I wanted to share this discovery with the user community.

I've been yearning for a way to launch the search tool (search.exe) from the command line using command line switches. Browsing to files is not always a practical form of navigation, especially when waiting for large folders to load their contents.

When you launch a search from the browser it has a context (it shows your selected search, with the current folder and vault). When you launch the search.exe program, it shows the tree view on the left and asks you to select which search form, vault, and folder.

It wasn't until I dared to try a command line switch that I found the documentation...

Now I can deploy a great search tool and completely bypass the Windows Explorer browser.

Here is an example of the syntax I used. I put this in a shortcut on the desktop...

"C:\Program Files\SolidWorks Enterprise PDM\Search.exe" "/S:My Search" /HT