JANUARY, 2011 - FILES AND FOLDERS

Every item on your computer -- documents, photos, videos, music, email, programs, etc. -- is made up of one or more files. These files are always grouped in folders and make up your directory. Groups of folders, called sub-folders, are often filed together in another folder -- just like your filing cabinet. This "filing cabinet" on your computer is called a hard drive.

Think of your hard drive as one big file cabinet. You will stash your work in the file cabinet. But you can't just throw documents in willy-nilly. You have to have an organizational structure to your filing system.

Folders provide that organizational structure, just as they do in a file cabinet. First, you will put labeled folders into your cabinet/drive. Each folder will have a name. When you view the contents of a hard drive, folders are normally listed in alphabetical order.

Inside the folder, you will put your documents, which are called Files. In order to be able to find your documents later within an overstuffed folder, you will give each File or document a name.

A file name is made up of two parts: (1) the name of the document and (2) the file extension. You may name a file anything you wish, but it is preferable to name a file something you are likely to remember later.

The second part of a file name is the extension. In the file text.doc, the word text is the file name and the .doc is the extension. A period always separates the two. The extension identifies what kind of a document you have and is determined by the software program in which the file is created.

Some examples of file extensions are:

.doc - Microsoft Word Document

.htm - Web document

.gif - image

.jpg - image

.ppt - PowerPoint Presentation

You can see how this looks on your hard drive in several ways. One way is to use your mouse and right-click on the START button in the lower left corner of your screen and then left-click on "Explore".

What you will see is a tree-like diagram. The left side of Explorer (the folder tree) shows all the folders and the right side shows us the contents of the highlighted folder. The contents of a folder can contain even more sub-folders and individual files.

It is easy to get lost among the pile of folders on most hard disks unless you can actually see the ways the folders are related to each other. The folder tree, located in the left pane, is just such a helpful diagram. The folder tree shows all of the computer's drives and folders in a nested arrangement, plus some special areas like the Control Panel and Recycle Bin.

A small symbol - the plus (+) sign - marks drives and folders which contain other folders. Clicking this symbol expands this branch of the folder tree.

Another symbol - the minus (-) sign - marks something that is already expanded to show its contents. Clicking the symbol will collapse this branch of the folder tree.

DO NOT – EVER – MAKE ANY CHANGES IN THE PROGRAM FILES OR WINDOWS FILES!

THE ONLY FILE THAT IS SAFE TO WORK WITH IS THE "MY DOCUMENTS" FILE – OR ANY OTHER DOCUMENT FOLDER OR FILE THAT YOU CREATE YOURSELF.

CREATING FOLDERS

You can create new folders in the Explorer window. In the folder tree – the left pane - click on the existing folder in which you want to create a NEW folder. For example, click on My Documents (or Documents, if you’re using Vista). In the (My) Documents window, right-click in a blank area. Select New>>Folder.

A new folder will appear in the window. It is named New Folder, but the name is highlighted. You can (AND SHOULD) type a new name for it. To change the name later, right-click the folder and select Rename. Then, enter another name.

If you open (click on) this new folder, there will be nothing inside. You can put the other folders inside it. Technically, they're called subfolders. You can see the hierarchy in the left panel. Subfolders can also contain folders, however, it can be a hassle to navigate through many levels of folders. You can also delete folders by right-clicking on them and then clicking on Delete.

CREATING FILES

In Explorer, you can drag and drop files into the folders, if you’ve already created files. You can also delete files in Explorer. However, files are NEVER created in Explorer. You would do this in a software program by clicking on File>>Save, then navigating to the correct folder in the Save dialog box. When you find your folder, just click Save. Your file will be stored in the appropriate place.

Explorer is called Explorer for a reason. Don't be afraid to browse your hard disk. Look in all your folders, and try all the programs in the Start Menu. Explore! (But, REMEMBER – DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING EXCEPT DOCUMENT FILES!)