DigUp reads only the folders you choose. During setup, it shows how long the first pass will take for each folder, measured on your computer. You can pick whole folders or select only some of their subfolders.
How choosing folders works
When you first open DigUp, you pick the folders to search while the 865 MB model downloads once. Later, you can skip additional folders or file types in Settings. On a Mac, folder options are located in Settings → Folders, as noted in the v0.6.1 release notes. Code projects have their own separate selection in Settings → Code.
| Inside a chosen folder | What DigUp does |
|---|---|
Code projects (a folder with .git, package.json and the like) |
Reads only screenshots; code is read only through code search |
Keys, certificates, password files, hidden folders like .ssh, apps and caches |
Never read |
| Folders that look like datasets | Skipped |
| Files that only live in the cloud (iCloud on a Mac, OneDrive on Windows) | Never downloaded |
| Folders or file types you skip in Settings | Skipped |
Cloud and on-demand sync folders
DigUp never downloads files that only live in the cloud, such as iCloud on a Mac or OneDrive on Windows. In an open user report as of 2026-10-16 (issue #61), a Mac user on 0.6.1 noted that a folder synced on demand by Synology Drive indexed almost nothing because nearly every file was an undownloaded cloud placeholder, and the app gave no hint why. The reporter stated that the same applies to OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Drive and iCloud Drive with Optimize Mac Storage, and proposed an optional setting that does not exist in DigUp today. See iCloud and OneDrive files not indexed for details on keeping files on your computer.
Photo libraries
In an open user report as of 2026-10-16 (issue #43), a Mac user reported that a 40 GB photo library in ~/Pictures showed “nothing to index here yet” or “zero of zero indexed”. There is no maintainer reply in that thread as of 2026-10-16. For other cases where chosen folders show zero files, see no results or zero files indexed.
Large folders and first-pass time
The first pass happens once, and setup shows the estimated time before you start. On a Mac, indexing takes a few minutes for a few hundred files and can take an hour for a big Downloads folder. On Windows and Linux (v0.7.0-beta.1), DigUp uses the graphics card where faster and the processor otherwise; on a processor alone a picture takes a few seconds (about five on a 2017 laptop’s Core i5), so a large photo library can take hours. Long PDFs and documents get their first 30 pages read right away and the rest once everything else is in (up to 5,000 pages a file).
On a Mac starting in v0.6.1, you can set DigUp to index only at set hours in Settings → Folders (1:00 to 7:00 by default) while search works all day. See CPU, battery and memory use for more on indexing load.
Mac 0.6.1 folder fixes
The Mac v0.6.1 release fixed several folder issues:
- A chosen folder with accents, Korean or Japanese in its name (such as Google Drive’s “내 드라이브”) no longer stops indexing for every folder (issue #14).
- Settings scrolls when you have many folders, instead of growing past the bottom of the screen (issue #17).
- Code folders show their files right away instead of “0 of 0”, and Settings notes they are read after your other folders (issue #21).