1. A computerized method of locating and opening a file on a computer, said computer including an index containing metadata representative of one or more files stored on the computer or on an external source, said metadata identifying a type associated with each of the one or more files, said method comprising: initiating a current application on the computer; initiating a desktop search application on the computer, said initiating the desktop search application comprising: displaying a persistent first user interface (UI) element to a user of the computer in an operating system shell of an operating system of the computer, said first UI element including a search field for receiving a user-entered dynamically modifiable search term, said search term comprising one or more characters representative of a file to be opened on the computer, said search term being dynamically modifiable as the user enters additional characters; defining a scope of the index as a function of a context of the current application of the user without receiving user selection of the context, wherein the current application is not the desktop search application; in response to the received dynamically modifiable search term, dynamically searching the defined scope of the index based on the dynamically modified search term; generating search results in response to the searching and the determining based on the dynamically modified search term, said generated search results having a plurality of files having a plurality of types; dynamically filtering the generated search results according to each type of file listed in the search results; and displaying a second UI element associated with the first UI element, said second UI element including a window for displaying the filtered search results based on the context, said second UI receiving user input to select the file to be opened from the search results, and wherein said computer is responsive to user input via the second UI element for opening the selected file.