trying to remove Windows Desktop Search 3.0. It may have already been uninstalled. Would you like to remove Windows Desktop Search 3.0 from the Add or Remove programs list?
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Yes No
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Begone! Foul demon! Leave the operating system alone! Release yourself from your host!
With that, I began the massive exorcism by shutting down the Windows search service and deleting the index files manually. It was painful, and the Windows search service let out an unnervingly unhuman cry as it shook and struggled to restart without the files. On the second restart attempt it rebuilt from scratch, forever releasing its grip on the unwarranted disk space. Maybe Microsoft should include a cross and bottle of holy water in their release of WDS.