Is there a way to find All Logic Projects That Use A Specifi

[RoyFan]

Is there a way to find or isolate only those Logic Pro X projects that uses a certain plugin ? (Nexus in my case) and even better a specific patch in that plugin?

[Jangus]

“EasyFind” (free) here->> ; http://www.devontechnologies.com/download/products.html

is a great file searching App.

 

It has the option to search for one word only, inside specific folders by using the “File Contents” option. It would take years to search through your whole hard drive, although you CAN point your search to a specific folder.

 

So, you could search for “Nexus” or the patch name and then point the search towards your folder where you keep your Logic Files and it will find all occurrences of that word, however with 10-20-50-100 files in your Logic Files Folder it could still take a very long time.

(let it go over-night?) Yikes.

 

It does work. The Logic Data files are loaded with some programing gibberish but the instrument and patch names (words) are clearly visible and the search will reveal the paths to the found files.

 

I tried it with “Boesendorfer” (Piano) and let it run for 10-15 minutes and it found 3 Project files that had Bosendorfer but I stopped the search.

 

Check it out if you really need it.

[RoyFan]

Thank you!! Exactly the tool I had in mind. By the way, what's the file in the Logic folder structure that would contain the words of the plugins? I'm assuming it's a word IN a file, rather than a name OF a file in that project yes?

 

I suppose the Apple built in finder can't be configured to search like that? I know there's a way to tell it to search a certain folder..

[Jangus]

The file that usually has what you want is actually a hidden file, so it won’t show up with the usual Control Click Show Contents method, but It’s called ‘ProjectData’ (one word). Interestingly, the found files show up in either backups, or Alternatives, but to find what you want it seems adequate and finds the word. There’s probably another file in there somewhere that actually has the real project data file but Apple must be using some ‘other’ method of hiding it. Probably a stream of insane gibberish in some crazy unreadable format.

 

Be sure to set the flags in EasyFind “Show Hidden files & Folders” , “Package Contents”, “Ignore Case”, “All words” and File Contents”

 

Again, most, if not all, found results will be hidden files as there will be a period preceding all of the paths found. However, in EasyFind, If you select one of the found paths and click “Display in Finder” (at the top), a folder will open and the file is now exposed and you can open it with text edit.app (just do a right-click-select) and with a simple finder find (CMD-F) your word(s) will show up there,… perhaps a few times. Although, once you have found all occurrences of the ‘patch’ you are looking and in which Projects they are in, I don’t see a way to save the search in EasyFind, perhaps just do a screen grab at this point so you don’t have to repeat the search?

 

I did a test run by duplicating 20 or so Project files and placing them in there own folder with a test run (using the word ‘piano’) and it actually went pretty fast. So, if your Logic projects folder is not too large this process may be useful and (to answer your question) yes, we are searching for a word in a file with this search.

 

The Apple finder Find is indeed very powerful and I tried it a bit for this, but couldn’t get it quite right somehow, but I will pursue it some more as it should work. With Apple find, there’s too many options and EasyFind is named well.

 

I admit, this is a sort of ‘tacky’ method of doing things, but it seems to produce some accurate results. I hope it helps somehow and I am just trying to give something back to the community here as I have gained so much by being a part of it.

I don’t pretend to be programer or hacker but just find it very interesting.

If anyone else has some input with this please join in and all comments are welcomed.

Later

[RoyFan]

thanks it seems to be working in a small directory I set up!

 

I'm trying to tell it in settings to only scan files that have the same extension as projectData - but I couldn't see anywhere what that is?

[RoyFan]

“EasyFind” (free) here->> ; http://www.devontechnologies.com/download/products.html

is a great file searching App.

 

Check it out if you really need it.

 

 

Or is there a way to tell it to search all Files starting with the words "projectData"? and do the same search you mentioned?

 

i.e. - within Contents, but only for those names

[Jangus]

I did a Search here for “ProjectData” with options ; Only Files, All words, & Package Contents and no other options, and ProjectData was found easily. I was surprised actually because I thought it was a hidden file. anyway…

 

So, in your test directory, you found the Logic files that had the patch you were looking for in them ? This was your original intent, right ?

 

The extension for a Logic file is “ .logicx” which is easily findable.,

but what is the/your purpose for that ?

 

Hey, so point the search at your Logic file folder and let it go, and find the Logic files that have the patch you want.

EF will show it’s progress as it searches and if it’s taking too long interrupt the search process by clicking on the little “x” way down at the right end of the search field.

No harm done. Go for it.

[martinharp]

Awesome tip! I have a bad habit of not committing to audio and I've been needing to go through my old projects to update from legacy/unsupported (32bit) soft synths. This is going to save me from opening every single project to find the ones that I need to work on. Thanks for the heads up on this little app!

[noisyneil]

I tried this and didn't have much luck; the search turned up nothing useful. It would be great to be able to do this, if anyone else has any suggestions.

[noisyneil]

You may find this discussion interesting!