Understanding the Catalog

The catalog contains the results of the indexing process running on the local computer. Each Windows 7 computer has a single catalog that is located by default in the Search subfolder under the %SystemDrive%\ProgramData\Microsoft folder. (You must make hidden files visible to view the ProgramData folder and its contents.) The catalog contains three main types of information:

• The full-text index of all content that has been crawled by the indexer.
• The property store, which is a Jet database that contains the properties of files that have been indexed. (The Windows 7 property schema is used to decide which properties are cached.)
• Configuration files that control how the indexer works. (Additional configuration settings are stored in the registry.)

Although the catalog indexes items for all users who use the computer, the property store contains security descriptors for each item. Thus the indexer can security-trim the results of queries against the index so that the results returned include only items that the user who is performing the query can access.

Note The location of the catalog can be changed using either Indexing Options in Control Panel or Group Policy. For more information, see the section titled "Configuring the Index" later in this tutorial.