Need a program that can compile lots of word and image files into one for easy searching

Hi,

Just wanted to put this up to ask if anyone know of a program where in I can copy paste a lot of formatted word files and images in just one file with the key goal of faster searching of text.

It may be an offline software solution like PDFs and CHMs or a content management system (CMS) but I would prefer the former type as it would more portable.

the data:
Its really a lot of data... a court case. a lot of transcripts and affidavits, etc. which I have no clue in since I don't do law; its just that I'm doing this for my uncle. This data came from an old hardcopy of the whole case in which a 400MB combined word and image files was actually typed/scanned.

What I have tried:
- CHM - tried HelpScribble but it was very limited and I had to manually define indexes.
- PDF - similar to CHM; but placing 250MB worth of images into one pdf file could have a drastic tax on any computer...

Might anyone know of a possible solution or provide a technology which I can try to research on o solve my needs.

Right now if I can't find anything; then I might end up just creating a CMS or an offline forum with good index searching.

 

Check out this post; http://forum.notebookreview.com/win...-ever-growing-free-windows-software-list.html

It may not have what you are after, but worth a look. Making an offline forum seems like a good idea too; and probably the best IMO.

 

Microsoft One Note

 

Sounds like you need a free-form database. I use Ultra Recall from Kinook Software.

 

Oh yeah, I didn't think of database software... If you have MS Office, try out OneNote or even Access.

As said above, Ultra Recall, that looks really nice, actually, more then really nice. Give it a go. Ultra Recall - Personal information manager and knowledge organizer for Windows

 

This will not help with the pictures, but a grep program can search through many files with text.

So, for example, download wingrep, place all word files in one folder, then tell wingrep to search for whichever expression (word, phrase) you want. It will search the entire folder very quickly.

 

depends on how the user wants to tag their images. just about every reasonable image format has a variant with exif tags. populate those tag fields and they can be indexed/searched.

 

Thanks; I've tried an offline forum; I used a portable xampp web server. It took me 2 hours to set things up. Everything was easy C&Ps word content into the posts using the WYSIWYG editor conserving the format automatically.

Everything was going great until I encountered a major blockage: the forum did not support an ordered list within an ordered list, and so on.

I will try out ultra recall now. it looks very promising.

As for the pictures; only the titles are needed (pictures are scanned copies of balance sheets, etc.). This is the hardest part for me as I will be typing out all the titles one by one.