Filed under: Mac 101
Mac 101: Search by color label
What is the use of these labels if you can't search them? Well, you can! Open a new Finder window and press command + F. In the "kind" drop-down box, select "other" then find "File Label" in the list. Click it, then click "OK."
Now, you can narrow down your search by the color of its label. Note that if you are using Mac OS X Tiger, you will see "Color Label" instead of "File Label."
Want more quick tips and tricks like this? Try TUAW's Mac 101 section.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Trevor said 12:30PM on 9-02-2008
Not sure how my email got displayed, but if someone could delete it, I'd appreciate it.
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Galley said 12:35PM on 9-02-2008
There's also a handy AppleScript to colorize your audio files based on their file type.
http://dougscripts.com/itunes/scripts/ss.php?sp=colorfilelabelsoftracks
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Grant said 12:40PM on 9-02-2008
After switching from a PC to my new MacBook, I had a lot of files that I wanted to reorganize, and a lot of files that I didn't. Instead of having to remember which files I needed to go back and look at, I went through and labeled everything that needed organizing with a red label, and then I made a smart folder called "To Be Organized" that searches the computer and only shows files with red labels. I put the smart folder in my Finder sidebar along with the other smart folders like "All Documents", etc., so now I have a running list of everything in my computer that needs organized. Once I fix the files, I remove the red label, and voila, I no longer see them in my To Be Organized folder. Basically, smart folders plus labeling is awesome.
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RS said 12:48PM on 9-02-2008
I wish there was a way to color label folders (mailboxes) in the application, Mail. I have about 50 mail folders and often wish I could color code them. Is there a way to do this?
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Jamie Phelps said 12:56PM on 9-02-2008
I have been doing this for quite a while and even wrote up a detailed implementation on my site: http://www.jamiephelps.com/all/dynamic-digital-organization
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RS said 12:57PM on 9-02-2008
I wish there was a way to color label folders (mailboxes) in the application, Mail. I have about 50 mail folders and often wish I could color code them. Is there a way to do this?
Reply
zideshowbob said 1:00PM on 9-02-2008
Is there a shortcut for applying color tags? Found nothing... I don't like to rightklick all the time. There must be something...
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Mike Piontek said 4:30PM on 9-02-2008
If anyone needs to find files by label in an Automator workflow, I've written an action that can do that: http://mikepiontek.com/journal/mac/new-automator-actions-for-the-web-beta.html
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BillNace said 8:23PM on 9-02-2008
Is there a way to automatically apply a label color to files of a certain type? I'd like all my PDFs to be red, automatically (for instance). Ideally, I could set something up that would do it as soon as the file is created. But, I'd settle for something I could run as a cron job. . .
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Jono said 8:57AM on 9-30-2008
@BillNace
You could do this with Hazel
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