New to Windows 11, Indexing and App Window Issues

[Soperoah]

Hi,

This is my first day with Windows 11 and I'm already having a lot of trouble with a few niche things that are pretty important to my workflow.

First: if I open the Photos app, for example, the first window opens where I want it to, but any subsequent photos I open while the first is open will open elsewhere on the screen, and I would like them to always open in the same place. This was the behaviour it had in Windows 10, and it was a lot easier for me to navigate multiple photos by hovering the Photos icon in the taskbar and selecting the photo I wanted. Sometimes I need to open multiple photos stored in different folders, so just scrolling through the photos isn't an option.

Is there a way to tell an app to always open in a specific part of the screen? Thanks.

Second, I have a problem with indexing. Obviously indexing is supposed to help with searching, and as I understand it the index is supposed to automatically update with any changes made to a file's metadata. However, I frequently (every time in Windows 11, half the time in 10) notice that if I do a search for tags to bring a specific file up, then change its metadata in the Details pane, upon saving those changes the file vanishes from the tag search even though I haven't changed that data.

For example, if I search for green; tree;, it'll show me any file where I've tagged both green; and tree; in the Tags field. If I run that search, select a photo and add something like flowers;, the file then vanishes from the green; tree; search, even though it still has those tags, and even after closing the window and reopening it it won't show up in any future searches for those tags. As you can imagine this makes it hard to update files with tag data, as the photos just disappear from the search function entirely unless I search by something else like Authors or Name, copy-paste it into a different folder, wait a few moments, then undo. For some reason that triggers the index to re-index the file, but the act of saving metadata changes only makes the index lose the file.

I'd greatly appreciate any help with that. I tend to mess around with tags on a daily basis and I don't want to keep having to manually rebuild the index every day.

Thanks.

 

[ChatGPT]

Hi there,

I understand that you're encountering a couple of issues with Windows 11 related to window placement and indexing. Let's address each of them.

For your first concern about the Photos app, it seems that you want subsequent photos to open in the same position as the initial window. Unfortunately, Windows 11 doesn't have a built-in feature to remember the position of each application window separately. However, you can try using a third-party application like WindowManager or AquaSnap. These tools enable you to customize window positions and sizes, so you can set up the preferred position for your Photos app windows. Keep in mind that third-party tools may have some limitations or require a paid license for advanced features.

Moving on to your indexing issue, it appears that after modifying the metadata of a file in the Details pane, the file no longer appears in searches where it previously showed up. This problem can occur if the Windows Search index hasn't updated yet. By default, Windows tries to keep the search index up to date in real-time, but sometimes it can lag behind.

To resolve this issue, you can try manually rebuilding the search index. Here's how:

1. Open the Settings app by pressing Win + I.
2. Go to System, then select Storage from the left sidebar.
3. Under the "More storage settings" section, click on "Search indexing."
4. In the Indexing Options window that opens, click on the "Advanced" button.
5. In the Advanced Options window, switch to the "Index Settings" tab.
6. Click the "Rebuild" button under the Troubleshooting section.
7. Windows will prompt for confirmation to rebuild the index. Click "OK" to proceed.
8. The rebuilding process may take some time, depending on the size of your index and the speed of your computer. Once it's complete, your search results should become accurate again.

It's worth noting that rebuilding the index might cause some initial slowdown while Windows is re-indexing your files, but it should eventually improve functionality. If you still encounter issues after rebuilding, you may need to look into more advanced troubleshooting or consider filing a bug report to Microsoft.

I hope these suggestions help resolve your issues with window placement and indexing in Windows 11! Let me know if you have any further questions.

 

[Soperoah]

Another issue: Sometimes I seem to lose the ability to rate files (click the stars) in metadata and I'm not sure how to get it back.