Windows XP Professional: The Missing Manual

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Microsoft Windows XP is the latest and, technically speaking, the best version of the most-used software in the world. If you recently bought a new PC, Windows XP probably came preinstalled. If you already own a computer (running Windows 98, Me, or 2000, for example), you can buy Windows XP separately to upgrade your machine (see Appendix A).

No matter how you get it on your PC, however, you'll be spending a lot of time with Windows XP. It's your computer's face; it's the first thing that greets you when you turn on your machine, and the last thing you see before it blinks off.

Windows is an operating system, the software that controls your computer. It's designed to serve you in several ways:

It's a launching bay. At its heart, Windows is a home base, a remote-control clicker that lets you call up the various software programs (applications) you use to do work or kill time. When you get right down to it, applications are the real reason you bought a PC.

Windows XP is a well-stocked software pantry unto itself; for example, it comes with such basic programs as a Web browser, email program, simple word processor, and calculator. Windows XP comes with eleven games, too, several of which you can play live against other people on the Internet. (Chapter 7 covers all of these freebie programs.)

If you were stranded on a desert island, the built-in Windows XP programs could suffice for everyday operations. But if you're like most people, sooner or later, you'll buy and install more software. That's one of the luxuries of using Windows: You can choose from a staggering number of add-on programs. Whether you're a left-handed beekeeper or a German-speaking nun, some company somewhere is selling Windows software designed just for you, its target audience.
It's a file cabinet. Every application on your machine, as well as every document you create, is represented on the screen by an

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Windows is an operating system, the software that controls your computer. It's designed to serve you in several ways:

It's a launching bay. At its heart, Windows is a home base, a remote-control clicker that lets you call up the various software programs (applications) you use to do work or kill time. When you get right down to it, applications are the real reason you bought a PC.

Windows XP is a well-stocked software pantry unto itself; for example, it comes with such basic programs as a Web browser, email program, simple word processor, and calculator. Windows XP comes with eleven games, too, several of which you can play live against other people on the Internet. (Chapter 7 covers all of these freebie programs.)

If you were stranded on a desert island, the built-in Windows XP programs could suffice for everyday operations. But if you're like most people, sooner or later, you'll buy and install more software. That's one of the luxuries of using Windows: You can choose from a staggering number of add-on programs. Whether you're a left-handed beekeeper or a German-speaking nun, some company somewhere is selling Windows software designed just for you, its target audience.
It's a file cabinet. Every application on your machine, as well as every document you create, is represented on the screen by an icon (see Figure 1-1). You can organize these icons into little onscreen file folders. You can make backups (safety copies) by dragging file icons onto a floppy disk or blank CD, or send them to people by email. You can also trash icons you no longer need by dragging them onto the Recycle Bin icon.

Figure 1-1: Your Windows world revolves around icons, the tiny pictures that represent your programs, documents, and various Windows components. From left to right: the icons for your computer itself, a word processing document, a digital photo (a JPEG document), a word processor

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

To get the most out of Windows with the least frustration, it helps to become familiar with the following concepts and terms. You'll encounter these words and phrases over and over again—in the built-in Windows help, in computer magazines, and in this book.

One of the most important features of Windows isn't on the screen—it's under your hand. The standard mouse has two mouse buttons. You use the left one to click buttons, highlight text, and drag things around on the screen.

When you click the right button, however, a shortcut menu appears onscreen, like the ones shown in Figure 1-2. Get into the habit of right-clicking things—icons, folders, disks, text in your word processor, buttons on your menu bar, pictures on a Web page, and so on. The commands that appear on the shortcut menu will make you much more productive and lead you to discover handy functions you never knew existed.

Figure 1-2: Shortcut menus (sometimes called context menus) sometimes list commands that aren't in the menus at the top of the window. Here, for example, are the commands that appear when you right-click a folder (left) and some highlighted text in a word processor (right). Once the shortcut menu has appeared, left-click the command you want.

This is a big deal: Microsoft's research suggests that nearly 75 percent of Windows users don't use the right mouse button, and therefore miss hundreds of timesaving shortcuts. Part of the rationale behind Windows XP's redesign is putting these functions out in the open. Even so, many more shortcuts remain hidden under your right mouse button.

Microsoft doesn't discriminate against left-handers…much. You can swap the functions of the right and left mouse buttons easily enough.

In the Control Panel window (Chapter 9), open the Mouse icon. When the Mouse Properties dialog box opens, click the Buttons tab, and turn on the "Switch primary and secondary buttons" checkbox. Then click OK. Windows now assumes that you want to use the

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Windows XP is the most dramatic Windows overhaul since the introduction of Windows 95. As noted in the Introduction, Microsoft's goal in creating XP was gigantic: It wanted to merge its home line (the friendly but cranky Windows 95, 98, and Me) with its corporate line (the unattractive but rock-solid Windows NT and 2000) into a single, unified operating system that offers the best of both.

But this flowing of two streams into a single mighty river is only the beginning. Some of the following features will seem new only if you're used to Windows 2000, and others only if you're coming from, say, Windows Me. The rest of this section is an overview of the other goodies Windows XP offers.

The biggest news in Windows XP is that it's based on Windows 2000. Its features, including protected memory (if one program crashes, it isn't allowed to poison the well of memory that other programs use) and strong network security features, give you vastly improved stability. In fact, it's possible to go for weeks without having to restart a crashed PC (as opposed to days or, well, minutes with Windows Me). That's not to say that individual programs don't still bomb now and then—they do—but they no longer take down your whole computer.

Here's what else Microsoft has done to make your PC more stable:

System File Protection. Before Windows XP (and Me), the installer for some new piece of software might have replaced some important Windows file with an older version, resulting in instability or crashes. When an installer tries to do that in Windows XP, it gets the door slammed in its face.

Of course, if its installer is unable to replace the component it wants to replace, your new software might not run. However, thanks to System File Protection, you'll at least be no worse off than before you performed the installation.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

It's mostly true that there's really just one Windows XP. The Professional and Home editions look alike, generally work alike, and are based on the same multigigabyte glob of software code.

But as with a pizza, insurance policy, or Toyota Camry, you can pay a little more to get a few extras tacked on. Buying the Professional Edition equips you with these goodies. Many of them are interesting primarily only to professional corporate network nerds, to be sure, but all are described in this book:

Remote Desktop. If your XP Pro machine has a permanent Internet connection (like a cable modem or DSL), you can connect to it from any other Windows machine via the Internet (or office network). You can see what's on its screen and manipulate what you find there—a great feature when you're traveling with a laptop.
Corporate domain membership. XP Pro computers can be part of a domain—a group of networked computers, usually in big corporations (Chapter 19), that system administrators can maintain as a unit. Computers running the Home Edition can't join a domain and aren't affected by the changes the administrator makes to the domain settings.
Administrative shares. Windows XP Pro creates several shared folders for use by administrators and operating system services that manage the computer environment on the network. For security reasons, and to limit problems like somebody deleting essential files, XP Pro doesn't give everyday employees access to these folders.
Remote Installation Service (RIS). RIS is a technical process that helps administrators install operating systems and software via the network without having to physically visit the computer.
Acknowledgment of high-horsepower chips

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Despite all of the improvements, Windows XP doesn't come without its share of controversy. Let us count the ways in which the new operating system has raised eyebrows and hackles.

Windows XP marks the first time Microsoft has ever copy-protected Windows, meaning you can't install Windows XP on more than one PC from the same CD. (Technically, the CDs are all identical. What you really can't use more than once is your serial number.) If you have a desktop PC as well as a laptop, you have to buy Windows XP twice, and Microsoft will give you only a 10 percent discount on the second copy. If you make the attempt, the second PC refuses to operate after 30 days.

How does it know that you're being naughty? When you first install Windows XP, the operating system inspects ten crucial components inside your PC: the hard drive, motherboard, video card, memory, and so on. All this information is transmitted, along with the 25-character serial number on the back of your Windows XP CD (the Product Key), to Microsoft's database via your Internet account. The process takes about two seconds, and involves little more than clicking an OK button. You have just activated Windows XP.

If you don't have an Internet connection, activation is a much more grueling procedure. You have to call a toll-free number, read a 50-digit identification number to the Microsoft agent, and then type a 42-digit confirmation number into your software. Do whatever it takes to avoid having to endure this fingertip-numbing ritual.

Later, if you try to install the same copy of Windows XP onto a different computer, Windows XP will check in with Microsoft and discover that the new machine's components aren't the same. It will conclude that you have tried to install the same copy of the operating system onto a different machine—and it will lock you out.

This aspect of Windows XP has frightened or enraged many a computer fan. In truth, though, it isn't quite as bad as it seems. Here's why:

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

When you turn on a Windows XP Pro computer for the first time, you may think that you're simply seeing the traditional Windows startup process as redesigned by a West Coast graphic designer. If it's a new computer, you may also receive a big hello from the company that sold it to you.

If you've just performed a clean installation of Windows XP (Section A.5.2), or if it's a brand-new PC, you may now be treated to a series of blue "Welcome to Microsoft Windows" setup screens. This Setup Wizard guides you through setting up an Internet account, activating your copy of Windows (Section 1.5.1), setting up accounts for different people who will be sharing this computer (Section 17.1), and so on. Appendix A has a complete description of this process.

What happens next in the startup process depends on which of XP Pro's two "personalities" you're seeing, which is determined by what kind of network you're connected to.

Eager though you may be to dive in, taking a minute to learn the difference is essential if you hope to understand what appears on screen when you log in and why it may not match the examples you see online and in magazines and books.

Unlike Windows XP Home Edition, which was designed primarily for individuals to use, well, at home, Windows XP Pro serves two masters. Although it works very well for home PCs, it's also designed to thrive in massively networked corporations.

As a result, Windows XP Pro has two distinct personalities, each of which presents different features, a different logon sequence, and different levels of security. What you get when you log in depends on what kind of network your PC is connected to:

A domain network is a group of computers and other network gear that's centrally maintained by an administrator, thanks to a special, master computer called a

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

What happens next in the startup process depends on which of XP Pro's two "personalities" you're seeing, which is determined by what kind of network you're connected to.

Eager though you may be to dive in, taking a minute to learn the difference is essential if you hope to understand what appears on screen when you log in and why it may not match the examples you see online and in magazines and books.

Unlike Windows XP Home Edition, which was designed primarily for individuals to use, well, at home, Windows XP Pro serves two masters. Although it works very well for home PCs, it's also designed to thrive in massively networked corporations.

As a result, Windows XP Pro has two distinct personalities, each of which presents different features, a different logon sequence, and different levels of security. What you get when you log in depends on what kind of network your PC is connected to:

A domain network is a group of computers and other network gear that's centrally maintained by an administrator, thanks to a special, master computer called a domain controller. That highly paid professional can set up and troubleshoot all files and security settings on all domain PCs without having to visit each one in person.

You, the employee, can generally sit down at any computer in the domain and log on with your user name and password. At that point, you find the same files, folders, and disks available to you as you did at your own computer. For more information on domains, see Chapter 19.
A workgroup is the kind of network in most homes and small offices: a small cluster of machines connected via network cables or wireless cards, as described in Chapter 18. Instead of enjoying central administration, as in a domain, you have to configure all settings for accounts and shared folders independently on each computer. If you have five PCs, and you'd like to be able to access all of their files from across the network, you must set up an account for yourself (a name and password) five times. (Clearly, workgroups get to be a real hassle as they grow larger than about ten machines.)

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Once you're past the heart-pounding excitement of the new startup logo and the Setup Wizard, you reach the digital vista shown in Figure 2-3. It's the Windows desktop, now graced by a pastoral sunny hillside that should look familiar to anyone who has ever watched "Teletubbies."

Figure 2-3: Everything you'll ever do on the computer begins with a click on one of these three elements: a desktop icon, the Start button (which opens the Start menu), or the taskbar, which is described in Chapter 3. (The Start menu, now in a new, improved two-column format, lists every significant command and software component on your PC.) Some people enjoy the newly streamlined Windows XP desktop. Others deliberately place additional icons on the desktop—things like favorite programs and documents—for quicker access. Let your personality be your guide.

On a fresh installation of Windows XP, you may be surprised to discover that Microsoft has gone cleanliness-crazy. A new installation of Windows XP on a new computer presents an absolutely spotless desktop, utterly icon-free except for the Recycle Bin. Even the familiar My Computer, My Documents, and My Network Places icons seem to be missing. (If you've upgraded from an older version of Windows, you'll still see your old icons on the desktop. Furthermore, the company who sold you your PC may have stocked the desktop with a few of its own icons—but you get the point.)

Those former desktop icons are now in your Start menu, which appear when you click the Start button in the lower-left corner of your screen (Figure 2-3). The following pages cover the Start menu in detail.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Windows XP is composed of 40 million lines of computer code, scattered across your hard drive in thousands of files. The vast majority of them are support files, there for behind-the-scenes use by Windows and your applications. They're not for you. They may as well bear a sticker saying, "No user serviceable parts inside."

That's why the Start menu is so important. It lists every useful piece of software on your computer, including commands, programs, and files. You can use the Start menu to open your applications, install new software, configure hardware, get help, find files, and much more.

When you click the Start button at the lower-left corner of your screen, the Start menu pops open, shooting upward. Its contents depend on which options you (or your computer's manufacturer) have put there; Figure 2-4 illustrates an example. The new, multi-column structure of the Start menu is one of the most radical developments in Windows XP.

Figure 2-4: Left: In Windows XP, the Start menu is divided into several distinct sections. The top left section is yours to play with. You can "pin" whatever programs you want here, in whatever order you like. The lower-left section lists the programs you use most often, according to Windows XP's calculations. (You can delete individual items here but you can't add items manually or rearrange them.) The right-side column provides direct access to certain Windows features and standard Windows programs. Right: The All Programs menu superimposes itself on the standard two-column Start menu, listing almost every piece of software you've ever installed. You can rearrange, add to, or delete items from this list.

The new Start menu is divided into four chunks. One area, the pinned items list, lists programs you use every day and is yours to modify. Another, the most frequently used programs list, lists programs you use often and is computed automatically by Windows. The final two sections list Windows features and standard Windows programs. Figure 2-4 describes the function of each section.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

This command is at the heart of Windows XP's accounts feature, in which each person who uses this PC gets to see his own desktop picture, email account, files, and so on (see Chapter 17). When you're logged into a network domain this is one of the most important features of all. You should log off your computer any time you walk away from it, especially if your computer stores confidential information. If this is a home computer and it doesn't store confidential information you can safely ignore this option forever.

Choosing this command may present either of two dialog boxes, depending on whether your computer is logged into a network domain, or whether or not you log on to a standalone or workgroup computer that has the Windows XP feature called Fast User Switching turned on.

You cannot use Fast User Switching on a computer that logs on to a network domain.

Immediate log off. If you see the dialog box shown at bottom in Figure 2-5, two possibilities exist. The first is that you're logged into a network domain. When you click Log Off (or press Enter), Windows closes all open programs and then presents the classic Welcome to Windows dialog box so that the next person can log on.

Figure 2-5: Top: On workgroup computers, if Fast User Switching is turned on, this is what you see when you choose Start→Log Off. No matter which button you click, you return to the Welcome screen. The only difference is that clicking the Switch User button leaves all of your programs open and in memory, and the Log Off button takes a few moments to close them. Bottom: On domain-network computers (or any computer where Fast User Switching is turned off), a dialog box like this appears when you choose Start→Log Off. If you click the Log Off button, Windows quits your programs and then takes you to the Classic Logon dialog box.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

In Windows XP Pro, this menu item is more powerful than its name implies. Choosing it opens a dialog box that offers several variations on "shut down" (see Figure 2-6).

Standby puts your computer to "sleep." This special state of PC consciousness reduces the amount of electricity the computer uses. It remains in suspended animation until you use the mouse or keyboard to begin working again. (This feature is available only if your computer offers it and you've turned it on in the Power Options program in the Control Panel.)

How the PC sleeps depends on its power-saving features. Usually, the hard drive stops spinning and the screen goes dark. Whatever programs or documents you were working on remain in memory.

This information is stored only in memory, not on your hard drive. If your computer loses power, you lose all of the information that was stored in memory. To be absolutely safe, save your open documents before putting the PC in Standby.

If you're using a laptop on battery power, Standby is a real boon. When the flight attendant hands over your microwaved chicken teriyaki, you can take a food break without closing all your programs or shutting down the computer. And best of all, Standby mode consumes only the barest trickle of battery power.

Use Standby when you want to put your computer to sleep on cue. It's worth noting, however, that you can set the computer to stand by automatically whenever you haven't used the mouse or keyboard for a while. You can even make it so that the computer won't wake up again unless you type in a certain password. Section 9.16 has the details on these extra features.
Shut down quits all open programs (or, in some cases, prompts you to do so), offers you the opportunity to save any unsaved documents, and then exits Windows. Most modern PCs then turn off automatically.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

For most people, the Start→All Programs command is the most important function of the Start menu. It's the master list of every program on your computer. (The installer for any new program generally installs its own name in this menu; see Figure 2-7.) You can jump directly to your word processor, calendar, or favorite game, for example, just by choosing its name from the Start→All Programs menu.

Figure 2-7: The Start→All Programs menu may list the actual application (such as Microsoft Word) that you can click to launch the program. But it may also list a program group, a submenu that lists everything in a particular application folder. Some software programs install a folder on the All Programs menu, like the Office Tools folder shown here, that contains commands for launching the software, uninstalling the software, running specific utilities, opening the help files, and so on.

When the Start menu is open, you can open the All Programs menu in a number of ways: by clicking the All Programs menu, by pointing to it and keeping the mouse still for a moment, or by pressing the P and then the right-arrow keys on your keyboard.

Speaking of keyboard fanaticism: Once the programs list is open, you can also choose anything in it without involving the mouse. Just type the first letter of a program's name—or press the up and down arrow keys—to highlight the name of the program you want. Then press Enter to seal the deal.

Clearly, the graphic designers were on vacation the day Microsoft came up with this one. The All Programs menu appears superimposed on the regular Start menu, adding a third column in a second layer—not the most elegant visual solution, to be sure, but at least easy to find.

The Start→All Programs menu also lists the Startup folder, which contains programs that load automatically every time you start Windows XP. This can be a very useful feature; if you check your email every morning, you may as well save yourself a few mouse clicks by putting your email program into the Startup folder. If you spend all day long word processing, you may as well put Microsoft Word or WordPerfect in there.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Use the Run menu item to get to a command line, as shown in Figure 2-9. A command line is a text-based method of performing a task. You type a command, click OK, and something happens as a result.

Figure 2-9: Top: The last Run command you entered appears automatically in the Open text box. You can use the drop-down list to see a list of commands you've previously entered. Bottom: The Run command knows the names of all of your folders and also remembers the last few commands you typed here. As you go, you're shown the best match for the characters you're typing. When the name of the folder you're trying to open appears in the list, click it to save having to type the rest of the entry.

Working at the command line is becoming a lost art in the world of Windows, because most people prefer to issue commands by choosing from menus using the mouse. However, some old-timers still love the command line, and even mouse-lovers encounter situations where a typed command is the only way to do something.

If you're an old-time PC veteran, your head probably teems with neat Run commands you've picked up over the years. If you're new to this idea, however, the following are a few of the useful and timesaving functions you can perform with the Run dialog box.

As noted later in this discussion, one of the most important Start menu commands is the All Programs menu, where you'll find the name of almost every application on your computer. You can open any of these programs one at a time by typing its program file name in the Open text box and then pressing Enter. That's an extremely useful shortcut for both pros and novices alike, because it's frequently faster to launch a program this way than to use the Start→All Programs menu.

Unfortunately, the program file name isn't the same as its plain-English name; it's a cryptic, abbreviated version. For example, if you want to open Microsoft Word, you must type

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

The humble Search command looks no more special than anything else on the Start menu. In Windows XP, however, it's a newly revised powerhouse that's far more complex to navigate. Microsoft has even given it a new name—Search Companion. You'll probably use it often.

The Search function can quickly find all kinds of computer-ish things: file and folder icons, computers on your network, Web sites, email addresses, and phone numbers.

If you save your files exclusively into the My Documents folder (Section 2.15), you'll have little need to use the Search function to locate your files. You'll always know where they are: right there in that folder.

Every now and then, however, you won't remember where you filed something, or you'll download something from the Internet and not be able to find it again, or you'll install something and not know where to look for it. In those situations, the Search command is just what you need (Figure 2-11). It lets you look for a particular file or folder based on its description—by its name, size, date stamp, and so on.

Figure 2-11: Left: The basic Search panel. You might expect that Microsoft had learned its lesson about cute anthropomorphic cartoon characters. Microsoft Bob and Clippy the paper clip, for example, have both gone to the great CompUSA in the sky. But Microsoft is at it again, now with Rover, the search-companion dog. He wags and sometimes even barks as you perform your search. Right: If you click the desktop itself and then press F3, or if you click the "More advanced search options" checkbox that occasionally appears, the Search panel may look slightly different, as shown here.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Choosing Start→Help and Support opens the new, improved Windows Help and Support Center window, which is described in Chapter 5.

The My Computer window at home and the My Computer window on my PC at work don't look alike. What's up with that?

The difference is that your PC at work is probably on a network domain, and the one at home belongs to a smaller, less formal workgroup network (see Section 2.1.1 for details on these differences). As you'll discover over and over again, the Windows XP Pro experience is slightly different depending on which kind of network you're on.

On a computer that's part of a domain, you see only two sections: "Hard Disk Drives" and "Devices with Removable Storage" (as shown at top in Figure 2-21).

Figure 2-21: The My Computer window is divided into two sections on a computer that's a member of a network domain, and three sections on a computer that's a member of a workgroup. Top: The screen you see when your computer joins a network domain. At the top of the screen comes a list of hard drives, followed by a list of removable-disk drives. This computer has one floppy drive, two hard drives (or one partitioned hard drive, as described in Appendix A), and one CD-ROM drive. (If there's a disk in the CD-ROM drive, you get to see its name, not just its drive letter.) Bottom: If your computer is a member of a workgroup, you see an additional section at the very top of the screen, which has an icon for the My Documents folder of each person who has an account on this computer. When you select a disk icon (on either type of computer) by clicking it, the Details pane on the left side of the window displays its file system, capacity, and amount of free space.

On a workgroup PC, you get a third section, called "Files Stored on This Computer" (Figure 2-21, bottom). It lists the My Documents folders for each person who has an account on—and who has logged on to—this computer.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

This extremely important command opens an extremely important window: the Control Panel, which houses two dozen programs you'll use to change almost every important setting on your PC. It's so important, in fact, that it gets a chapter of its own (Chapter 9).

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

In previous versions of Windows, a My Network Places icon used to appear on everybody's desktop. Of course, for the millions of non-networked PC users in their home offices and bedrooms, it never made much sense. In Windows XP Professional, in fact, My Network Places appears only when your PC joins a network—and then only in the Start menu. (You can also put its icon on the desktop yourself, as described in Section 9.7.3.1.)

In any case, once it's there, choosing this command opens the My Network Places window, which displays icons for the computer, disks and folders other people on the office network have made available for rummaging. (Much more on this topic in Chapter 20.)

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

The My Computer command is the trunk lid, the doorway to every single shred of software on your machine. When you choose this command, a window opens to reveal icons that represent each disk drive in your machine, as shown in Figure 2-21. (Note to power users: Technically, My Computer displays a different icon for each hard drive partition.)

For example, by double-clicking your hard-drive icon and then the various folders on it, you can eventually see the icons for every single file and folder on your computer. (The My Computer icon no longer appears on the desktop—unless you put it there, as described in Section 9.7.3.1.)

You don't have to live with "My This, My That" as the names of the important Windows folders. You can easily rename them, as described on this page.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Clearly, Microsoft imagined that most of its Windows XP customers would be multimedia mavens, decked out with digital cameras and MP3 music players. To hammer home the point, it has stocked your My Documents folder with My Pictures and My Music folders to store digital photos and music files, respectively.

If you do indeed have a digital camera or MP3 player (and it's Windows XP–compatible), you'll probably find that whatever software came with it automatically dumps your photos into, and sucks your music files out of, these folders. You'll find much more on this topic in Chapter 8.

If you don't feel the need to stare at these folder names in your Start menu day after day, it's easy enough to get rid of them. Right-click the Start menu; from the shortcut menu, choose Properties. In that dialog box, click the Start Menu tab, click Customize, and then click the Advanced tab. Now scroll down in the Start menu items list until you see My Music or My Pictures. Click "Don't display this item," and then click OK.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

You should see the My Recent Documents menu command in your Start menu by default. If you don't, you can turn it on using the techniques described in the box below.

There's one good reason for turning on this menu: It adds to your Start menu a submenu listing the last 15 documents you've opened. Using a list of recent documents can save you time when you want to reopen something you've worked on recently, but you're not in the mood to burrow through folders to find its icon.

Note, however, that:

Documents appear on the "recently used" list only if your applications are smart enough to update it. Most modern programs (including all Microsoft programs) perform this administrative task, but not all do.
The Documents list doesn't know when you've deleted a document or moved it to another folder or disk; it continues to list the file even after it's gone. In that event, clicking the document's listing produces only an error message.

Some of the commands that populated the Start menus of previous Windows versions no longer appear in the home version of Windows XP. That's by design, of course: Microsoft is trying to make its new operating system look less overwhelming to the newcomer.

But if you miss some of the old folders—My Network Places and My Recent Documents, for example—it's easy enough to put them back.

Right-click the Start menu. From the shortcut menu, choose Properties. Now the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box appears; on the Start Menu tab, click the Customize button, and then the Advanced tab.

In the scrolling list, you'll find a checkbox that makes My Network Places appear in the Start menu. Windows 2000 veterans may also want to turn on "Display as Connect to menu" under Network Connections, so that you have a handy submenu of network connections in your Start menu. If you scroll all the way to the bottom of the list, you'll also see an option that adds System Administrative Tools to your All Programs menu and even to your Start menu. (You can read about these technical utilities in Chapter 16.)

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

This command opens up your My Documents folder, which, until Windows XP, appeared as an icon on your desktop. It's designed to hold the data files you and your programs create.

Of course, you're welcome to file your documents anywhere on the hard drive, but most programs propose the My Documents folder as the target location for newly created documents.

Sticking with that principle makes a lot of sense for three reasons. First, it makes navigation easy. You never have to wonder where you filed some document, since all your stuff is sitting right there in the My Documents folder. Second, this arrangement makes backing up easy, in that you can drag the entire My Documents folder right onto a Zip disk or blank CD.

Third, remember that Windows XP has been designed from the ground up for computer sharing. It's ideal for any situation where different family members, students, or workers share the same PC. Each person who uses the computer will turn on the machine to find her own separate, secure set of files, folders, desktop pictures, Web bookmarks, preference settings—and My Documents folder. (Much more about this feature in Chapter 20.)

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

As millions of Windows users have demonstrated, it's perfectly possible to live a long and happy life without ever tampering with the Start menu. For many people, the idea of making it look or work differently comes dangerously close to nerd territory. (It's true that listing your favorite files there gives you quicker access to them—but it's even easier to use the Quick Launch toolbar, as described in Section 3.4.3.)

Whenever you log on, Windows XP provides a My Documents folder just for you. (It actually sits in the My Computer→Local Disk (C:)→Documents and Settings→[Your Name] folder.)

This feature can be confusing if you're not expecting it. For example, if you stop by the computer after somebody else has logged in, none of your stuff is where you expect to find it—specifically, in the My Documents folder. That's because the computer no longer opens your documents folder when you choose Start→My Documents.

If this happens to you, check the name that appears at the top of the Start menu. It identifies who's currently logged on—and whose documents are showing up in the My Documents window.

Still, knowing how to manipulate the Start menu listings may come in handy someday, and provides an interesting glimpse into the way Windows works.

Thanks to the User Accounts feature described in Chapter 17, any changes you make to the Start menu apply only to you. Each person with an account on this PC has an independent, customized Start menu. When you sign on to the machine using your name and password, Windows XP loads your customized Start menu.

Microsoft offers a fascinating set of customization options for the Start menu. It's hard to tell whether these options were selected by a scientific usability study or by a dartboard, but you're likely to find something that suits you.

To view and change the basic options, right-click the Start menu; choose Properties from the shortcut menu. Now the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box opens, as seen in Figure 2-22.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Windows got its name from the rectangles on the screen—the windows—where every computer activity takes place. You look at a Web page in a window, type into a window, read email in a window, and look at the contents of a folder in a window—sometimes all at once. But as you create more files, stash them in more folders, and launch more programs, it's easy to wind up paralyzed before a screen awash with cluttered, overlapping rectangles.

Fortunately, Windows is crawling with icons, buttons, and other inventions to help you keep these windows under control.

There are two categories of windows in Windows:

Desktop windows. These windows, sometimes called Windows Explorer windows, include the windows that open when you double-click a disk or folder icon. This is where you organize your files and programs.
Application windows. These are the windows where you do your work—in Word or Internet Explorer, for example.

Nonetheless, all windows have certain components in common (see Figure 3-1).

Title bar. This top strip displays the name of the window. Drag it like a handle when you want to move the window on the screen.
Minimize button. Click this box to temporarily hide a window, shrinking it down into the form of a button on your taskbar (Section 3.4). You can open it again by clicking that button. Keyboard shortcut: Press Alt+Space bar, then N.
Maximize button. Click this button to enlarge the window so that it fills the screen, gluing its edges to the screen borders. At this point, the maximize button turns into a restore down button (whose icon shows two overlapping rectangles), which you can click to return the window to its previous size.

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

There are two categories of windows in Windows:

Desktop windows. These windows, sometimes called Windows Explorer windows, include the windows that open when you double-click a disk or folder icon. This is where you organize your files and programs.
Application windows. These are the windows where you do your work—in Word or Internet Explorer, for example.

Nonetheless, all windows have certain components in common (see Figure 3-1).

Title bar. This top strip displays the name of the window. Drag it like a handle when you want to move the window on the screen.
Minimize button. Click this box to temporarily hide a window, shrinking it down into the form of a button on your taskbar (Section 3.4). You can open it again by clicking that button. Keyboard shortcut: Press Alt+Space bar, then N.
Maximize button. Click this button to enlarge the window so that it fills the screen, gluing its edges to the screen borders. At this point, the maximize button turns into a restore down button (whose icon shows two overlapping rectangles), which you can click to return the window to its previous size. Keyboard shortcut: Press Alt+Space bar, then X.

You can also maximize or restore a window by double-clicking its title bar.
Close button. Click the X button to close the window. Keyboard shortcut: Press Alt+F4.
Menu bar. Click a menu title (such as File or Edit) to open a menu, revealing a list of commands available for that menu in this window. Keyboard shortcuts:

Additional content appearing in this section has been removed.
Purchase this book now or read it online at Safari to get the whole thing!

Content preview·Buy reprint rights for this chapter

Windows' windows look just fine straight from the factory: all the edges are straight, and the text is perfectly legible. Still, if you're going to stare at this computer screen for half of your waking hours, you may as well investigate some of the ways these windows can be enhanced for better looks and greater efficiency. As it turns out, there's no end to the tweaks Microsoft lets you perform.

You can view the files and folders in a desktop window in any of several ways: as small icons, jumbo icons, a tidy list, and so on. Each window remembers its own view settings.

To change the view of a particular open window, choose one of these commands from its View menu (or from the little

icon on the toolbar): Filmstrip, Thumbnails, Tiles, Icons, List, or Details. Figure 3-5 illustrates each of these options.

Figure 3-5: The new Filmstrip view (upper left) creates a slide show right in the folder window. Thumbnails view (upper right) is also good for photos—or anyone who would like a larger target for clicking each icon. (Tip: If you press Shift as you switch to Thumbnails view, you hide the file names. Do it again to bring the names back.) In the new Tiles view (middle left), your icons appear at standard size, sorted alphabetically into vertical columns—with name and file details just to the right. Icons view (middle right) sorts the icons horizontally in rows, displaying only their names. The List view (lower left) packs, by far, the most files into the space of a window. Details view (lower right) is the same as List view, except for the additional columns of information that reveal the size, the icon type, and the date and time the item was last modified.

Table of Contents