As I try to keep track of files residing in various folders on my work network, I periodically will fetch the filenames and tree structure of the server and maintain an index in an Access database. When I want to search for a file I have much more detailed query options and the search is much faster than Windows Explorer search.
As I understand it, if Vista ever comes out it will have a much improved search function, including networked machines. But I don’t want to wait for Vista, and I’m sure that IT would never let us take advantage of Google Desktop’s extended options or any internet solutions.
I had the idea to make a more user friendly way of searching the indexed database through a web interface, so that it would look more like a search engine instead of a big scary Access form, and my co-workers might be more inclined to take advantage of it. I also thought this might be a good project for me to use & learn some new tools. I have done a bit of HTML, Access, and vb stuff, but I have no experience with any sort of back end web database stuff. I’m hoping that a lot of this will be simplified since I am keeping it within our intranet only.
Can anyone point me in the right direction for creating something like this?