The programs and information that are stored on your computer are stored as something called files. In order to get the most from your computer you need to understand how those files are kept. For the time being we will assume that you only have 1 hard drive and it is designated as drive letter C.
 

Think of your entire "Hard Disk" as a big filing cabinet. In order to keep track of your files, and stay organized, you need to have drawers in your file cabinet to keep things sorted. You wouldn’t want to sort through every piece of paper you have in order to find this months phone bill. Your computer thinks of each drawer in the file cabinet as a "directory".
 

Note: Windows 95 has changed the terminology a bit. It calls each drawer or "directory" a "Folder", and it calls the "File Manager" the "Explorer".
 

Your "hard disk" (file cabinet) can have as many "directories" (drawers) in it as you like, (provided there is space on your hard disk). Inside each "directory" (drawer) you have "sub-directories" (or folders). These folders can contain not only "files" (sheets of paper), but they can also contain other "sub-directories" (folders) inside them, and each sub-directory can contain more sub-directories, files, etc..
 

Note: With DOS and Windows 3.1 you must stay with a certain way of naming your files and directories, they can only be a total of 11 characters long: 8 characters for the first part of the name (or less) and 3 characters for the 2nd part of the name (or less) separated by a period (ex: myfile.doc). The first 1 - 8 letters is called the file name, and the last 3 letters is called the file extension. The characters you use should be any of the standard alpha- numeric set. (i.e. 0 through 9, and A through Z). While some of the other characters can be used ($, !, ~, etc.) it is best to stick with the alphabet, because some of the other characters are seen as something special to DOS.
 

Exception: Windows 95 (and the Macintosh’s) can use up to 255 characters to name a file, (including spaces) but those names are not compatible with the older DOS, and Window 3.1 programs as well as being incompatable with some UNIX or Server systems.
 
 

WHAT ABOUT THOSE SPECIAL FILES ?
Those special files mentioned in the previous sections, (autoexec.bat, config.sys, etc.) sit in the "Root Directory" of your Hard disk. Think of these files as simply sitting on top of your file cabinet. If those files are not in your root directory when you start your computer (including those hidden files io.sys and msdos.sys) then your computer will not be able to start. You may get error messages like "missing system files" or "unable to load command.com. So do not just decide to move these files trying to organize your hard disk.
 
 

HOW DO I MANAGE FILE AND DIRECTORIES ?
With Windows you use a special program called the "File Manager" to manipulate your files and directories. The file manager makes this a lot easier than plain old DOS, by doing away with those hard to remember commands (Like cd, md, chdir, del, copy, etc.).

Note: Those old commands are still there, the internal commands (like md, cd, dir, etc.) are written into command.com) while the external commands (defrag, move, more, etc.) commands are usually inside a directory called C:\DOS. But enough about DOS...
 

Your file manager is usually inside the program group Main. It should look like a yellow filing cabinet. (Remember, the pictures can be changed and icons can be moved). Find the icon and double-click on it to start your File Manager.
 
 

This will start the File Manager program and you will see a windows similar to the one below. The names of the directories will be different and the way the files are listed may be different, but we will show you how to customize it the way you want.

VIEWING, MOVING, AND COPYING
 

If you click on the "view" menu item you will see toward the middle of the options a choice of

1. "Name", - OR - 2. "All Details" - OR - 3. "Partial Details"

 If you choose the Name option you will see only the name of the files listed on the left, If you choose the All Details you will see a list similar to the picture, OR - you can choose to view the items you want from a check box options that pops up when you click on Partial Details.

Note: If you are not logged onto a network you will not see all the additional drive options. (g:, h:, k:, etc.)

 When you click on a directory (folder in the left window) you will see a list of files in that directory. Remember that you have the scroll arrows, and you can adjust the size of your window to see more or less. While you can choose a file (click on the file name) and choose to work with it (rename it, copy it, move it, etc.) this text will cover mostly the mouse actions you use with files. By dragging a file (click on the file and continue to hold the mouse button down while you move it to a different location) from 1 folder to another you can move files.
 
 

Note: By tapping the delete key when a file is highlighted (OR IF AN ENTIRE FOLDER IS HIGHLIGHTED) you can delete files and entire directories from your hard drive. Do this with EXTREME care, you may accidentally be deleting files that you will need later on.
 
 

1. If you hold down the Ctrl key while you are dragging a file to another folder you will force file manager to actually be making a copy of the file and your original file will still be there.

2. If you hold down the Shift key while you are dragging a file to another folder or drive you will force file manager to actually MOVE the file and your original file will NOT be there anymore.

3. If you hold down the Ctrl key while you are clicking on files, you can choose more than one file at a time to act on.

4. If you hold down the Shift key while you are clicking on files you can choose a whole group of files at one time. Click on one file at the top of the list, scroll down toward the bottom of the list then while Holding down the shift key click on another file and you will be choosing all the files in between the first and last file.

Note 1: If you stay on the same drive letter, File Manager will assume that you want to "MOVE" the files, and if you drag a file or directory (folder) to another drive letter, File Manager will assume that you want to "COPY" those files or folders. Using the Shift, and Ctrl keys is a way to make sure you are preforming the actions you want.
 
 

Note 2: Once you have chosen a file or directory you can also run the different operations you want by tapping the Alt key, typing the underlined letter of the menu option you want to use, and choosing the command you want to run. (Alt, F, C will give you a box to copy files - this same (Alt + underlined letter) method works in MOST Windows applications).

Should File Manage ask for Conformation ?
 

This means when you preform an action then file manager will ask you -- Are you sure you want to " Delete file sure.doc" ? This is an extra security option in case your moving around too fast and accidently do something you did not intend to do.
 

When you are first starting out with File Manager it is best to leave all of the conformation boxes checked, just in case you accidently hit delete, forget to hold a Ctrl key to copy etc. These options can be found in the menu ribbon item under Options, Conformation...

This will bring up an option box

 The options for confirmation are:

File Delete: - (what it says) - it will check to make sure you want to delete the files that are highlighted when you tap the delete key

 Directory Delete - This is one you should always keep checked - it is very easy to have a folder (directory) highlighted and hit the delete key thinking you are going to delete just a file and instead deleting an entire directory. (Take my word for it, I have already deleted ALL of DOS by accident - take the extra step to ensure your actions are what you intended)

 File Replace - When you copy or move a file from one folder or directory to another, this looks to see if there is already a file in the destination folder with that same name, If there is it will ask you if you wish to replace it. Note: if you choose yes then the original file that WAS in the destination directory will no longer be there. Every file in each directory (folder) must have its’ own unique name. If you want 2 different files to have the same name then they must be in 2 different directories.

 Mouse Actions: - This asks you if your sure you want to preform those copy, move, delete, commands when you are using a mouse to drag files from one place to another.

 Disk Commands: - This asks you to confirm items like making a copy of a disk, formatting a disk, etc.

 WHAT IF I WANT TO WORK WITH MORE THAN ONE DRIVE AT A TIME?
With File Manager you may want to work with more than one window at a time. An example would be if you had a floppy disk in your drive A: and you wanted to make sure you had a copy of these files on your Hard Drive C:. At the same time you want to make sure you keep copies of only the newest files. You can open a new window by clicking on the "Window" menu item and choosing the option "New Window". (double clicking on a drive letter will do the same thing). Pretty soon if you keep opening new windows you may end up with a screen that looks similar to the one on the next page --
 

Now you have such a mix of Windows it is hard to tell what you want to copy where. One of the nice Window features supported by File Manager is the option to automatically arrange this mess into something a little more manageable. Under the Window command on the menu ribbon you will see a couple options.

 1. Cascade Shift+F5

and

 2. Tile Shift+F4
 

The Cascade option will re-arrange you windows as desplayed below.
 
 

While the Tile option will re-arrange your windows as shown on the following page ...

While both Cascade and Tile are helpfull, - personally I find that 2 or 3 windows arranged as Tiled, the most common, and most useful.
 
 

Try out several methods and see what is best for your particular needs.
 

How Your Files are Sorted:
Under the "View" command on the menu ribbon you can also choose to sort your files--- "Sort By Name" or "Sort By Type" (will sort on the file extension), or "Sort By Size" or "Sort By Date" -- Note: Notice the option to "Sort By File Type ..." , You can choose to "Show Hidden/System Files" here or only ones with certain attributes, names, or extensions.

Note: typing "*.*" (without the quote marks) in the Name box will show all the files again. I would suggest that beginners NOT choose to view hidden/system files in this option so that there is less temptation to do anything damaging to these special files.
 
 

Naming Files:
Note: With DOS and Windows 3.1 you must stay with a certain way of naming your files and directories, they can only be a total of 11 characters long:
 
 

8 characters (or less) for the first part of the name and ...

3 characters (or less) for the 2nd part of the name

 These 2 ‘parts’ of the entire file name must be seperated by a period (ex: myfile.doc).

The first 1 - 8 letters is called the file name, and

The last 3 letters is called the file extension.
 

The characters you use should be any of the standard alpha- numeric set. (That is: 0 through 9, and A through Z). While some of the other characters can be used ($, !, ~, etc.) it is best to stick with the alphabet, because some of the other characters are seen as something special to DOS You can never use characters like spaces, the * symbol, or the ?.
 
 

Exception: Windows 95 (and the Macintosh’s) can use up to 255 characters to name a file, (including spaces) but those names are not compatible with the older DOS, and Window 3.1 programs (spaces CAN NOT be used to name files), as well as being incompatable with some flavors of UNIX and/or Server systems.
 
 

Many PROGRAMS will automatically add the last 3 letters if you only type in a 1 to 8 letter name with no period. An example of this is if you type a document with MS Word, Save the file, and name it: myfile and press enter, then Word will name the entire file ‘ myfile.doc’. This is because the program Word ‘associates’ those last 3 letters of a file with the program. Then when you double-click on a file in file manager, Windows knows what program to start with that file. Also when you choose to ‘Open’ a file, Word looks for ALL the files in that directory with a DOC extenstion.

Saving your settings:
Under the Options menu item you will see an option called "Save Settings On Exit", (Just like Program Manager has). Once you have File Manager arranged like you want check this option and Exit File Manager. Then open File Manager again and un check this option, and File Manager will start the same way every time. Note: If you have a window open for Drive A:, and you start File Manager with no disk in your floppy drive a:, then File Manager will not try to open a window for that drive., since it must have something to ‘look at’ in order to run, it will default to drive C:

file: help-04
created: 1996-1997
edited: 2002