Think And Do - Windows

Think And Do

Microsoft Windows

Cool Links	Glossary	Hardware	Online Stuff	How To's
Microsoft Windows	Microsoft Office	Microsoft Excel	Microsoft Word	Riddles & Puzzles

Clipboard	Cursor	Desktop	Files
Folders		Mouse

You hear and see the word Windows all the time, but do you know what Windows really is?

Whether you have Windows 95™, Windows 98™, Windows 2000™, Windows Vista™ you have a program which manages everything that goes on in your computer.
You can run more than one program at a time and switch back and forth between programs.
You can arrange your screen items to look any way that you want them to.
You can have sounds associated with different functions.
Windows 98™, Windows 2000™, and Windows Vista™ make your interface with the Internet look just like the work that you you’re doing at your own computer.
In short, Windows gives you the power to manage your computer and the work associated with it.

This does not mean that it's simple.
Like anything else, you need to understand the hardware and software that you're using and REALLY pay attention to what you're doing.
The media leads us to believe that we simply buy the computer, bring it home, plug it in, and AWAY YOU GO!
We've all found out that that's pretty far from reality.

Here's reality:
You are working carefully and trying to learn how to navigate Windows.
Then an error message appears or a dialog box pops up and you are asked a question that has no meaning for you whatsoever!

Now What?
Before you start to run into trouble, Think and Do.

What Is A Window?
Every program, or application, that you open, is displayed in a window.
Title Bar	Topmost bar of the window - contains the name of the program, and, where applicable, the name of the current document.
Menu Bar	Beneath the TITLE BAR - contains WORDS ONLY
Toolbars	Beneath the MENU BAR - contain ICONS
Workspace	Large white area on the screen - the space to create your document, spreadsheet, drawing or whatever. The most common thing for people to forget is the MENU BAR.
Before investigating anything, remember one important fact: Microsoft is trying to simulate a Real Desk environment. Hence, what you see on your screen is called your DESKTOP. Sitting at your computer and looking at your screen, you most likely see clouds if your computer is brand new. You can also see little pictures with captions underneath them. The pictures and captions together are called Objects.
Objects	Pictures with captions underneath them
Icons	Actual picture
Labels	Words beneath (captions) the ICONS
Note that these OBJECTS on your Windows™ desktop can be moved or changed, just as you would on your real desk. In addition, more objects can be added at any time.
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The Windows Clipboard

We use the clipboard all the time, not exactly realizing what we're doing. So here's some info on what the clipboard is and why it is so powerful.

The clipboard is a place to store information. Very simple concept.
Windows does not, in fact, care what information is stored there, whether it's text or graphics, big or small, a lot or a little.
You can store the Declaration of Independence there as long as you have enough memory to hold it.
You can also store just one little character there.
Using CUT or COPY, you can place an image there, or a scanned picture, virtually anything.

Now the information, whatever it is, is in the clipboard.
You use the PASTE button to retrieve it and insert it into whatever application you're working in.
So, if you've taken a great picture and scanned it, you can select the picture and Click COPY, then go to your word processor and click PASTE.
Voila! The picture is in your word processor.

Another Example: Let's say that you write a letter.
You write it, including the information on the top, indicating where you'll send it.
You print it and send it. But, you just love one of the paragraphs in the letter and you want to re-use that paragraph.
Do you have to type it over again? No way! You just SELECT the paragraph from the original letter, click COPY,
go to your second letter, click where you want the paragraph to appear, and click PASTE.

The object on the screen that responds to the movement of your mouse. It has many appearances, each specific to what you are doing at the time.

It normally appears as a white arrow which is pointing toward 11:00. As you move the mouse on the desk, the cursor moves on the desktop. Position the cursor over one of the ICONS (not the label) on the desktop. Hold down the left mouse button. Move the mouse a little and watch the object on the desktop move. When you release the mouse button, the object stays in its new destination.

What if it doesn't? What if it pops right back to where it was in the first place?

Now is the time to use your RIGHT mouse button. The objects on your desktop can be moved around, or, you can "lock" them into one place. Move your mouse to an empty spot on the desktop.

Click the RIGHT mouse button.
Now you see a Drop Down Menu. The first item on this menu is ARRANGE ICONS and it has a small arrowhead next to it. Move your mouse so that ARRANGE ICONS is highlighted in blue with white lettering.
You now see a series of options: NAME, TYPE, SIZE, DATE, AUTO ARRANGE.

If your original object that you dragged bounced to its original spot, AUTO ARRANGE has a checkmark next to it. When this occurs, the system will automatically lay out your objects in columns down the left side of the desktop.

Slide the mouse down so that AUTO ARRANGE is now highlighted.
Now CLICK with the LEFT MOUSE BUTTON. The DROP DOWN MENU will disappear. What has happened is this: you have un-checked AUTO ARRANGE.

Now you are in control of where your objects are placed, and you can drag them all over the desktop..

I-Beam Cursor	In effect whenever you are TYPING. It looks like an uppercase I.
Sizing Arrows	Double-headed arrows, ready to re-size an object. The direction of the arrows is important. It indicates the direction that you will be sizing. When the arrows are pointed up and down, you are sizing up and down, meaning, you are sizing along the top or bottom edge of the object. When the arrows are pointed left and right, you are sizing left and right, meaning, you are sizing along the left or right edge of the object. When the arrows are pointed diagonally, you are sizing diagonally, meaning, you are sizing along the corner of the object. There are two main types of sizing arrows - for windows and graphics objects, and for rows and columns For graphics objects, the arrow is a SINGLE-LINE, DOUBLE-HEADED ARROW. You operate it like a window shade, holding down the LEFT MOUSE BUTTON. Wherever your cursor is, that is the movable side. The opposite side is stationary.
Cursor At Any Edge	Alters the HEIGHT (if the cursor is at the top or bottom) or the WIDTH (if the cursor is at either side).
Cursor At Any Corner	Alters both the HEIGHT AND the WIDTH of the object from that particular corner.
Row & Column Sizing Cursors	These look like plus signs with arrowheads at either the horizontal or vertical lines. You see these everywhere - in Excel, in Access, in your Explorer windows, in your mail windows. These appear when you move the cursor to a DIVIDER BETWEEN COLUMNS OR ROWS. When you hold down the LEFT MOUSE BUTTON, you can drag either the column or row to whatever size you want. For columns, DOUBLE-CLICK the LEFT MOUSE BUTTON to have the system automatically size it to accommodate the longest item.
Thin Plus Sign +	PLACES graphic objects wherever you click. For example, if you wish to draw a circle, you click on the circle tool, move your mouse to the white space where you want the circle to be, hold the left mouse button, and drag to draw a circle.
Thin Plus Sign +	PLACES graphic objects wherever you click. For example, if you wish to draw a circle, you click on the circle tool, move your mouse to the white space where you want the circle to be, hold the left mouse button, and drag to draw a circle.
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The Windows Desktop
Here is my current Windows Desktop. I change it pretty frequently. Note: This is NOT my screen saver! The screen saver is the moving picture that appears on your screen after a period of time that you have been idle.

Gray strip at the bottom of your screen. On the left end you will find the START button; on the right, you will most likely find at least the current time, and the icon of the speaker. The TASKBAR is the point from which all your programs can be launched. Clicking the START BUTTON activates the START MENU which contains a list of items from which to choose. Some of those items have a small arrowhead next to them; this indicates that, when they are chosen, another menu will appear on the screen. These are SUB-MENUS, and each contains different program options to choose from.

A file is a place where information is stored. That's it. There are two main types of information: Programs and Data. Think of the Programs as the Verbs of your system, and the Data as the Nouns. So Word is a file, just like your Word document is a file. One is a Program (Microsoft Word), and the other is Data (Word document).

How are files named?
When you click the Save button, whatever program you are working in will ask you to name your file. If you are working in Word, the default name is Doc1; in Excel, it's Book1. If didn't choose a name, those are the Default names that the system would use. The next time that you saved a file, it would be named Doc2 or Book2, etcetera. They're great names, but, after a while, it's going to be rather difficult to know what Doc22 is, what Doc147 is, etc. So we give our files names that are meaningful to us. Names like 1999Expenses, LetterToMom, FinancialPlan, etcetera.

Take a look at the names that I've made up above. It's a good idea to develop a naming convention for yourself, and here's some tips:

DON'T USE ALL UPPERCASE - IT'S HARD TO READ AND PEOPLE HAVE THE FEELING THAT YOU ARE SHOUTING
Don't use spaces in a filename. If the filename is more than one word long, omit all of the spaces and make the first letter of each word uppercase, like LetterToMom. It's the easiest way to read it.
If you like using dates as part of your filename, put the year first. This way, all of your files for a particular year will sort together.

Let's take LetterToMom again. That's NOT the entire name of the file.
If it was created using Word, it's full name is LetterToMom.doc.
Notice the .doc at the end? That is called the File Extension. It is the way that Windows identifies the type of file that it is dealing with.

Okay for that. When you click Save As in your application, you select the same of the file and type it into the File Name box. But what it's location?

That's where Folders come in. Once again, the Windows system will save your files in a default location, if you don't specify your own. Windows applications will save your file in the My Documents folder. That's fine for the beginning. But, as time passes, you'll discover that you have many, many files. My Documents just won't be specific enough. That's where the Folders come in. You create Folders depending upon your requirements. And remember, you don't have to stick to the folder names that you've created. If you find that the name is not explicit enough, you can Rename the folder. What If You Just Can't Find Your File?

That's where Windows Find feature comes in. Find does exactly that. It finds files or folders based upon criteria that you set. For example, if I don't know where LetterToMom is, I can ask Windows Find to find it for me.
Here's How:

Click Start/Find. A drop-down box will be displayed.
The first option is Files or Folders. Click that. A dialog box is displayed and it is shown below.

Note that there are three tabs in the body of the window, just below the Menu Bar.
The first tab shows Name & Location, and contains 3 drop-down boxes below.

If you know the name of your file, type it into the window next to Named:.

But what if you forgot the whole name? All that you can remember is that it had something to do with Mom. Now what?

The Wildcard The Wildcard is an asterisk (*) - a special character that helps you look for files. Let's call it a Placeholder. Here's how it works:

mom* will find all files that start with mom and end with anything
*mom will find all files that start with anything and end with mom
*mom* will find all files that start with anything, contain mom, and end with anything

In the LetterToMom example, since I can't remember anything but the fact that the title contains the word mom, I would type *mom*.

Folders in Windows, like real manila folders, are places that we use to store files.
Windows comes with a folder called My Documents, and we can use that forever if we wish.
However, we know that, as time goes by, there will be so many files that if we store them all in My Documents, it will become difficult to find any particular file.
So we use Folders. The folders allow us to get organized and keep our files in logical places that are easy to find and recognize.

Think of your mouse as an extension of your hand. Don’t clutch it - you’ll get tired quickly. Let your fingers rest on the mouse - pay attention and see to it that they really are resting, so that you can simply drop down a finger on either the left or right mouse button.
Left Button - this is the button that you will use most frequently - it is for picking up, moving, and putting down objects.
Right Button - this has one function - to activate a drop-down menu.
With your hand resting gently on the mouse, gently drag the mouse around on your real desk.
Be sure to read the section on cursors to be sure that you know what they all look like.

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