deanishe

You need to install Homebrew: https://brew.sh/

FWIW, Alfred uses the same index as Spotlight.

Install the workflow, add some searches, and then look at the configuration files created in the searches subdirectory of the data directory. I can't give you a more real-world example than that.

Not exactly. Engines (in the workflow's terminology) are collections of searches ("variants"), typically different regional/language versions for a single site. You could also use engines to group searches by topic. The configuration files for the individual searches you add to the workflow are in the searches directory in the workflow’s data folder. If you add a new engine, it shows up in the workflow’s settings (from where you can add/remove searches). If you add a new search configuration, a new Script Filter will be created for it next time you run searchio > Reload.

As soon as you introduce prefixes, it makes having this built in to Alfred a rather moot point. In that case, you can use a workflow and make it behave exactly the way you want.

@chris Have you looked at Searchio!? It's basically what you're describing, only it's for providing search suggestions from different search engines, not just generating search URLs. It's fairly simple to add custom search engines or specific searches, including your own icons. It doesn't do what you're trying to do, but it's probably worth looking at because it covers all three of your bullet points.

You have to set the workflow up to use it. Add some searches with searchio > All Engines ….

Where did you add the text? Titles/names and keywords, AFAIK.

No it wouldn't. Getting results for a single autosuggest endpoint is trivial.

Why do you think other people would want to install all of them? No. A URL needs to be under ~2000 characters to work reliably across browsers. If icons and batch import are important to you, then you can add them directly to the Alfred.alfredpreferences bundle.

Please don't try to generate JSON by smushing strings together. It never works. As you noted, Alfred does accept invalid JSON (trailing commas aren't actually allowed), but it's only so lenient. Use a language that has proper JSON support.

If the troubleshooting passed, it's likely that you haven't configured Alfred correctly or are using the wrong search. Please describe exactly how you're searching for files.

Long-press on the title (with a touchpad). Don't know about a mouse. Double-click?

Are you not using a real JSON library to generate the JSON? If not, you should, or the workflow is buggy.

I was pointing out that your thread title and post talk about File Filters, but it appears that you actually mean List Filters (that's what your screenshot is of).