Windows 2000 Administration in a Nutshell

Name

files and folders

Synopsis

Compress, copy or move, customize a folder, encrypt, explore, modify attributes, modify a file association, open, search, secure, send to somewhere, share, and view properties of a file or folder.

Procedures

Most operations on files and folders can be performed regardless of the underlying disk filesystem. For example, if you right-click on a folder, the same shortcut menu is displayed regardless of whether the underlying partition or volume is formatted using FAT, FAT32, or NTFS. Additional tasks can be performed on files and folders located on NTFS volumes, as indicated later in this article.

Compress a File or Folder

Right-click on file or folder → Properties → General → Advanced → Compress contents → accept prompts

If you compress a folder, you will be prompted to choose between the following:

Apply changes to this folder only

Compresses the folder but (contrary to what you might expect) does not compress any of the files in the folder. However, if you copy existing uncompressed files or save new files to this folder, they will be automatically compressed.

Apply changes to this folder, subfolders, and files

Compresses the folder, all files within the folder, all subfolders within the folder, and all files within these subfolders. Use this option if you want to compress existing files within a folder.

To display compressed files and folders using an alternate color, open My Computer or Windows Explorer and select:

Tools → Folder Options → View → “Display ...