---
title: Search
description: Describes BabelBird file-name search, full-text search, tag filtering, image metadata, OCR search, advanced search and permission boundaries.
slug: search-preview
lang: en
category: Product Features
category_order: 2
order: 8
keywords:
  - file management
  - search
  - OCR
  - image metadata
  - advanced search
---

# Search

Search is the entry point that connects files, tags, full-text content, image metadata, OCR results and AI capabilities in BabelBird Enterprise Drive. Users can combine file names, body text, descriptions, tags, uploaders, time ranges, file types, sizes, versions and image metadata. Results are returned only within the user’s permission scope.

![Advanced search](../../assets/images/advanced-search.jpg)
*Advanced search can combine keywords, file types, uploaders, time ranges, search scopes, full-text conditions, tags and metadata.*

## Search Scope

| Scope | Description | Use cases |
| --- | --- | --- |
| File name | Match file or folder names | Quickly locate known files |
| Full text | Search indexed Office, PDF and text content | Contracts, policies, proposals and reports |
| Tags and descriptions | Search enterprise tags, user tags and file descriptions | Cross-folder classification and material lookup |
| Comments and review content | Find content related to discussions, annotations and review opinions | Design review, drawing markup and contract review |
| Image metadata | Filter by shooting time, camera data, dimensions, DPI and more | Galleries, material libraries, photo delivery and product images |
| OCR results | Search text extracted from images, scans and optional OCR documents | Screenshots, certificates, scanned PDFs and invoices |

## Advanced Search And Filtering

Advanced search is useful when results are numerous or conditions are complex. Users can enter a keyword first and then narrow results by file type, uploader, time range, size, version, tags, descriptions, search scope and image metadata.

Common uses include:

1. Search a contract number inside project files and limit the upload date.
2. Find images in a material library with specific tags and required dimensions.
3. Search a keyword in department files and only show PDF or Office documents.
4. Locate a specific submission by uploader and time range.
5. Filter images by shooting date, camera model or resolution.

## OCR Search

BabelBird supports search based on OCR recognition results. Text inside images, scanned materials, and optional private-cloud OCR for image-based PDFs and embedded images in Office documents can participate in search once configured.

OCR search is suitable for:

- Screenshots, posters, certificates, invoices and scanned images.
- Image-based PDF documents.
- Text in images embedded in Word, Excel and PowerPoint files.
- Multilingual or mixed-language images.

See [OCR Image Recognition](ocr-image-recognition.md).

## Image Metadata Search

Image metadata helps users narrow candidates in large image collections. Available fields depend on image format, capture device and system parsing results. Common fields include shooting time, camera brand, camera model, lens model, width, height, resolution, DPI/DPCM and file size.

![Image information in file details](../../assets/images/file-details-panel.jpg)
*File details show properties, tags, descriptions, versions and image-related information for later search and organization.*

Image metadata is often used together with material libraries, waterfall view, tags, batch rename and AI image search. See [Image Metadata](metadata-search.md).

## Permission Boundaries

Search results do not bypass the permission system. Users only see files they are authorized to access. Permission checks include:

- Personal, department, project and enterprise file-space permissions.
- File access control and custom file permissions.
- Sharing permissions, external collaboration permissions and expiry.
- Encrypted folder passwords.
- Preview-only, download restriction, sharing restriction and other security policies.

If a user lacks access, the system does not expose the file even when a keyword matches. Zhichao AI, OCR search, AI image search and knowledge-base Q&A should follow the same permission boundary.

## Improving Search Quality

- Use standardized enterprise tags and maintain department or project tag rules.
- Add descriptions, owners, project numbers or customer information in important file details.
- Enable OCR for images, scans and invoices so text becomes searchable.
- Preserve useful image metadata for material libraries and project photos, then browse with waterfall view.
- Batch rename historical files before intake to reduce meaningless names.
- Combine watermarks, sensitive content recognition, access logs and sharing approval for sensitive files.

## Related Pages

- [OCR Image Recognition](ocr-image-recognition.md)
- [Image Metadata](metadata-search.md)
- [Tag Management](tag-management.md)
- [Material Library](material-library.md)
- [AI Search](ai-search.md)