Windows has nifty features. Here’s how to use them.

 

In Windows XP & Vista, the screen’s bottom-right corner shows the time, like this:

In Windows 7, the screen’s bottom-right corner shows the time and date, like this:

Date in English

If you move the mouse’s arrow to the time, the date in English will flash on the screen briefly, like this:

Calendar (in Windows Vista & 7)

To see a calendar, click the time. Then you see a calendar for this month, with today’s date highlighted in blue.

The calendar also shows the end of last month and the beginning of next month. (If you want to see a calendar for all of next month, click the right-arrow.)

You also see the face of a traditional clock, with an hour hand, minute hand, and second hand that all move.

Date and Time window While viewing the calendar, you can click “Change date and time settings”.

Then you see a bigger window, called the “Date and Time” window. It shows the traditional clock, the time zone (such as “Eastern Time”), and when Daylight Savings Time will begin or end.

If you want to change the time zone (because your computer traveled to a different time zone), do this:

Once you’ve chosen the correct time zone, the computer will automatically show the correct time, usually. (That’s because, once a week, the computer synchronizes its internal clock with the Internet’s clock.)

When you finish using the “Date and Time” window, click “OK”.

Calendar (in Windows XP)

To see a calendar, double-click the time. Then you see a calendar for this month, with today’s date highlighted in blue.

You also see the face of a traditional clock, with an hour hand, minute hand, and second hand that all move. You see the time zone, such as “Eastern Daylight Time”.

If you want to change the time zone (because your computer traveled to a different time zone), do this:

When you finish using that clock/calendar window, click “OK”.

Once you’ve chose the correct time zone and clicked “OK”, the computer will automatically show the correct time, usually. (That’s because, once a week, the computer synchronizes its internal clock with the Internet’s clock.)

 

At the screen’s bottom left corner, you see the Start button. At the screen’s bottom right corner, you see the time. Across the screen’s bottom, running from the Start button to the time, you see a box that’s very wide (as wide as the screen) and about half an inch tall. In Windows XP, that box is blue; in Windows Vista, that box is gray; in Windows 7, that box is bluish gray. That box is called the taskbar. It includes the Start button (at the screen’s bottom-left corner), the time (at the screen’s bottom-right corner), and everything between them.

When you’re running a task (program), the taskbar usually shows a button for that task. For example, while you’re running WordPad, you see a WordPad button on the taskbar. While you’re running Paint, you see a Paint button on the taskbar.

Experiment

Try this experiment!

Start running WordPad (by clicking Start then Programs then Accessories then WordPad). Now the taskbar includes a WordPad button. Since WordPad is a word-processing program, type a few words, so you’ve created a short document on your screen.

While WordPad is still on your screen, start running Paint (by clicking Start then Programs then Accessories then Paint). Now the taskbar includes a WordPad button and a Paint button, because WordPad and Paint are both running simultaneously: they’re both in the computer’s RAM memory chips. Paint is blocking your view of WordPad, but WordPad is still running also.

To see WordPad better, click WordPad’s button on the toolbar. Then you’ll see WordPad clearly, and WordPad will block your view of Paint.

Here’s the rule: clicking WordPad’s button lets you see WordPad better; clicking Paint’s button lets you see Paint better. Both programs are in RAM simultaneously, until you close them (by clicking their X buttons).

Windows Vista lets you play this trick (if your edition of Windows Vista is at least “Premium”):

Many tasks

You can run several programs simultaneously. For example, you can run WordPad, Paint, and Calculator all simultaneously, so you see all their buttons on the taskbar simultaneously. But if you try to run many programs simultaneously, the computer will tend to get confused and fail (especially if you bought too little RAM or your computer’s been on for many hours in a row). To avoid headaches, run no more than two major programs at a time.

To copy data, you can use this 2-step process: first copy the data to the computer’s invisible Clipboard, then stick the clipboard’s data wherever you want it by using Velcro. Here are the details.…

Ctrl with C

You can copy data from one document to another, even if the documents were created by different programs, and even if one “document” is a drawing and the other “document” contains mostly words. (For example, you can copy data that’s a drawing, from Paint to WordPad.) Here’s how:

Print Screen key

Try this experiment: say Print Screen (by pressing a key labeled PrintScreen or PrtScr or PrtScn or PrtSc, or by pressing a key labeled fn then a key labeled prt sc). That makes the computer secretly take a snapshot of your whole screen and put that photo onto the clipboard.

If you want the computer to take a snapshot of just one window, do this:

After something’s on the clipboard, stick it into a WordPad document or Paint document or some other document (by clicking there and then pressing Ctrl with V). Then, if you wish, edit the snapshot and print it on paper.

Snipping Tool

If you want to copy part of the screen to the clipboard, use Windows Vista or 7 and do this:

After you’ve done that, stick your clip into a WordPad document or Paint document or some other document (by clicking there and then pressing Ctrl with V).

 

Windows XP & Vista include a ball game. I’ll explain how to play. (Windows 7 lacks a ball game, so if you have Windows 7 skip ahead to the next section, called “Time”.)

Windows Vista

In Windows Vista, the ball game is InkBall. You can access it in two ways.

Goal You see a blue ball and an orange ball, bouncing around, like billiard balls on a billiard table. To win, coax the blue ball into the blue hole, and coax the orange ball into the orange hole. (If the blue ball accidentally falls the orange hole — or the orange ball accidentally falls into the blue hole — you lose.)

Strategy To change the direction in which a ball moves, use your mouse to draw a black squiggle (by dragging, as if you were using Paint). The squiggle acts as a barrier: when a ball hits the barrier, the ball bounces off the barrier, and the barrier disappears.

For example, if the blue ball is getting too close to the orange hole, draw a barrier between the blue ball and the orange hole. If the blue ball is getting wonderfully close to the blue hole, nudge the blue ball into the blue hole by drawing a loop that contains the blue ball and the blue hole.

Speed You must be reasonably fast: the game has a 2-minute time limit. If you take more than 2 minutes, you lose. The window’s red box shows how many seconds are left.

Game over If a ball falls into the wrong hole or you take more than 2 minutes, the computer says “Game over!” To react, press the Enter key; then the game will restart.

Winning If you get a ball into the correct hole, you get points. Your point total is written in white, in a black box. If you get both balls into the correct holes, you proceed to a more difficult round of the game, where you might encounter differently colored balls and differently colored holes. Gray holes are neutral: when a ball falls into a gray hole, you get no penalty but also no points.

How many points? When you correctly sink a ball into a hole, you get 200 points if the ball is orange, 400 if blue, 800 if green, 1600 if gold. When you successfully finish a round (by sinking both balls within 2 minutes), the computer notices how many seconds were remaining: those unused seconds are given to you as bonus points.

Close When you finish using InkBall, close its window (by clicking its X button).

Windows XP

In Windows XP, the ball game is Pinball. To access it, click Start then “Programs” then “Games” then “Pinball”.

The computer will say “3D Pinball”. After a few seconds, you see a fancy pinball machine with flashing lights and hear sounds of the machine reloading. It’s much fancier than the pinball machines you see in video arcades and bars!

At the machine’s bottom right corner, you see a ball (round bullet), and the computer says “Awaiting Deployment”, which means the computer is waiting for you to fire the ball.

How to play Fire the ball, as follows:

Then the ball goes zooming through the machine. Each time the ball bangs into something, you hear wild noises and get points.

Your goal is to keep the ball in play as long as possible, without letting the ball fall to the screen’s bottom. To keep the ball in play, hit it up by using the flippers, which are near the screen’s bottom.

You get 3 chances to do all that (fire the ball and keep it in play). If the computer sympathizes with you (because you’re amazingly good or pathetically bad), the computer gives you free replays, so you get more than 3 chances.

As you play, you see your score rise. When all your chances are used up, the computer says “GAME OVER”.

High scores The computer keeps track of the 5 highest scores. If you have one of the 5 highest scores, you see the High Scores window: it’s a chart showing the top 5 scores so far and who got them. Your score is temporarily called credited to “Player 1”, because you haven’t told the computer your name yet. Type your name and press Enter.

Play again If you (or a friend) want to play again, press the F2 key.

Bigger machine If you want to want the pinball machine to look bigger and fill the whole screen, press the F4 key. Unfortunately, that makes the menus disappear. Press the F4 key again to return to normal size and see the menus.

Pause If you want to pause (so you can go to the bathroom, wipe the sweat off your brow, catch your breath, order a pizza, tell your Mom you’re doing your homework, or tell the boss you’re doing accounting), press the F3 key. That makes the ball immediately stop rolling. As in a sci-fi movie, you’ve put the ball into a state of suspended animation!

When you’re ready to resume, press the F3 key again, and the ball will come flying at you as fast as when you left off.

Close When you finish using Pinball, make sure the pinball machine is normal size, then close its window (by clicking its X button).

 

 

 

 

 

Before 1980, music came on records or tapes. Nowadays, music comes on compact discs instead.

If you’ve bought a compact disc containing music, you can shove that disk into your computer’s CD-ROM drive (or DVD-ROM drive) while Windows is running. Here’s how.…

Find the drive

Find your computer’s CD-ROM drive (or DVD-ROM drive, which is a souped-up CD-ROM drive). It’s in a desktop computer’s front or a notebook computer’s side.

If you’re lucky, it’s a 5-inch horizontal slit. If you’re unlucky (which is more likely), it’s a 5-inch-wide drawer you must open by pressing an eject button (which is on the drawer, or under the drawer’s right-hand end).

Insert the disk

Grab the CD. Hold that disk horizontally, so its label is on the top surface. Don’t touch its shiny underside.

Put that CD into the CD-ROM drive, as follows:

Finish installing Media Player

If your computer has never played any CDs, it might ask you questions. Here’s how to reply:

Enjoy the music

The computer will play the CD as background music, while you continue your work.

Adjust the volume

On a desktop computer, do this:

On most systems, the screen’s bottom right corner shows a Volume icon (which looks like a blaring loudspeaker and is next to the time).

If you’re using Windows XP but the Volume icon is missing, do this:

If you click the Volume icon, you’ll see a slider. Using the mouse, drag the slider up (to raise the master volume) or down (to lower it).

For Windows Vista & 7, you can adjust the volume further by doing this:

When you finish adjusting the slider window, close it by clicking its X.

Control what you hear & see

Here’s how to control what you hear & see.

While the music plays, you see the Windows Media Player window. Make sure that window’s top-left corner says “Windows Media Player” (or shows „). If you don’t see that (because you’re using an early version of Windows XP), make it appear by doing this: click the ÙÚ button (which is at the window’s top left corner).

Maximize that window by clicking its maximize button (which is next to the X button).

At the window’s bottom, you should see several buttons. (If you don’t see them yet, make them appear by moving the mouse.)

Click the ║ button to pause in the middle of a song. To resume, click that button again (which has changed to a big „).

Click n to stop back at the beginning of the current track (song). To begin playing there, click the big „.

Click „| or „„| to skip ahead to the next track (song), |ƒ or |ƒƒ to hop back to the beginning of the previous track. (If you don’t hear any music, click the big „ to remind the computer to play.) To skip to a far-away track, click those buttons repeatedly or double-click the track’s number (or name) at the screen’s right edge. (If the screen’s right edge doesn’t show the list of tracks yet, right-click the screen’s middle then click “Show list”. You’ll see track names instead of numbers just if the CD is in the recording industry’s database and you’re connected to the Internet.)

As a song plays, you see a tiny object slide from left to right:

To fast-forward, use your mouse to drag that object farther to the right immediately. To reverse, drag that object back to the left.

As the music plays, you see the music’s visualization (an animated abstract cartoon that thumps to the music’s beat).

When you tire of listening to that CD, click the eject button (which is the rightmost button on your CD-ROM drive), then remove the CD. If you wish, insert a different CD instead. If you don’t want to listen to any CD now, close the Windows Media Player window (by clicking its X button).

 

Videos used to come on videotape. Nowadays, a video come on Digital Versatile Disk (DVD) instead.

If you’ve bought a DVD containing a movie, you can shove that disk into your computer’s DVD-ROM drive while Windows is running. Playing a movie DVD is similar to playing an audio CD. Here’s how to do it.

Find the drive

Find your computer’s DVD-ROM drive. It’s in a desktop computer’s front or a notebook computer’s side.

If you’re lucky, it’s a 5-inch horizontal slit. If you’re unlucky (which is more likely), it’s a 5-inch-wide drawer you must open by pressing an eject button (which is on the drawer, or under the drawer’s right-hand end).

Insert the disk

Grab the DVD. Hold that disk horizontally, so its label is on the top surface. Don’t touch its shiny underside.

Put that DVD into the DVD drive, as follows:

Finish installing Media Player

If your computer has never played any movie DVDs, it might ask you questions. Here’s how to reply:

Enjoy the movie

The computer will start playing the movie. (If the movie begins with a menu giving you a choice such as “play movie”, click “play movie” with your mouse.)

Adjust the volume

To adjust the movie’s overall volume on a desktop computer, turn the master volume knob, which is typically on the front of the right speaker.

Control what you see

If you move the mouse, the screen’s bottom will show several buttons temporarily.

Move the mouse’s pointer to the screen’s bottom. That makes the buttons stay on the screen until you move the mouse’s pointer back up.

While the buttons are on the screen, here’s what you can do.…

Click the ║ button to pause the movie. To resume, click that button again (which has changed to a big „).

Click n to stop back at the movie’s beginning. To begin playing there, click the big „.

While the movie plays, click „„| to skip ahead to the next scene, |ƒƒ to hop back to the previous scene.

As the movie plays, you see tiny blue bubble (with a long blue tail) slide from left to right. To fast-forward, use your mouse to drag that object farther to the right immediately. To reverse, drag that object back to the left.

Ending

When you tire of watching that movie, click the eject button (which is the rightmost button on your DVD drive). Then remove the DVD.

If you wish, insert a different DVD instead.

If you don’t want to watch any more DVDs now, press the Escape key (which is at your keyboard’s top left corner and says “Esc” on it). Then close the Windows Media Player window (by clicking its X button).

What’s in your computer? How much hardware and software do you have, and what type? Let’s find out!

System properties

To find out what kind of computer system you have, do this.…

You’ll see a message about your computer’s properties.

Windows 7 When I bought a computer using Windows 7, its message said —

That means:

Windows Vista When I bought a computer using Windows Vista, its message said —

That means:

Windows XP When I bought a computer using Windows XP, its message said —

That means:

Your computer What message does your computer show?

When you finish admiring your computer’s message, do this.…

Disk drives

Each disk drive has a letter.

A typical computer has these drive details:

Drive C is the most important: it’s the main part of the main hard drive. Drive C holds Windows itself and the most important programs & documents.

Here’s how the drives are named:

To find out what drives are in your computer and how they’re lettered, do this….

You’ll see the My Computer window. Make sure it consumes the whole screen. (If it doesn’t consume the whole screen yet, maximize the My Computer window by clicking the maximize button, which is next to the X button.)

You’ll see an icon (little picture) labeled “C:” (for the main part of your main hard drive) and icons for your other disk drives also.

The icons are labeled like this:

If you’re using Windows XP, do this….

Drive C’s files

To find out about drive C, do this:

To find out even more about your hard disk, double-click the “C:” icon. You’ll see the C window, which lists files that are on disk C.

Make sure the C window consumes the whole screen. (If it doesn’t consume the whole screen yet, maximize the C window by clicking the maximize button, which is next to the X button.)

If disk C contains more files than can fit on the screen, view the remaining files by pressing the 6 and 5 buttons, which are at the screen’s right edge.

For each file, you see the file’s name and a tiny picture (icon) representing the file.

Your computer can handle 3 kinds of files:

In the C window, you see a folder called “Program Files”, a folder called “Windows” or “WINDOWS”, and a folder called “Users” or “Documents and Settings”.

Those folders are extremely important. You might also see some extra folders, documents, and application programs.

If you double-click a folder, a new window shows you what files are in the folder.

When you finish examining the new window, either close it (by clicking its X button) or go back to the previous window (by clicking the Back button, which is near the screen’s top-left corner).

If you click a file’s icon, here’s what happens.…

Here’s what happens if you double-click a file’s icon:

Here’s how to find the documents you wrote using WordPad:

Views While you’re viewing icons, here’s how to change their appearance.

For Windows 7, click the down-arrow near the screen’s right edge, left of the question mark, then choose one of these 5 views.

Here’s a different way to express your desires: if you click the Views icon (which is left of the down-arrow) repeatedly, the computer will cycle among those 5 popular choices (from Details to Tiles to Content to Large Icons to List then back to Details).

For Windows Vista, click the down-arrow to the right of “Views”, then choose one of these 4 views.

Here’s a different way to express your desires: if you click the word “Views” repeatedly, the computer will cycle among those 4 popular choices (from Details to Tiles to Large Icons to List then back to Details).

For Windows XP, click the word “View”, which gives a
View menu. The menu offer these choices:

Usually you’ll be happiest if you choose “List”.

New folder To create a new folder, do this:

A new folder will appear. Type a name for it (and press Enter).

Close the C window When you finish examining the files that are on hard disk C, close the C window by clicking its X button.

CD-ROM files

The CD-ROM drive resembles drive C. (If your computer is modern, that drive can also create CD-R and CD-RW disks and handle DVD disks.)

Grab a CD-ROM disk that contains computer info, and put it in the CD-ROM drive. (To find out how, read “Find the drive” and “Insert the disk” on page 99.)

The computer will analyze that disk.

If it’s a CD that contains music, the computer will automatically start playing the music (as I explained on page 99).

If it’s a CD-ROM disk containing a program called autorun.inf, the computer will automatically start running that program, which typically makes the computer run another program, called setup.exe. If you don’t want to continue running such programs, exit from them by clicking their X buttons or by clicking whatever “Exit” choices they offer you. Then if you want to find out what’s on the disk, right-click the CD-ROM disk’s icon (which is in the My Computer window) and click “Open”.

If it’s a CD-ROM disk that lacks an autorun.inf program, the computer will typically show you a list of files that are on the disk, with their icons. (If the computer doesn’t show you that list yet, press Enter.)

When you finish examining any files that are on the CD-ROM disk, close the CD-ROM disk’s window by clicking its X button.

Close

When you finish using the My Computer window, close it by clicking its X button.

Find a file’s icon

To manipulate a file, the first step is to get the file’s icon onto the screen.

If the file’s a document you created using WordPad, here’s the easiest way to get the file’s icon onto the screen:

If the file’s a painting you created using Paint, here’s the easiest way to get the file’s icon onto the screen:

If the file’s on disk C, here’s another way to get the file’s icon onto the screen. For Windows Vista & 7, try this:

For Windows XP, try this:

Another way to get a file’s icon onto the screen is to go to the My Computer window and click icons for drives & files until you find the file you want.

Many programs put documents into a folder called Documents (or My Documents). Here’s how to see what documents are in that folder.…

The Paint program puts paintings into a folder called Pictures (or My Pictures). Here’s how to see what’s in that folder.…

Some programs put music into a folder called Music (or My Music). Here’s how to see what’s in that folder.…

 

Now I’ll explain how to manipulate a file.

If you want to practice this stuff, use a file you don’t mind wrecking. For example, create a WordPad document containing just once sentence (such as “I love you”) and save it as a file called “Love”.

To manipulate a file, find its icon (by using the tricks in the previous section) then do one of these activities.…

Send to USB flash drive

Here’s how to copy the file to a USB flash drive.

Close all windows (by clicking their X).

Plug the USB flash drive into one of the computer’s USB ports. (To do that, you must first uncover the flash drive, if the flash drive had a protective cover.)

If the flash drive has a light, that light will flash awhile.

When any light stops flashing, you might see the AutoPlay window:

Which file to you want to copy to the flash drive? Right-click that file’s icon, then click “Send to” then the flash drive’s letter.

If the flash drive has a light, that light will flash. When the light stops flashing, the file’s been copied.

Send to CD

Here’s how to copy the file to a CD (or DVD) disk.

Windows 7 What CD do you want to copy the file to? Put that CD (which is blank or partially blank) into the drive.

If the CD has never been used before (or was totally reformatted), do this:

If the CD is rewritable (CD-RW), the computer will say, “The format might take a long time”; to reply, press Enter then wait about 25 minutes.

The computer will say “Open folder to view files”. Press Enter. You’ll see the CD’s folder.

Which file do you want to copy to the CD? Use any of these techniques:

Copy more files that way, if you like.

When you finish copying files, click “Eject” (which is at the top of the CD’s window). The computer writes final notes onto the disk then opens the drive’s tray.

Remove the CD. Push the tray back in.

Windows Vista If you see “Burn” (at the top of the window where you saw the file’s icon), click the file’s icon then “Burn”; if you don’t see that choice, right-click the file’s icon then click “Send To” then “DVD RW Drive”.

The computer will open the drive’s door (tray). Put a blank CD or DVD disk onto the tray. Push the tray back in.

Invent a name for the disk. The name must be short (no more than 16 characters). Type the name (and press Enter).

If the CD is rewritable (CD-RW), the computer will say, “The format might take a long time”; to reply, press Enter then wait about 25 minutes.

The computer will copy the file to the disk. Then it will say “Files Currently on the Disc”.

If you wish, copy another file to the disk (by clicking the file’s icon then “Burn”).

Press the drive’s button (which is on the system unit below the drive’s tray). The computer says “Preparing to eject”. The computer writes final notes onto the disk then opens the drive’s tray.

Remove the CD. Push the tray back in.

Windows XP Put the CD into the drive. (If the computer asks “What do you want Windows to do?”, click “Take no action” then press Enter.)

Right-click the file’s icon; click “Send To” then the CD’s icon. That copies the file to a list called “Files ready to be written to the CD”. Copy more files to that list, if you like.

Then copy that entire list to the CD, as follows:

Send to My Documents folder

For Windows 7, here’s how to copy the file to your hard disk’s My Documents folder (if the file isn’t there already):

For Windows Vista, here’s how to copy the file to your hard disk’s Documents folder (if the file isn’t there already):

For Windows XP, here’s how to copy the file to your hard disk’s “My Documents” folder (if the file isn’t there already):

Send to Desktop

To copy the file to your Desktop (which is the main screen), do this:

To save disk space, that technique copies just the file’s icon to the Desktop. The file itself stays just in its original location.

On the Desktop, the file’s icon’s bottom left corner has a bent arrow, which means the icon is just a shortcut (which points the computer to the original location).

Here’s how that shortcut icon is named:

If you double-click that shortcut icon, the computer will try to find the original file and run it. If the original file was on a floppy disk or CD, that works just if the file’s floppy disk or CD is still in the drive.

Send to a different location

To copy the file to a different location (such as a folder on your hard drive), do this:

Rename

To change the file’s name, do this:

If the file’s on a hard disk or floppy disk, that procedure works fine. If the file’s on a CD, that procedure works in Windows Vista & 7 but not in Windows XP.

Delete

To delete the file, try this procedure:

Does that procedure really delete the file? Here’s the answer.

Peek in the Recycle Bin To discover what’s in the hard disk’s Recycle Bin (which holds hard-disk files you said to delete), double-click the Recycle Bin icon (which is typically at the screen’s left edge but might have moved elsewhere, such as to the screen’s bottom right corner). You’ll see the Recycle Bin window, which shows a list of hard-disk files you said to delete. (If you don’t see a file list, the Recycle Bin is empty.)

To see lots of info about the files in the Recycle Bin, make sure the Recycle Bin window is maximized (so it consumes the whole screen). Make sure you’re seeing the Details view, by doing this:

To see even more details about a certain file, right-click the file’s icon and then click “Properties”. When you finish admiring the details, click “OK”.

If you change your mind and do not want to delete a certain file, click the file’s icon then “Restore this item”. That makes the computer pull the file out of the Recycle Bin and put the file back to its original location on the hard disk.

If, on the other hand, you really do want to delete a certain file, click the file’s icon then press the Delete key then press Enter. The file will disappear.

To delete all files from the Recycle Bin, click “Empty the Recycle Bin” (which is at the screen’s top in Windows Vista & 7 but at the screen’s left edge in Windows XP). Then press Enter.

When you finish admiring the Recycle Bin window, click its X button.

Shift Delete You’ve learned that to delete a file, the usual procedure is to click the file’s icon, then tap the Delete key, then tap the Enter key. If the file was on the hard disk, that procedure moves the file into the Recycle Bin. Notice that the procedure involves tapping the Delete key. If instead you tap the Delete key while holding down the Shift key, the computer deletes the file immediately instead of moving it to the Recycle Bin.

Multiple files

To “delete” or “send” several files at once, highlight the files you want to manipulate. Here’s how:

Those methods work best while you’re not running a program. They do not work while you’re running a primitive program (such as WordPad). Those methods sometimes work while you’re running a fancy program (such as Microsoft Word).

After highlighting the files, do this:

You’ll discover that the other files magically “tag along” with the first file, because they’re highlighted also.

Erase entire CD-RW

Here’s how to erase an entire CD-RW disk:

 

These tricks will make you a pro and amaze your friends.

Sample music

Windows comes with free samples of music.

Windows 7 Here’s how to hear 3 samples of music.

Windows Vista Here’s how to hear several types of music:

Windows XP Here’s how to hear Beethoven or blues:

Here’s how to hear David Byrne sing about what humans do:

Sample video

Windows comes with free sample video.

Windows 7 Here’s how to see a sample video.

Windows Vista Here’s how to see 3 samples of video.

Windows XP Here’s how to see a sample video.

Recently used

The computer keeps track of what you’ve recently used.

When you click Start, you see a list of the programs you’ve used most often recently. That list appears at the screen’s left edge, above “All Programs” but below the horizontal line under “E-mail”.

Sleep

When you try to shut down the computer, the computer might take several seconds — or even several minutes — to do so. When you try to turn the computer back on, the computer might take several seconds — or several minutes — to do so. You might get annoyed at waiting for the computer to shut down and turn back on — especially during your lunch break!

Instead of telling the computer to “shut down” and then “turn back on”, you can tell the computer to “sleep” and then “wake back up”. The computer can go to “sleep” almost instantly and “wake up” almost instantly, so you don’t have to wait.

While the computer sleeps, you can say it’s “napping” and “in standby mode”.

How to make the computer sleep To make the computer sleep, try one of these 4 methods:

Go ahead: try one of those sleep methods! It’s okay to give one of those “sleep” commands anytime — even while you’re running a program whose window is still open and whose work is still unsaved.

What happens during sleep When you give a sleep command, the computer makes a note in its RAM about what you’ve been doing. On most computers, Windows Vista’s sleep command does hybrid sleep (where the computer also copies its RAM to the hard disk, for extra protection).

Then the screen goes black and the computer takes a nap. While the computer is napping, it uses little electricity (about 5 watts) and its power light flashes.

If the computer is a laptop or notebook whose battery is running out and the computer isn’t using hybrid sleep, Windows Vista will realize the emergency, copy the RAM’s information to the hard disk, and put itself into a nearly powerless state called hibernation.

Waking The best way to wake the computer from its nap is to tap the Shift key. Other ways, which usually work, are to tap any other key on the keyboard, or jiggle the mouse (or the table it’s on), or press the mouse’s button. If none of those techniques work, quickly tap the system unit’s power button (which wakes the system unit from sleep and hibernation).

The computer will waken and make its screen show exactly the same image as when you put the computer to sleep, so you can continue your work where you left off. (Exception: if your computer has a password or several different users, the computer might ask you to identify yourself first.)

Is sleep good? Sleep is fun, cute, consumes significantly less electricity than leaving the computer fully on, and happens fast enough to maximize your lunch break. But at night you should turn the computer off completely by giving the usual “Shut Down” command, which erases the computer’s RAM and lets the computer start fresh the next day.

Run

Here’s a different way to tell the computer to run WordPad:

To run Paint instead of WordPad, type “mspaint” instead of “wordpad”. To run the Calculator, type “calc” instead. To play Pinball (which is included in Windows XP), type “pinball” instead.

When you buy a program, it typically comes on a disk (a floppy disk or a CD-ROM disk). The instructions for copying it onto your hard disk might say to run a program called “setup”. To obey such instructions, do this:

For some programs, the instructions say to type “install” instead of “setup”.

Control Panel

To control your computer completely, go to the Control Panel. To do that, click “Start” then “Control Panel”. Maximize the window.

You can see 2 views.

The category home view shows you these categories:

(Windows Vista & 7 also show subcategories.)

The icon classic view shows you these icons instead:

(Windows XP’s oldest versions omit Automatic Updates, Indexing Options, Network Setup Wizard, Security Center, Windows CardSpace, Windows Firewall, and Wireless Network Setup Wizard.)

Here’s how to switch between those 2 views:

Pointer trails For your first experiment in Control Panel, play with pointer trails. Here’s how.

Go to icon classic view.

For Windows 7, click the Mouse icon. For Windows XP & Vista, double-click the Mouse icon.

Click “Pointer Options”.

Then if you put a a in the “Display pointer trails” box by clicking it, you’ll see a trail of mouse pointers whenever you move the mouse.

To make the trail be long and obvious, make sure the slider is dragged toward the right, to the “Long” position.

The long trail helps you notice the mouse pointer more easily. It’s useful when you’re giving a presentation to a group of people and want to make sure they always notice where the mouse is moving.

If you change your mind, stop the trails by clicking the “Display pointer trails” box again, so the check mark disappears.

When you finish experimenting with pointer trails, close the Mouse Properties window by clicking “OK”.

Experimenting You can experiment by clicking (or double-clicking) any of the other icons in the Control Panel window, but be careful! If you tell the computer to use hardware you don’t own, Windows will stop working! Before changing a setting, make a note to yourself of what the setting was, so you can get back to it! Be especially cautious about playing with the Display icon, since if you make a wrong choice your screen will be unreadable!

When you finish playing with the Control Panel window, close it by clicking its X button.

Notepad

Notepad is a stripped-down version of WordPad. Notepad is easier but does less.

Like WordPad, Notepad comes free as part of modern Windows.

Since WordPad does more than Notepad, most people prefer WordPad rather than Notepad. But sometimes WordPad is too fancy and too complex, and Notepad’s primitive simplicity is appealing. Notepad is popular for writing “short notes”, “computer programs”, and “pages to put on the Internet”. Notepad will confuse you less often than WordPad, since Notepad does less. It’s retro; it’s cool! Try it! Here’s how.…

To start using Notepad, click Start then “Programs” then “Accessories” then “Notepad”. Make sure the Notepad window consumes the whole screen. (If it doesn’t consume the whole screen yet, maximize the window by clicking the maximize button, which is next to the X button.)

Start typing whatever you wish, as if you were using WordPad. Here are the differences.…

No formatting saved When you save the document (copy it to the hard disk), Notepad saves info about which characters you typed (which letters of the alphabet, digits, and symbols, and where you hit the Space bar, the Enter key, and Tab key); but it saves no info about the document’s appearance. Notepad doesn’t save any info about fonts, boldfacing, italics, underlining, font size, color, centering, justification, margins, or bullets; all those features are missing.

The document that’s saved is called a plain-text document, since it contains just text, no formatting.

A stripped-down word-processing program (such as Notepad) that produces just pure text documents (and saves no formatting) is called a plain-text editor.

While you stare at your document (in the Notepad window), which font are you seeing? Here’s the answer:

But when you save your document, no font info is saved as part of the document.

Optional word wrap If you type near the screen’s right edge, and you type a word that’s too long to fit on the screen, WordPad automatically moves the word to the line below. Notepad does so just if you request word wrap.

Here’s how to request word wrap:

No buttons Notepad has no buttons.

No drag & drop To move a phrase, WordPad lets you use drag & drop, but Notepad doesn’t understand that; Notepad requires you to use cut & paste instead. So here’s how to move a phrase in Notepad: select the phrase (by dragging across it), then say “cut” (by pressing Ctrl with X), then click where you want the phrase to be, then say “paste Velcro” (by pressing Ctrl with V).

Keyboard

A traditional keyboard contains 101 keys. If your keyboard is designed especially for modern Windows, it contains 3 extra keys near the Space bar, so you get 104 keys altogether (or more).

Two of those extra keys are the Windows keys: each shows a flying window. If you press either of the Windows keys, the Start menu appears. So pressing either of those keys has the same effect as if your mouse clicked the Start button. You can press either of the Windows keys: those two keys serve the same purpose as each other, except that one is nearer your left hand, the other is nearer your right. Your keyboard has two Shift keys, two Ctrl keys, two Alt keys, and two Windows keys.

The other extra key, called the Menu key, shows an arrow pointing at a menu. If you press the Menu key, a shortcut menu appears. For example, if you click an icon and then press the menu key, that icon’s shortcut menu appears.

Property window Here are 4 ways to make an icon’s property window appear.…

Use whichever method you wish! My favorites are the right-click method (which feels the most natural) and the Alt-double method (which is usually the fastest).

Alt F4 While a window is open, try this experiment: while holding down the Alt key, tap the F4 key. That makes the computer click the window’s X button, so the window closes.

Suppose your mouse stops working (because the mouse is broken or the computer gets too confused to handle the mouse). To get out of that mess, press Alt F4 several times. That starts the process of closing the windows and shutting down the computer. Finish shutting down the computer (as best as you can), then try again to turn the computer on.

Help

To get more help about using Windows, you can click Start then “Help and Support”. You see the Help and Support window. Maximize it (by clicking its maximize button).

What topic do you want help about? To express your desire, do this —

or do this:

If you want to go back to seeing the previous screenful of help, click the Back button (the white left-arrow at the screen’s top-left corner).

When you finish using help, close the Help and Support window by clicking its X button.