Fuzzy File Search

Search for files using their full paths with a fuzzy find algorithm.

This extension is meant as a replacement/alternative for the built-in Search Files.
Raycast’s built-in extension Search Files only searches for filenames, which is not ideal when organizing files using directories.
Imagine the following scenario:

~/
    algorithms/
        homework.pdf
    data-structures/
        homework.pdf

Using Raycast’s built-in Search Files, you can search for homework.pdf, but you will get both files.
With Fuzzy File Search, you can search for algo homework and directly find ~/algorithms/homework.pdf.
This functionality is very helpful for highly structured data in deeply nested directories.

Raycast’s Search Files allows you to specify in which directory the file is located, e.g., homework in ~/algorithms/.
However, this approach requires the user to know the exact directory and provide the full path.

Another solution is to add directory information into filenames, e.g., algorithms_homework.pdf, but this leads to extremely long filenames and duplication of information (directory path + filename).
This plugin, using the fzf approach, avoids that issue.

How does it work

Under the hood, this extension runs fd to find all the files in the searched directories (by default, the home directory).
I chose fd because it ignores hidden files and files ignored by Git, while also being fast.
This allows for very quick lookups.

Afterwards, the files are filtered using the npm fzf package to provide the user with fast results.
Since fd doesn’t support fuzzy searching, I chose to use this package.

Note: This Raycast extension automatically installs fd on the first run.