Would like to write a javascript that helps me to find documents in a folder

Question

I would like to write a js for an offline website (located on a local Windows server or any other server). It's supposed to look for files like PDFs in several directories and display them as search result on the "website", which isn't a real website, since it's on a local server and not in the web. The PDF is supposed to open in the browser after clicking it. I already have this kind of search engine as a php file, which I wrote with some help from friends. I also want to share this site with other friends. Basically I'll send them the whole folder with the html - document (or the .php site), so they can use it to search for certain pdfs in the folder. Its like a offline wiki for medical research documents. But I don't want them to always install php on their local servers, so they can run my php-searchmachine, thus I need to write it new as a javascript. By google and stack overflow I came across this solution https://www.codegrepper.com/code-examples/javascript/find+file+in+directory+javascript but it seems like that this needs node.js, so all have to install node.js, which is similar to installing php, I guess (im not familiar with node.js). Also I'm not sure if node.js is running on a normal client or server, which is not a webserver.

How can I start with such a project? Is javascript the correct attempt to solve this?

Answer 1

Windows Search has the ability to search PDF contents when boosted by a PDF (index) iFilter, this means the user can search and find instantly a new search word or a saved search it took only a second to hand enter this search (actually took longer to save for double click next time) just for illustration I chose a word I knew was in one file and actually found it is also in two other PDFs.

The problem for your JS coding is how to use JavaScript to interface with Windows Search since using explorer I could not run that search on a remote server shared library drive (I could see their contents as per second screen but for search, had to pull a local library copy down to my documents) and that is where your JS skills come into play. Personally I would avoid JS and use a VLC method to share view via a remote Lan server or simpler invoke a plain text indexed local copy of remote files for download as and when required.