Hello,
I have a lot of hard drives I use for backup, and in addition I sometimes burn files to DVD-R for archiving.

Is there an OS X application that can store a list of the contents of my drives?

What I need is a searchable table of contents for my digital life - the thousands of files that exist in various places, in many states of disarray.

My dream app would have a simple iTunes-like sidebar. Clicking on a drive or disc name would bring up the table of contents in the main window. You could then search across all table of contents from the upper-righthand search box.

It may sound like I'm talking about FileMaker Pro or some kind of database program- but what I really need is something that can take a snapshot of the contents of my backup drives with one click. Then I could eject the drive, and that snapshot remains, fully searchable. (Obviously what I'm talking about is far beyond Apple's Shift+Apple+4 screenshot command.)

You might also think I'm looking for something like Time Machine, which will be a part of Leopard. But what I need is a program that can handle the myriad backup DVD-Rs and hard drives that I have stacked in my closet. Moving forward, I may come to rely on Time Machine but how many times have you archived an iTunes show to conserve space... and later had no idea where you put it?

Short of using Print Window to make countless pdf's of my drives, has anyone heard of a program with the functionality I described?

Thanks to all in advance!! :)

cheers,
tonyc