As anyone who’s looked at Mac OS X lately knows, one of the major new features in 10.4 is Spotlight, which allows you to search files on your computer based on specific bits of metadata. The great thing about Spotlight is that it goes beyond the traditional filename, changed date search and allows you to search for things like Creator, Contents, Type, etc. It also provides a way for 3rd party developers to create code which adds file types and attributes to the system.

So you’re saying to yourself, “gee, I have tons of music on my computer, but what songs are CC licensed? I wish I knew.” We can help you with that. The CC Spotlight Importer is an importer which adds CC license URLs to the list of indexable metadata. While this is an early release, it includes a simple Smart Folder which does just that.

Future versions will include the ability to search on specific license attributes, and support for more file types. Got an idea for improving it? Just drop me a line (nathan@creativecommons.org). Enjoy!