Whenever I explicitly specify a hidden folder on the included folders list in baloofilerc, it does get indexed.

What should I do if I want to index all hidden files and folders by default?

I found some scarce mentions of the following options for baloofilerc:

index hidden files=true
index hidden folders=true

They don't work, however.

Another thing I would like to learn is whether Baloo has an option to index file names only, not file contents. I do a lot of filename searching but almost never search for content. I suppose disabling content indexing would save me a lot of CPU time.

P.S. Running Kubuntu 14.04 on regular Plasma and Kubuntu 14.10 on Plasma Next.

I've updated the configuration page to address your concerns - https://community.kde.org/Baloo/Configuration

It would be best if you reset Baloo after changing the configuration. That way it can index everything from scratch
$ balooctl disable
$ balooctl enable

If one of these features doesn't work then please file a bug. I haven't personally tested them.

Just tried what you suggested:

[General]
exclude filters=
exclude filters version=2
exclude folders[$e]=/dev,/sys,/proc,/var,/tmp
first run=false
folders[$e]=/
index hidden files=true
index hidden folders=true
only basic indexing=true

The following options are totally ignored, even after manually deleting the database and restarting the indexing service from command line:

index hidden files=true -- does nothing, a bunch of deliberately hidden files in the Downloads folder didn't get indexed
index hidden folders=true -- does nothing, although manually specifying a hidden folder on the included list does the trick (for that particular folder)
only basic indexing=true -- does nothing, the database size is virtually the same after rebuilding from scratch; searching for the keyword 'start' in the root folder brings up millions of search results, and those results are clearly not based on file names

What is working: adding or deleting a folder from include or exclude list immediately triggers an automatic (partial?) reindexing with good, expected results. Explicitly adding a hidden folder to the include list immediately gets its contents indexed.

What's weird: searching e.g. for '.kde' not only finds the hidden folder ~/.kde but also all instances of the folder 'kde' -- doesn't the dolphin search box understand the dot character literally? Vice versa, searching for 'kde' finds all instances of 'kde' but doesn't find '.kde' Normally, searching for 'ape' finds 'grape', 'ape' and 'landscape' but a preceding dot is still somehow not considered a normal character (in this paragraph, it is assumed that '~/.kde' is explicitly mentioned on the include list -- otherwise it never shows up in search results)

I'll try it out both the options this week and get back to you.

Any news on this? Just installed Kubuntu 14.04.1, updated it (without backports) and still the same weird behaviour: zero search results if searching in 'Everywhere', zero search results if searching from any of the quick access Places on Dolphin's left panel, yet every search is successful if performed from the root folder. Hidden files and folders only get indexed if their names are explicitly listed in baloofilerc.

Automatic reindexing takes place every time anything in baloofilerc is changed. Forcing the databases to rebuild as per your previous instructions does not affect anything -- stuff gets reindexed just the same way it does when I edit baloofilerc.

eierfrucht wrote:Any news on this? Just installed Kubuntu 14.04.1, updated it (without backports) and still the same weird behaviour: zero search results if searching in 'Everywhere', zero search results if searching from any of the quick access Places on Dolphin's left panel, yet every search is successful if performed from the root folder. Hidden files and folders only get indexed if their names are explicitly listed in baloofilerc.

Automatic reindexing takes place every time anything in baloofilerc is changed. Forcing the databases to rebuild as per your previous instructions does not affect anything -- stuff gets reindexed just the same way it does when I edit baloofilerc.

This have been happening for a long time in KDE 4.
I tried enabling, disabling baloo and also editing baloorc to index hidden files with no result, I can't search for hidden files with dolphin.
Here's the bug: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=269367
I hope the developers fix this.