Most computers use an operating system called Windows, invented by Microsoft.

 

Microsoft began distributing Windows 10 on July 29, 2015.

The newest version of Windows is Windows 11, which Microsoft began distributing officially on October 5, 2021. But preliminary versions (called beta versions) were available before that. Some computers aren’t eligible for Windows 11 until June 2022, and some computers aren’t eligible at all (because their chips aren’t fancy enough to handle it). Windows 11 is just a slight improvement over Windows 10, so most computers still use Windows 10, not Windows 11.

This chapter explains both Windows 10 & 11.

Earlier versions

Before inventing Windows 10 & 11, Microsoft invented many earlier versions:

I explained them in this book’s older editions (which you can get by phoning me at 603-666-6644). Most of those early versions were pleasant, except Windows 8 & 8.1, which were experiments that went horribly wrong: they hid all the menus!

There was no “Windows 9,” apparently because Americans pronounce “9” like the German word “nein,” which means “no!”

Windows 10’s editions & modes

Windows 10 came in many editions. The most popular are Windows 10 Home (which is the normal version, for use in homes and small businesses) and Windows 10 Pro (for big businesses that insist on more security). This chapter explains how to use Windows 10 Home, plus its upgrade to Windows 11.

Windows 10 came in 2 modes:

Patches

Microsoft patches (improves) Windows often, especially on the afternoons of some Tuesdays (called patch Tuesdays). The typical patch Tuesday is the 2^nd Tuesday of the month, though Microsoft sometimes patches on other Tuesdays and on other days of the week.

This chapter explains how to use Windows 11. It also explains the updated Windows 10 that Microsoft began distributing on October 13, 2020. That update is called “Windows 10 version 20H2” (because it came out in 2020’s 2^nd half). Later Windows 10 versions (such as 21H1 and 21H2) are similar, and this book includes some of those modifications.

Computers

This chapter explains how to use 2 computers I bought recently.

The Lenovo laptop is a better-than-average laptop I bought for a below-average price (just $350) when it was on sale from Best Buy in November 2020. It’s made by Lenovo (which is based in Hong Kong, Beijing, Singapore, and North Carolina), called an “IdeaPad 3, model 81WE”, and came with these specifications:

The HP desktop is a better-than-average desktop computer I bought for a below-average price (just $700) when it was on sale from HP’s Website in January 2021. It’s made by HP (which is based in Palo Alto, California and was formerly called “Hewlett-Packard), called an “All-in-One, model 24-dp0140z,” and came with these specifications:

To update those computers to Windows 11’s newest reasonable version (called the beta version), I used Windows 10 then did a fancy procedure. In case you’re curious, here it is (but other procedures are simpler & safer and might be more appropriate for you):

Other Windows computers are similar. This book’s previous edition (the 33^rd edition) explains how to use many kinds of older Windows 10 computers, plus Windows 7 & 8 & 8.1 computers. For free help using YOUR computer, phone me anytime at 603-666-6644.

Here’s how to start using the computer and have fun.

Unpack

The computer comes in a brown cardboard box, which is taped shut. Using a knife, break that tape.

Open the box. Put its contents on your desk (or table).

The Lenovo laptop box contains 2 electronic devices:

The HP desktop box contains 5 electronic devices:

Each device is protected in its own plastic sheath. Remove those sheaths and throw them away.

The Lenovo laptop box contains 4 pamphlets:

The HP desktop box contains 2 pamphlets:

For the Lenovo laptop, do this:

For the HP desktop, do this:

Turn on

For the Lenovo laptop, do this:

For the HP desktop, do this:

Setup procedure

If the computer was never turned on before, it does the following Setup procedure.

Lenovo laptop:

HP desktop:

You’ll hear a woman robot’s voice. You can ignore her.

The screen says, “Let’s start with region. Is this right?” On the screen, you also see “United States” and “Yes”. If you’re in the United States, put your finger on the screen and tap “Yes”.

The screen says more. Tap “Yes” again then “Skip”.

The screen says, “Let’s connect you to a network”. Make sure you’ve already set up your room’s wireless router (which is a box that lets a computer communicate with the Internet).

Then the computer’s screen shows a list of routers in your neighborhood, including the router in your room. (If you don’t see your room’s router yet, put your finger in the screen’s middle and swipe up, to see it.) Tap that router’s name then “Connect”.

Using the keyboard, type the router’s password. Tap “Next”. Tap “Next” again.

The screen says “Windows 10 License Agreement”. Tap “Accept”.

On Lenovo laptop, the screen says “Sign in with Microsoft”. On HP desktop, the screen says “Let’s add your account”.

If you don’t have a Microsoft account yet, tap “Create account” and follow the instructions. But you probably do have a Microsoft account already (from other computers you own or have been using); if so, do the following. Type your Microsoft account’s email address (which you gave Microsoft in the past). If the email address includes a capital letter, here’s how to type it: while holding down the Shift key, tap the letter. The email address includes the symbol “@”; to type that symbol, do this: while holding down the Shift key, tap the “@” key. When you finish typing the email address, tap “Next”. The screen says “Enter your password”. (HP says “Enter the password” instead.) Tap “Password” (which is in a box). Using the keyboard, type your Microsoft account’s password (which you gave Microsoft in the past). Tap “Next”. On HP desktop, then tap “Skip for now”.

Tap “Create PIN” (at the screen’s bottom-right corner). Invent a 4-digit Personal Identification Number (PIN); type it. Tap “Confirm PIN”. Type the 4-digit PIN again. Tap “OK”.

The screen says “Choose privacy settings for your device”. Tap “Accept”. The screen says “Customize your device”. To keep things simple for now, tap “Skip”. On Lenovo laptop, then tap “No”.

Tap “Do it later” then “Only save files to this PC”. If the screen says “Your device is even better with Microsoft 365”, tap “Got it”.

The screen says “Let Cortana help you get things done”. Tap “Accept”.

Lenovo laptop:

HP desktop:

Lock-screen procedure

If the computer was set up previously, it does the following Lock-screen procedure (instead of the Setup procedure).

Lenovo laptop:

HP desktop:

You see the Lock screen, which shows the time & date. Press the keyboard’s Enter key (which says “Enter” on it).

The computer says “PIN”. Type the PIN you created for this computer.

Then you see the Desktop screen.

Examine the keyboard

On the keyboard find the following keys (but don’t press them yet).…

Find the Enter key, which says “Enter” or “enter” on it.

It’s the big key on the right side of the keyboard’s main section. Some people call it the Return key. Pressing it makes the computer read what you typed and proceed.

Find the Backspace key (which says “Backspace” or “backspace” on it). It’s above the Enter key. You press it when you want to erase a mistake.

Find the key that has the letter A on it. When you press the A key, you’ll be typing a small “a”.

Near the keyboard’s bottom-left corner, find the Shift key (which says “Shift” or “shift” on it). Under the Enter key, you’ll see another Shift key. Press either Shift key when you want to capitalize a letter. For example, to type a capital A, do this: hold down a Shift key; and while you keep holding down the Shift key, tap the A key.

Find the key that looks like this:

┌───┐

│!  │

│1  │

└───┘

It’s near the keyboard’s top left corner. That’s the 1 key. You press it when you want to type the number 1. Press the keys to its right when you want to type the numbers 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 0. If you press the 1 key while holding down a Shift key, you’ll be typing an exclamation point (!). Here’s the rule: if a key shows two symbols (such as ! and 1), and you want to type the top symbol (!), you must typically hold down a Shift key.

Find the key that has the letter U on it. To the right of that key, you’ll see the letters I and O. Don’t confuse the letter I with the number 1; don’t confuse the letter O with the number 0.

In the keyboard’s bottom row, find the wide key that has nothing written on it. That’s the Space bar. Press it whenever you want to leave a blank space.

Try moving the mouse pointer

If your computer has a mouse, try this experiment:

If your computer’s a laptop, it comes with no mouse. I recommend you add a mouse (to make Windows easier), but in the meantime use the touchpad instead. Here’s how:

Start menu

Windows 10:

Windows 11:

If you do that procedure, you see the Start menu, which is a huge light-gray box consuming much of the screen.

 

Practice clicking

Try to click by using the mouse or touchpad. Here’s how.

To practice clicking, try to click the Windows Start button. Here how:

That’s called clicking the Windows Start button. It has the same effect as tapping the Windows Start button with your finger. It makes the Start menu appear (or suddenly disappear).

Services (just Windows 10)

In the Start menu’s bottom-left corner (at the screen’s left edge, immediately above the Start button), you see these 4 services, each represented by a black-and-white symbol:

You see those 4 symbols. To choose a service, tap (or click) its symbol.

How to shut down

Whenever you finish using the computer, tell the computer to shut down. Here’s how.

Windows 10:

Windows 11:

After you’ve done that, the computer will tidy the info it holds. Then the screen will turn black.

Lenovo laptop:

HP desktop:

Tiles

The Start menu has tiles.

Windows 10 In the Start menu, you see “Productivity” atop a group of 6 tiles (boxes), like this:

Productivity

Office	Folder	Mail
Microsoft Edge	Photos	To Do

You also see “Explore” atop a group of 6 tiles, like this:

Explore

Microsoft Store	Weather	News
Movies & TV	Spotify Music	Play

All those 12 tiles are provided by Microsoft. Below those 12 tiles, the computer’s manufacturer can provide extra tiles. The Lenovo laptop provides these 3 extra tiles:

Lenovo

Lenovo Vantage

McAfee Security

Mirkat

The HP desktop provides these 9 extra tiles (but you see just the first 3 until you put your finger in their middle and swipe up):

HP JumpStarts	Netflix		McAfee Security
Booking	Simple Solitaire		LastPass
Express VPN	Games	Utomik

Each tile represents an application program (app). If you tap a tile, you run its app.

Windows 11 In the Start menu, under the word “Pinned”, you see 18 choices, called tiles.

My Lenovo laptop shows these 18 tiles:

My HP desktop shows these 18 tiles:

(Your computer might show slightly different tiles.)

To the right of the 18 tiles, you see 2 tiny circles. If you tap the second circle (or the “€” that can appear temporarily), you see 10 extra tiles:

Instead of “Clock”, Lenovo shows “Alarms & Clock”.

To the right of those 10 tiles, you still see 2 tiny circles. If you tap the first circle (or the “�” that can appear temporarily), you see the first 18 tiles again.

In the Start menu, under the word “Recommended”, you see extra tiles that are more specialized, based on your previous history.

Each tile represents an application program (app). If you tap a tile, you run its app. (Exception: Lenovo’s “Alarms & Clock” has stopped working.)

Disappear

The Start menu disappears when you press the keyboard’s Escape key (which is at the keyboard’s top-left corner and says “Esc” on it) or tap the Windows Start button again or run an app.

App lists

Besides the tiles, your computer contains many other apps. Here’s how to find them.

Windows 10 In the Start menu, near the screen’s left edge, you see a column that starts listing all your apps. That list begins by listing 6 apps you’ve already used a lot, if any. Then come all the apps, in alphabetical order. That list is too tall to fit on the screen; to see the rest of the list, put your finger on a blank area in the list and swipe up (or repeatedly tap the keyboard’s down-arrow key, or move your mouse’s pointer to that list then rotate the mouse’s wheel toward you).

The Lenovo laptop comes with these 55 app choices:

The HP desktop comes with these 72 app choices:

Most of those app choices are simple apps, but some of those app choices (such as “Windows accessories”) are collections of apps; tap the collection’s name to see the details.

Windows 11 In the Start menu, tap “All apps”. Then you see a column that starts listing all your apps, in alphabetical order. That list is too tall to fit on the screen; to see the rest of the list, put your finger on a blank area in the list and swipe up (or move your mouse’s pointer to that list then rotate the mouse’s wheel toward you).

My Lenovo laptop shows these 65 app choices:

My HP desktop shows these 79 app choices:

Most of those app choices are simple apps, but some of those app choices (such as “Windows tools”) are collections of apps; tap the collection’s name to see the details.

 

Sleep

To turn the computer partly off, so it uses very little power, choose one these methods:

That makes the screen go black; the computer sleeps (uses very little power). While the computer sleeps, the power button’s light flashes repeatedly.

To make the computer wake up from its sleep, press the flashing power button (or the Enter key or reopen a laptop so you see the keyboard again). Then the screen turns on again. But unfortunately, you see just the lock screen (which shows just the date & time), until you press the Enter key then type your PIN.

Finally, the computer shows where you left off: the same tiles are still open.

The computer can be in 3 states:

Another way to make the computer sleep is to keep your hands off the computer equipment awhile: don’t touch the screen, keyboard, touchpad, or mouse.

The computer uses the following rule to decide when to blacken the screen and sleep. Lenovo laptop:

HP desktop:

If you want to change the rule, do this:

 

 

 

 

 

 

These tiles (on the Start menu) are nice & easy to use.

They’ve been improved. I’ll explain how they work now. (They worked differently when Windows 10 was first invented.)

News

On the Start menu, find the News tile.

Then you see the News window, which consumes most of the screen.

Maximize In the window’s top-right corner, you see an X.

Left of the X, you see either a little square (called the maximize button) or a pair of overlapping squares (called the resize-down button). Try tapping the maximize button or resize-down button several times, to see what happens. If you tap the maximize button, the window gets bigger, so it consumes the whole screen; if you tap the resize-down button, the window gets smaller, so it consumes about half the screen.

Maximize the News window (by tapping the maximize button if necessary), so the News window consumes the whole screen.

See headlines You see headlines. Lenovo laptop:

HP desktop:

To see headlines for other news articles, put your finger in the screen’s middle and swipe up. For each article, you see the headline and its main photo. You also see some ads (whose bottom-left corner says “Ad” in a green box).

Read an article When you find an article (or ad) that interests you, tap it. Then you can start reading the whole article (or ad). To see the rest of it, put your finger in the screen’s middle and swipe up.

Choose a category At the screen’s top, you see this menu of news categories:

If you care about just one category, tap the category you care about. To stop choosing that category, tap “My News” (which is in that menu).

If you care about just one narrow topic (such as “soccer”), do this:

 

Finish When you finish reading an article or using a narrow subject, tap the Back button (the left-arrow at the screen’s top-left corner), which makes the computer go back to the previous screenful.

When you finish using the News window, close the window by tapping its close button (the X in the window’s top-right corner). That makes the window disappear. Then you can see other things on the screen instead, and the computer can stop wasting time thinking about that window.

Weather

On the Start menu, find the Weather tile.

Tap that tile. Then you see the Weather window, which consumes most of the screen.

Windows 10 might do this chat:

Maximize In the window’s top-right corner, you see an X.

Left of the X, you see either a little square (called the maximize button) or a pair of overlapping squares (called the resize-down button). Try tapping the maximize button or resize-down button several times, to see what happens. (If you tap the maximize button, the window gets bigger, so it consumes the whole screen; if you tap the resize-down button, the window gets smaller, so it consumes about half the screen.)

Maximize the Weather window (by tapping the maximize button if necessary), so the Weather window consumes the whole screen.

Enjoy The screen’s top shows the city’s name, current temperature, and lots of details about the current weather.

Below that, you see the city’s weather forecast for today & the next 9 days. For each day, you see the high temperature, low temperature, and weather.

Tap the day that interests you. Then the screen’s bottom shows more details about that day.

To make sure you see lots of details, tap the Details button (which is at the screen’s right edge) instead of the Summary button. Then for each hour you see the temperature, weather, percentage chance of precipitation, and wind speed. For a day after today, you see that data for 1 AM, 2 AM, 3 AM, etc. To see later hours that don’t fit on the screen, tap “>” (which is at the screen’s right edge).

To see even more about that day, put your finger in the screen’s middle and swipe up.

To temporarily switch to a different city, do this:

Finish When you finish using the Weather window, tap the X in the window’s top-right corner.

Microsoft Edge

To access the Internet’s main part (the World Wide Web) easily, use Microsoft Edge. Choose one of these methods:

Have fun If Microsoft Edge hasn’t been used on your computer yet, here’s what happens:

You see the Microsoft Edge window. Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button if not maximized yet).

Near the screen’s top-left corner, you see 3 arrows (an arrow pointing left, an arrow pointing right, and an arrow pointing in a circle).

To the right of those arrows, you see the address box. It’s a white area that’s almost as wide as the screen. It usually contains a magnifying glass or a picture of a lock. If your computer was updated recently, it might contain “https” instead.

Tap the address box’s middle (in the wide blank space, not in the middle of other typing).

Type the Web address you want to visit. For example, if you want to visit yahoo.com, type:

While you’re typing a Web address, you see a list of Web pages matching what you’ve typed so far. If you want one of those Web pages, tap it; otherwise, finish your typing then press the Enter key.

To switch to a different Web page, tap in that same address box again and type the new Web address you want to visit, such as.

Flick up If a Web page is too tall to fit on the screen, here’s how to see the page’s bottom. Put your finger in the screen’s middle, then slide up (or, to move faster, flick your finger up, as if you were flicking an insect off your screen). To return to the Web page’s top, slide down or flick your finger down.

Headline If you see a headline, tap it to see its whole article.

Magnify To enlarge what’s on the screen (so you can see small type better), do this:

After you’ve magnified, here’s how to return the screen to normal (unmagnified):

Back After viewing several Web pages, you can go back to the previous Web page by doing this: tap the Back button (the left-arrow near the screen’s top-left corner).

Print Here’s how to print the Web page onto paper.

Make sure you’ve bought a printer, attached it to the computer (by wire or wirelessly), turned the printer’s power on, and put paper into the printer. Then, while viewing the Web page, choose one of these methods:

Near the screen’s top-left corner, you see the word “Printer”. Under “Printer”, you see the Printer box. Make sure that box contains your printer’s name. If it contains something else (such as “Microsoft Print to PDF”), tap it then tap your printer’s name.

Tap the Print button (which is blue and near the screen’s bottom-left corner).

The printer will try to print the Web page. (If the Web page is too tall or too wide to fit on a single sheet of paper, the printer might have difficulty printing the Web page’s extra parts.)

Details More details about Microsoft Edge are in the Web chapter, on pages 104-106.

Calculator

To run the Calculator app, do this:

Then you see the Calculator window (a big picture of a pocket calculator). Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button if not maximized yet).

How to calculate For your first experiment, make sure the screen’s top left corner says “Standard.” If it says something else, such as “Scientific”, tap “º” (which is at the screen’s top-left corner) then “Standard”.

To compute 42+5, you can use 4 methods:

If you use any of those methods successfully, the calculator will show the answer, 47, in the main box.

Try all 4 methods. See which method you prefer. (You’ll prefer whichever method you’ve practiced the most.)

Try fancier calculations, by tapping these calculator buttons on the screen (or pressing keys on the keyboard):

(To do +/- on the keyboard, do this: while holding down the Fn key, tap the F9 key.)

Standard versus scientific You can choose 2 popular kinds of calculators:

The first time you (or your colleagues) ask for the calculator, the computer shows a standard calculator (which is simple and cute). If you want to switch the calculator from standard to scientific, tap “º” (which is at the screen’s top-left corner) then “Scientific”.

Then you’ll see extra buttons, such as these:

If you tap the 7 button and then say “factorial” (by pressing the n! button), the computer will multiply together all the numbers up to 7 (1 times 2 times 3 times 4 times 5 times 6 times 7) and say 5,040 (which is called “7 factorial”). If you say “pi” (by pressing the p button), the computer will say 3.1415926535897932384626433832795.

After making the calculator scientific, you can switch the calculator back to standard again by tapping “º” then “Standard”.

Order of operations The calculator’s answer to “2+3´4=” depends on whether you chose standard or scientific:

Tricky buttons These 4 buttons are tricky:

Memory When the Calculator window is maximized, its top-right corner says “History” and “Memory”. The computer assumes you want “History” (which shows a history of what calculations you did). If you tap “Memory” instead, the computer shows what numbers you saved in memory, if any.

 

The calculator includes these memory buttons:

In that list of memory buttons, “the big number” means “the number that’s written in the biggest font on your screen”. It’s the number you’ve been typing most recently (or the number you computed most recently by tapping “=”).

Close When you finish using the Calculator window, tap its X (in the window’s top-right corner).

Camera

The Camera app lets you use the computer’s built-in camera.

Start by doing this:

Then you start seeing an alphabetical list of all apps. If you don’t see “Camera” yet, get to the “C” part of that list (by putting your finger in the list’s middle and swiping up). Tap “Camera”.

Use the camera If the computer asks “Let Camera access your precise location?” tap “Yes”.

Lenovo laptop:

HP desktop:

To have fun, grab your friends and favorite objects and put them next to you, so the screen shows them all! The quality will be better if the room is brightly lit, flooded with bright daylight, not at night. You can tilt the screen, to let the camera get a different view.

Anything near the camera will look bigger. For example, if you put your hand near the camera, your hand will look bigger than your head.

Zoom You can zoom in by doing this:

Zooming in makes the camera act as a magnifying glass!

To zoom back out, put 2 fingers in the screen’s middle then pinch (slide your fingers together).

Snap a photo To snap a photo, use one of these methods:

To snap several photos, do that procedure several times.

View photos While you’re using the Camera app, the screen’s bottom-right corner shows part of the newest photo you took. Tap that. Then you see the whole photo, filling almost the whole screen.

Here’s how to have fun with the photo:

Mirror image If you put a book in front of the screen, the book’s writing will look backwards (a mirror image) on the screen before you take the photo, but the final photo will show the book’s writing correctly.

Photos app To see all photos (from all sessions on all days), choose one of these methods:

You see the Photos app window, whose top-left corner says “Photos”. Maximize that window, answer any questions, then swipe up repeatedly, to see small versions of all photos.

To enlarge a photo, tap it. Then you can do these activities:

Close When you finish looking at photos, tap the left-arrow (near the screen’s top-left corner); if you don’t see the left-arrow, tap the X (at the screen’s top-right corner).

Delay Instead of snapping a photo immediately, you can delay the snap (until you’ve had a chance to get you & your friends to position yourselves in front of the screen properly and smile). Here’s how to delay.

Tap the Photo Timer button (the circular alarm clock at the screen’s left edge).

Record a movie The computer treats a movie as if it were a fancy photo. So before you try to record a movie, practice snapping and editing a simple photo, which is easier. After you’ve practiced photography, do the following….

To record a movie (instead of snapping a photo), tap the Video button (the small drawing of a movie camera, at the screen’s right edge) instead of the Take Photo button. Then the Video button gets surrounded by a white circle, and the screen’s bottom says 00:00.

Tap the Video button again (or press the keyboard’s Space bar or Enter key). Wait until you see a red dot in front of the “00:00”, then start recording.

The screen’s bottom shows how many minutes and seconds have elapsed so far. To finish recording, tap the big red square at the screen’s right edge (or press the keyboard’s Space bar or Enter key).

View movies The screen’s bottom-right corner shows part of the first frame of movie you made. Tap that. Then you see the whole first frame, filling almost the whole screen.

To watch the whole movie (visuals & sound), tap the triangle (which is near the screen’s bottom). To watch the movie again, tap the triangle again.

Here’s how to have fun with the movie:

To see all movies & photos (from all sessions on all days), choose one of these methods:

You see the Photos app window, which I explained previously. (To play a movie, get its first frame on the screen, then tap the triangle at the screen’s bottom-left corner.)

Trim a movie Here’s how to trim a movie (delete its beginning or ending):

Maps

The Maps app lets you see maps.

Run the Maps app by doing this:

If the computer says “Let Maps access your precise location” tap “Yes”.

You see the Maps window. Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button, if necessary).

Zoom in You see a map of part of the world. If you want to zoom in (so you see more details), use one of these methods:

Zoom out If you want to zoom out (so you see fewer details but see a bigger part of the world), shrink the map by doing this: pinch your fingers (by putting two fingers on the screen then sliding the fingers toward each other). If you do that several times, you’ll see most of the world on your screen.

Yourself While holding down the Ctrl key, hold down the Home key that’s to the right of the Enter key. That adjusts the map so your location is in the map’s middle. You see a blue circle there.

Map views Tap “Road” then “Aerial”. That shows you an aerial photo from a satellite.

To return to the normal view, do the opposite: tap “Aerial” then “Road”.

 

Your computer has some built-in word-processing programs. The simplest is called WordPad.

To run WordPad, do this:

You see the WordPad window. Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button if not maximized yet).

Now that the WordPad window consumes the whole screen, you can easily do word processing: you can easily type words and sentences. Try it! Type whatever sentences you wish to make up. For example, try typing a memo to your friends, or a story, or a poem. Be creative! Whatever you type is called a document.

Use the keyboard

On page 72, I explained how to examine the keyboard. Here are more hints to help you type.

Capitals Find the Shift keys. (One Shift key is next to the Z key. The other Shift key is next to the question-mark key.)

To capitalize a letter of the alphabet, type that letter while holding down the Shift key.

To capitalize a whole passage, do this:

Backspace key If you make a mistake, press the Backspace key. (It’s in the top-right corner of the keyboard’s main section. It’s to the right of the + key.)

To erase the last two characters you typed, press the Backspace key twice.

Word wrap If you’re typing near the screen’s right edge, and you type a word that’s too long to fit on the screen, the computer will automatically move the word to the line below. Moving the word to the line below is called word wrap.

Enter key When you finish typing a paragraph, press the Enter key. That makes the computer move to the line underneath so you can start typing the next paragraph.

The computer automatically leaves a slight gap between the paragraphs, to separate them. If you want the computer to leave a bigger gap between the paragraphs, press the Enter key twice instead of once.

Tab key If you want to indent a line (such as the first line of a paragraph), begin the line by pressing the Tab key (which is at the screen’s left edge). The computer will indent the line a half inch.

Nudge a phrase To move a phrase toward the right, press the Tab key several times before typing the phrase. To move a phrase down, press the Enter key several times before typing the phrase.

Ctrl symbols On your keyboard, below the two Shift keys, are two Control keys, which say “Ctrl” on them. You can use them to type special symbols:

To type an accented letter, type the accent first (while holding down the Ctrl key), then type the letter. Examples:

Alt symbols You can type these alternative symbols:

For example, here’s how to type the symbol é, whose code number is 130. Hold down the Alt key; and while you keep holding down the Alt key, type 130 by using the numeric keypad (the number keys on the keyboard’s far right side). When you finish typing 130, lift your finger from the Alt key, and you’ll see é on your screen! Try it!

That chart skips numbers whose results are unreliable (producing different results on different printers and different versions of Windows).

Windows copied that chart from DOS. But Windows goes beyond DOS by letting you also use this fancier chart:

For example, here’s how to type the symbol ©, whose code number is 0169: while holding down the Alt key, type 0169 on the numeric keypad.

Scroll arrows

If your document contains too many lines to fit on the screen, the screen will show just part of the document, accompanied by two arrows at the screen’s right edge: a scroll-up arrow (which is Ù) and a scroll-down arrow (which is Ú).

Insert characters

To insert extra characters anywhere in your document, you can tap where you want the extra characters to appear, then type the extra characters.

For example, suppose you typed the word “fat” and want to change it to “fault”. Tap between the “a” and the “t”, then type “ul”.

As you type the extra characters, the screen’s other characters move out of the way to make room for the extra characters.

4 ways to move the cursor While you’re inserting the extra characters, you see a blinking vertical line there, called the cursor (or caret or insertion point). To move the cursor to a different place in your document (so you can insert characters there instead), you can use 4 methods.

2 ways to erase You can erase nearby mistakes by pressing the Backspace key or Delete key.

Split a paragraph

Here’s how to split a long paragraph in half, to form two short paragraphs.

Decide which word should begin the second short paragraph. Tap the left edge of that word’s first letter.

Press the Backspace key (to erase the space before that word), then press the Enter key. Now you’ve split the long paragraph in two!

If you want to double-space between the two short paragraphs, press the Enter key again. If you want to indent the second paragraph, press the Tab key.

Combine paragraphs

After typing two paragraphs, here’s how to combine them, to form a single paragraph that’s longer.

Tap the first paragraph’s end. Press the Delete key several times, to delete unwanted Enters and Tabs. Now you’ve combined the two paragraphs into one!

Then press the Space bar (to insert a space between the two sentences).

Zoom

You can zoom in 2 ways.

Stretch zoom Try this experiment: put two fingers together at the screen’s middle, then spread those fingers apart. That’s called stretch or zoom in. That makes the screen’s characters enlarge, so you can read them even if you’re sitting far from the screen or have poor vision. It’s like looking at the document through a magnifying glass: the document looks enlarged, so you can see the details of each word and character more clearly; but not as many words and characters fit on the screen. Use the arrow keys to see different parts of the page.

To make the screen’s characters shrink, do the opposite: put two fingers apart at the screen’s middle, then pinch those fingers together. That’s called pinch or zoom out. That makes the screen’s characters shrink, so they’re harder to read but you can fit more characters and pages onto the screen.

When you finish playing with the zoom, stretch or pinch until the screen’s bottom-right corner says “100%”, which means you’re back to normal size.

Slider zoom At the screen’s bottom-right corner, you see a plus sign (+). Left of it, you see a minus sign (-). Between those signs, you see the zoom slider, which is a pentagon.

Try this experiment: drag the zoom slider toward the right, using one of these methods:

If you drag the zoom slider toward the right, the screen’s characters enlarge, so you can read them even if you’re sitting far from the screen or have poor vision. It’s like looking at the document through a magnifying glass: the document looks enlarged, so you can see the details of each word and character more clearly; but not as many words and characters fit on the screen. Use the arrow keys to see different parts of the page.

If you drag that slider toward the left, the screen’s characters shrink, so they’re harder to read but you can fit more characters and pages onto the screen.

When you finish playing with the zoom slider, put it back to its normal position (the middle), so the number left of the minus sign is “100%” (or a number close to 100%, such “98%”), by dragging the slider (or pressing the keyboard’s arrow keys, which give you more accurate control).

All delete

Here’s how to delete the entire document, so you can start over:

 

Quick Access Toolbar

At the screen’s top-left corner, you see the Quick Access Toolbar. It’s a row of icons (little pictures) called buttons. The 2 most important buttons are:

If you hover over a button (by moving the arrow pointer there, without tapping), the computer will tell you the button’s name.

Here’s how to use those buttons.…

Save button To save the document you’ve been typing (copy it onto a disk or onto a solid-state drive), tap the Save button.

Then invent a name for your document.

For example, if you named the document “mary”, the computer puts a document called “mary.rtf” into the Documents folder. (The “.rtf” is hidden from you but stands for “rich text format”.)

Afterwards, if you change your mind and want to do more editing, go ahead! When you finish that extra editing, save it by tapping the Save button again.

Save often! If you’re typing a long document, tap the Save button about every 10 minutes. Tap it whenever you get to a good stopping place and think, “What I’ve typed so far looks good!” Then if an accident happens, you’ll lose at most 10 minutes of work, and you can return to the last version you felt good about.

Instead of tapping the Save button, you can use this shortcut: while holding down the Ctrl key, tap the S key (which stands for “Save”).

Undo button If you make a mistake (such as accidentally deleting some text or accidentally inserting some useless text), tap (or click) the Undo button (which is an arrow turning back). That makes the computer undo your last activity, so your text returns to the way it looked before you made your boo-boo. (To undo your last two activities, tap the Undo button twice.)

Instead of tapping the Undo button, you can use this shortcut: while holding down the Ctrl key, tap the Z key (which stands for “Zap”).

If you tap the Undo button, the computer might undo a different activity than you expected. For example, it might even erase everything you typed! If tapping the Undo button accidentally makes the text look even worse instead of better, and you wish you hadn’t tapped the Undo button, you can “undo the undo” by tapping the Redo button (which is next to the Undo button and shows a blue arrow curving to the right, so it bends forward).

Instead of tapping the Redo button, you can use this shortcut: while holding down the Ctrl key, tap the Y key (which stands for “Yes, I do want it, very much”).

File menu

Near the screen’s top-left corner, you see the word “File”. Tap it. Then you see the File menu:

From that menu, choose whatever you wish (by tapping it). Here are the most popular choices.…

Save If you choose Save from the File menu (by tapping the word “Save” after tapping “File”), you get the same result as tapping the Save button that’s on the Quick Access Toolbar.

Save as Suppose you’ve already saved a document then edited it some more, but you’re not sure you like the new editing. Try this experiment.…

Choose “Save as” from the File menu (by tapping the phrase “Save as” after tapping “File”); when you do that, make sure you tap the phrase “Save as”, not just the arrow next to it.

Then invent (and type) a new name for the document. At the end of the new name, press Enter.

The computer will save the document’s new, edited version. That new, edited version will have the new name you invented.

The document’s old original version will still be saved also and keep its old original name. The computer will contain both versions of the document.

How to finish

When you finish working on a document, choose Exit or New or a previous document from the File menu.

Exit Whenever you want to stop using WordPad, choose Exit from the File menu (or tap the WordPad window’s X button).

Then you see the Desktop screen. If you want to see the Start screen, press the Windows Start key.

New If you choose New (instead of Exit) from the File menu, the computer will let you start typing a new, different document.

A previous document If you want to reuse a previous document you had saved, tap “File”, so you see the File menu.

To the right of the File menu, you see a list of the
9 documents you used most recently. That list starts with the most recent.

If you want to use one of those 9 documents, tap it.

If you want to use a different document, which is not on that list of 9, do this:

Didn’t save? If you didn’t save your document before doing those “how to finish” procedures, the computer asks, “Do you want to save?” If you tap “Save”, the computer saves your document’s most recent version to the hard disk; if you tap “Don’t Save” instead, the computer ignores and forgets your most recent editing.

How to hide the recently-used list To the right of the File menu, you see a list of the 9 documents you used most recently. That list might annoy you, for two reasons:

If the document list annoys you, delete documents from it, as follows.…

Print

Here’s how to print a document onto paper.

Make sure you’ve bought a printer, attached it to the computer, turned the printer’s power on, and put paper into the printer.

If your computer has never used that printer before, do this:

Choose Print from the File menu (by tapping the word “Print” after tapping “File”); when you do that, make sure you tap the word “Print”, not the arrow next to it.

Press Enter. The computer will print the document onto paper.

Font group

To make sure your computer acts normal, tap the word “Home” (which is near the screen’s top-left corner).

Then you see these 5 words: Clipboard, Font, Paragraph, Insert, Editing. Above each word, you see a group of icons. I’ll explain how to use each group. Let’s start with the Font group, which looks like this:

Underline Here’s how to underline a phrase (like this).

Activate the Underline button (which says U on it) by tapping it. Activating the button makes the button turn medium-blue (not just light blue). Then type the phrase you want underlined. Then deactivate the Underline button (by tapping it again).

Go ahead: try it now! Practice using the underline button before you progress to more advanced buttons!

Instead of tapping the Underline button, you can use this shortcut: while holding down the Ctrl key, tap the U key.

Bold Here’s how to make a phrase be bold (like this). Activate the Bold button (which says B on it) by tapping it. Then type the phrase you want emboldened. Then deactivate the Bold button (by tapping it again).

Here’s how to make a phrase be bold and underlined (like this). Activate the Bold and Underline buttons (by tapping them both). Then type the phrase. Then deactivate those buttons (by tapping them again).

Instead of tapping the Bold button, you can use this shortcut: while holding down the Ctrl key, tap the B key.

Italic Here’s how to italicize a phrase (like this). Activate the Italic button (which says I on it) by tapping it. Then type the phrase you want italicized. Then deactivate the Italic button (by tapping it again).

Instead of tapping the Italic button, you can use this shortcut: while holding down the Ctrl key, tap the I key.

Superscript Here’s how to make a phrase be tiny and raised (^{like this}). Activate the Superscript button (which says x² on it) by tapping it. Then type the phrase you want superscripted. Then deactivate the Superscript button (by tapping it again).

The superscript button helps you type math formulas, such as the Pythagorean Theorem (a² + b² = c²).

Subscript Here’s how to make a phrase be tiny and lowered (_{like this}). Activate the Subscript button (which says x₂ on it) by tapping it. Then type the phrase you want subscripted. Then deactivate the Superscript button (by tapping it again).

The subscript button helps you type math formulas, such as the Fibonacci Series (F_n+2 = F_n + F_n+1) and the Slope Formula:
m = (y₂ - y₁) / (x₂ - x₁).

Strikethrough Here’s how to make a phrase be crossed out (like this). Activate the Strikethrough button (which says abc on it) by tapping it. Then type the phrase you want crossed out. Then deactivate the Strikethrough button (by tapping it again).

The Strikethrough button helps you type semi-censored sentences, such as “You’re an asshole showing little empathy for the team’s needs.”

Font size Look at the Font Size box (which has a number in it). Usually that box contains the number 11, so you’re typing characters that are 11 points high.

To type characters that are bigger or smaller, you can use 4 methods:

Any new characters you type afterwards will be the size you chose. (Characters typed earlier don’t change size.)

The popular sizes look like this:

When you finish typing the enlarged or reduced characters, here’s how to return to typing characters that are normal size (11 points high): tap the down-arrow that’s to the right of the Font Size box, then tap 11.

Font You see a box saying “Calibri”. That’s called the Font box.

Next to that box is the symbol 6. Tap it.

You’ll start seeing the Font menu, which is a list of fonts in alphabetical order. To see the rest of the list, choose one of these methods:

Tap whichever font you want. The list includes these 132 fonts (plus their variants):

Though Microsoft likes the font called “Calibri”, the best fonts are “Times New Roman”, “Tahoma”, “Comic Sans MS”, and “Courier New”. Here’s how they look:

 

 

 

After you’ve tapped a font, any new characters you type will be in that font. (The characters you typed earlier remain unaffected.)

When you finish typing in that font, here’s how you can return to typing characters in the Calibri font:

 

Text color Normally, the characters you type are black. Here’s how to make them a different color, such as red.

Look at the Text color button, which has an underlined A on it. Notice the color of the A’s underline. If it’s the color you want, tap the underline. If it’s not the color you want, do this instead:

Afterwards, whatever characters you type will be in the color you chose. (The characters you typed earlier remain unaffected.)

When you finish typing in that color, here’s how to return to typing characters that are normal (black): tap the down-arrow that’s to the right of the A’s underline, then tap “Automatic” (which means “normal”).

Text highlight color Normally, the characters have a white background, as if they were on plain paper. Here’s how to make the background be a different color, such as yellow, as if you were using a yellow highlighting pen.

Look at the Text highlight color button, which is just to the right of the Text color button and shows a pen writing on paper. Notice the paper’s color. If it’s the color you want, tap the underline. If it’s not the color you want (if it’s just white or pale blue), do this instead:

Afterwards, whatever characters you type will be highlighted in the background color you chose. (The characters you typed earlier remain unaffected.)

When you finish using that highlighter, here’s how to return to typing normal characters (on a white background): tap the Text highlight color button’s down-arrow, then tap “No color” (which means “normal”).

Select

Here’s how to dramatically change a phrase you typed.

Tap in the phrase’s first word. Then while holding down the Shift key, tap in the phrase’s last word. That makes the whole phrase get highlighted: its white background turns blue. Turning the phrase blue is called selecting the phrase.

(That’s the easiest way to select a phrase. Instead of tapping in the phrase’s first word, you can try tapping the left edge of the phrase’s first letter. Instead of tapping in the phrase’s last word, you can try tapping the right edge of the phrase’s last letter.)

Then say what to do to the phrase. For example, choose one of these activities:

Go ahead! Try it now! It’s fun!

 

Many ways to select To select a phrase, you can choose any of these methods:

Document vanishes While you’re typing a document, if the whole
document suddenly disappears, you accidentally deleted it. Here’s why:

Cure:

Drag a phrase To move a phrase to a new location, just “select the phrase, and then drag from the phrase’s middle to the new location.” Here are the details.

Select the phrase you want to move, so the phrase turns blue. Then take your finger off everything. Finally do this….

If you want to use a mouse:

If you want to use a touchscreen:

If you want to use a touchpad:

In that procedure, you drag the phrase to a new location then drop it there. That procedure is called drag & drop.

Clipboard group

In the Clipboard group, you see 3 choices: Cut, Paste, and Copy.

Cut and paste Here’s another way to move a phrase to a new location.

Select the phrase (so it turns blue). Tap the Cut button (which looks like a pair of scissors). The phrase will vanish from its original location.

Tap the new location where you want the phrase to reappear. Then tap the
Paste button’s picture of a clipboard (not the word “Paste”). The phrase will appear at that new location.

Here are shortcuts:

Copy Here’s another way to copy a phrase, so the phrase appears in your document twice.

Select the phrase (so it turns blue). Tap the Copy button (which looks like a pair of dog-eared pages). Tap where you want the copy of the phrase to appear, then tap the Paste button’s clipboard. The copy will appear at the new location, so the phrase will be in your document twice.

If you want the phrase to appear in your document a third time, tap where you want that additional copy to appear, then tap the Paste button’s clipboard again. If you want the phrase to appear in your document a fourth time, tap where you want that additional copy, then tap the Paste button’s clipboard again.

Here’s a shortcut: instead of tapping the Copy button, you can press Ctrl with C.

Paragraph group

The Paragraph group looks like this:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alignment buttons While typing a line, you can tap one of these alignment buttons:

 

 

 

     Align     Center      Align   Justify

     text                           text

     left                        right

Tapping the Center button makes the line be centered,

Tapping the Align text right button makes the line be at the right margin,

Tapping the Align text left button makes the line be at the left margin,

Tapping one of those buttons affects not just the line you’re typing but also all other lines in the same paragraph.

Tapping the Justify button makes the paragraph be justified, so the paragraph’s bottom line is at the left margin, and each of the paragraph’s other lines is at both margins (by inserting extra space between the words),

When you tap one of those alignment buttons, you’re activating it. That button deactivates when you tap a different alignment button instead.

When you start typing a new document, the computer assumes you want the document to be aligned left, so the computer activates the Align Left button. If you want a different alignment, tap a different alignment button instead.

Examples:

Tapping one of those alignment buttons affects the entire paragraph you’re typing, but the paragraphs you typed earlier remain unaffected, unless you do this:

When you start typing a new paragraph, the computer gives that paragraph the same alignment as the paragraph above, unless you say differently (by tapping one of the alignment buttons).

Here’s how to type a centered title:

Here are shortcuts:

Line spacing While typing a paragraph, you can tap the Line Spacing button (which has an up-arrow and down-arrow on it), which makes this menu appear:

Tapping “2.0” makes the paragraph be double-spaced (so there’s a blank line under each line). Tapping “1.0” makes the paragraph be single-spaced (without extra space under the lines). Tapping “1.15” makes the paragraph have a little extra space between each pair of lines; that’s what the computer assumes you want if you don’t say otherwise.

The computer assumes you want a 10-point-high blank space under the paragraph, to separate that paragraph from the paragraph below. If you don’t want that space, remove the checkmark that’s left of “Add 10pt space after paragraphs” (by tapping it).

Indentation Before typing a paragraph, you can press the Tab key. That makes the computer indent the paragraph’s first line, half an inch.

If you want to indent all lines in the paragraph, do this instead of pressing the Tab key: while typing the paragraph, tap the Increase indent button (which shows a right-arrow pointing at lines). That makes the computer indent all lines in the paragraph. (The paragraphs you typed earlier remain unaffected.)

When you start typing a new paragraph, the computer indents that paragraph if the paragraph above it was indented.

If you indented a paragraph by tapping the Increase Indent button but then change your mind, here’s how to unindent the paragraph: tap in the paragraph, then tap the Decrease indent button (which shows a left-arrow pointing from lines).

For example, suppose you start typing a new document. Here’s how to make just paragraphs 3, 4, and 5 be indented.

To indent a paragraph you typed earlier, tap in the middle of that paragraph and then tap the Increase Indent button. To unindent a paragraph you typed earlier, tap in its middle and then tap the Decrease Indent button.

If you tap the Increase indent button twice instead of just once, the computer will indent the paragraph farther. After typing that doubly indented paragraph, if you want the paragraph below to be unindented you must tap the Decrease indent button twice.

Each time you tap the Increase Indent button, the computer indents the paragraph a half inch farther. Each time you tap the Decrease indent button, the computer indents the paragraph a half inch less.

Start a list Here’s a different way to indent an entire paragraph: while typing the paragraph, activate the Start a list button (which is the third button in the Paragraph group) by tapping it. That makes the computer indent the paragraph and also put a bullet (the symbol ·) to the left of the paragraph’s first line. That’s called a bulleted paragraph. The bullet symbol is indented a quarter inch; the paragraph’s words are indented a half inch.

After you’ve typed a bulleted paragraph, any new paragraphs you type underneath will be bulleted also — so you’re creating a list of bulleted paragraphs — until you request an unbulleted paragraph (by deactivating the Start a list button).

Here’s how to request different symbols instead of the bullet symbol: instead of tapping the Start a list button, tap that button’s down-arrow. Then you see 6 popular choices:

Tap the choice you want. Your choice affects the current paragraph. It also affects the paragraphs underneath that are part of the same list. It also affects each list you start typing in the future (until you choose different symbols instead or start a new document).

Editing group

In the Editing group, you see 3 choices: Find, Replace, and “Select all”.

Find Here’s how to make the computer search through your document to find whether you’ve used the word “love”:

Suppose you’ve written a history of America and want to find the part where you started talking about Lincoln. If you forget what page that was, no problem! Just put the cursor at the document’s beginning, tap Find, type “Lincoln”, and press Enter.

Replace You can search for a word and replace it with a different word. For example, here’s how to change each “love” in your document to “idolize”:

The computer preserves capitalization. For example, if the document said —

the computer changes it to:

Notice that when told to change “love” to “idolize”, the computer unfortunately also changes “glove” to “gidolize”.

The Replace command helps you zip through many chores:

Select all To select everything in the document (so the whole document is highlighted in blue), use one of these methods:

Insert group

Here’s how to make the computer type the date & time.

In the Insert group, tap “Date and time”. The computer will show a list of formats, like this:

Double-tap the format you want. The computer will type the date or time in the format you requested.

 

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

Like WordPad, Notepad comes free as part of 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, do this:

You see the Notepad. Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button if not maximized yet).

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 solid-state drive or hard drive), Notepad saves info about which characters you typed (letters of the alphabet, digits, symbols, Space bar, Enter key, and Tab key) but 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:

The font you choose affects Notepad forever (it affects how Notepad displays all documents), unless you switch fonts again. 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.

Drag & drop?

To move a phrase, WordPad lets you use drag & drop.

 

Your computer has some built-in graphics programs. The most famous is called Paint.

To use Paint, do this:

Then you see the Paint window. Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button if not maximized yet).

Start drawing

To draw, you can use 3 methods:

Try all 3 methods!

Colors

When you start drawing, the computer assumes you want to draw in black.

At the screen’s top, above the word “Colors”, you see the 20 main colors, which have these names:

To draw in one of those colors instead of in black, tap the color you want. Whatever you draw next will be that color. The computer will keep using that color until you choose a different color instead (or you exit from the Paint program).

If you don’t like any of the 20 main colors, try this:

Warning: don’t tap the Color 2 button, until I explain later how to use it properly.

Eraser

If you drew a shape badly, erase it and try again! To erase, tap the Eraser button (which is pink and above “Tools”). Then your mouse (or finger) acts as eraser instead of a brush.

Erase your mistake by dragging across your picture’s bad part. (While dragging, press the mouse’s left button or the touchpad’s bottom-left corner.)

When you finish erasing, tap the Brushes icon (which is above the word “Brushes”) and try drawing better.

Undo

If you make a mistake, try tapping the Undo button (which is at the screen’s top and shows a blue arrow bending back to the left). That undoes your last activity. For example, it can undo your last brushstroke or your last erasure. If you tap the Undo button twice, it will erase your last two activities.

If you tapped the Undo button but wish you hadn’t, you can “undo the undo” by tapping the Redo button, which is to the right of the Undo button and shows a blue arrow bending forward to the right.

The Undo and Redo buttons work just if their arrows are blue. While an arrow is gray, the button doesn’t work.

All delete

Here’s how to delete the entire picture, so you can start over.

While holding down the Ctrl key, press the A key. That means “all”. All of the picture is surrounded by a blue dotted line.

Then press the Delete key.

The entire picture disappears, so you can start over!

Change the brush

To change how thick the brushstrokes are, tap “Size” then tap the thickness you want.

If you tap the down-arrow under “Brushes”, you see 9 different types of brushes:

Tap the type of brush you want, then tap “Size” and choose a thickness for that brush. If you’re a beginner, choose the thickest size, so you can see clearly how that type of brushstroke looks.

If you tap the Pencil button (which is above the Eraser button and looks like a yellow pencil), you’ll draw with a hard pencil (instead of a softer tool). After tapping the Pencil button, tap “Size” to choose the pencil’s thickness. To switch from the hard pencil back to softer tools (such as brushes), tap the icon above “Brushes” (to return to the same type of brush you were using before) or tap the down-arrow under “Brushes” (to choose a different brush type).

Shapes

Above the word “Shapes”, you see these 21 shapes:

 

 

 

 

 

The first 6 shapes are the most important. Here’s how to use them.

Line To draw a line that’s exactly straight, tap the Line shape (which is the first shape). Then put the mouse pointer where you want the line to begin, and drag to where you want the line to end.

While dragging, if you hold down the Shift key, you’ll force the line to be perfectly simple (perfectly vertical, perfectly horizontal, or at a perfect 45-degree angle).

Rectangle To draw a rectangle (box) whose sides are exactly straight, click the Rectangle shape (which is the 4^th shape). Then put the mouse pointer where you want the rectangle’s top-left corner to be, and drag to where you want the rectangle’s opposite corner.

While dragging, if you hold down the Shift key, you’ll force the rectangle to be a perfect square.

Rectangle variants Instead of tapping the Rectangle shape, try tapping these variants:

Polygon To draw a polygon (a shape that has many straight sides and corners), tap the Polygon shape (which is the sixth shape). Then put the mouse pointer where you want the polygon’s first corner to be, and drag to where you want the second corner. Tap where you want the third corner, tap where you want the fourth corner, tap where you want the fifth corner, etc.

At the last corner, double-tap instead of tap. The double-tapping makes the computer complete the polygon: it makes the computer draw the final side back to the first corner.

Curve To draw a curve, tap the Curve shape (which is the second shape). Then put the mouse pointer where you want the curve to begin, and drag to where you want the curve to end. Then take your finger off the mouse’s button.

You temporarily see a straight line. To turn that line into a curve, bend the line’s middle, by pointing at the line’s middle and dragging that midpoint in the direction you want to bend it. (While doing that dragging, try wiggling the mouse in all four directions, until the line bends close to the way you want.) Then take your finger off the mouse’s button.

To bend the line more, and even create a second bend (arc) in the line, drag again. (You get just two chances to bend the line.)

Other shapes If you tap one of the other shapes (triangle, diamond, pentagon, octagon, arrow, star, or callout), here’s what to do next. Imagine the shape is enclosed (embedded) in a box (rectangle). In your picture, put the mouse pointer where you want the box’s top left corner to be, and drag to where you want the box’s bottom right corner.

When you finish dragging, you’ll see the shape is in your picture and temporarily enclosed in a blue box.

If the shape isn’t yet exactly where you want it, move it by doing this:

You can also adjust the shape by doing this:

Afterwards, when you tap elsewhere, the shape stays in your picture, though the temporary blue box vanishes.

Brushes for shapes To draw each of those shapes, the computer uses a normal brush unless you say otherwise.

To say otherwise, do this:

To return to using a normal brush, tap the shape again then “Outline” then “Solid color”.

Finish When you finish playing with shapes, tap the icon above “Brushes”.

Color picker

Look at what you’ve created. In that picture, if you see a color you’ve used and like, here’s how to use it again:

Save

To save the picture you’ve been creating (copy it onto a disk or onto a solid-state drive), tap the Save button. (It’s at the screen’s top, near the left edge. It’s a purple-and-white square that’s supposed to look like a floppy disk, though it also looks like a TV set.)

If you haven’t saved any pictures yet, tell the computer which folder to put pictures in, by doing this:

If you haven’t saved this picture yet, give this picture a name, by doing this:

For example, if you named the picture “mary”, the computer puts a picture called “mary.png” into the Saved Pictures folder, which is in the Pictures folder, which is on your hard disk or sold-state drive. (The “.png” is hidden from you but stands for “portable network graphics”.)

Afterwards, if you change your mind and want to do more editing, go ahead! When you finish that extra editing, save it by tapping the Save button again.

Save often! Tap the Save button about every 10 minutes. Tap it whenever you get to a good stopping place and think, “What I’ve drawn so far looks good!” Then if an accident happens, you’ll lose at most 10 minutes of work, and you can return to the last version you felt good about.

File menu

Near the screen’s top-left corner, you see the word “File”. Tap it. Then you see the File menu:

From that menu, choose whatever you wish (by tapping it). Here are the most popular choices.…

Save If you choose Save from the File menu (by tapping the word “Save” after tapping “File”), you get the same result as tapping the Save button that’s on the Quick Access Toolbar.

Save as Suppose you’ve already saved a picture then edited it some more, but you’re not sure you like the new editing. Try this experiment.…

Choose “Save as” from the File menu (by tapping the phrase “Save as” after tapping the “File”); when you do that, make sure you tap the phrase “Save as”, not just the arrow next to it.

Then invent (and type) a new name for the picture. At the end of the new name, press Enter.

The computer will copy the picture’s new, edited version onto the hard disk or solid-state drive. That new, edited version will have the new name you invented.

The picture’s old original version will be saved also and keep its old original name. The computer will contain both versions of the picture.

How to finish

When you finish working on a picture, choose Exit or New or a previous picture from the File menu.

Exit Whenever you want to stop using Paint, choose Exit from the File menu (or tap the Paint window’s X button). You see the Desktop screen. If you want to see the Start screen instead, press the Windows Start key.

New If you choose New (instead of Exit) from the File menu, the computer will let you start creating a new, different picture.

A previous picture If you want to reuse a previous picture you had saved, tap “File”, so you see the File menu. To the right of the File menu, you see a list of the 9 pictures you used most recently: that list starts with the most recent. Tap whichever picture you want to use. If you want to use a different picture, which is not on that list of 9, do this:

Didn’t save? If you didn’t save your picture before doing those “how to finish” procedures, the computer asks, “Do you want to save?” If you tap “Save”, the computer copies your document’s most recent version to the hard disk; if you tap “Don’t Save” instead, the computer ignores and forgets your most recent editing.

Print

Here’s how to print a picture onto paper.

Make sure you’ve bought a printer, attached it to the computer, turned the printer’s power on, and put paper into the printer.

Choose Print from the File menu (by tapping the word “Print” after tapping “File”); when you do that, make sure you tap the word “Print”, not just the arrow next to it.

Press Enter. The computer will print the picture onto paper.

If your printer doesn’t have colored ink, it will print shades of gray instead.

Text

Here’s how to type words in your picture.

Tap the Text button (which is in the Tools group and looks like an A). In your picture, tap where you want the first word’s first letter to begin. Type the words.

The words will be surrounded temporarily by a blue box that’s about 1.4 inches wide. If you type more words than the box can hold, the extra words will appear underneath, and the box will automatically grow taller, to hold the extra words.

On the box’s edges, you see 8 handles (tiny squares you can drag). If you want to widen the box, drag any handle on the box’s right edge: drag it toward the right, by putting your finger on a mouse or touchpad (not touchscreen, which isn’t accurate enough).

While typing, you see the Font group, which resembles WordPad’s: it lets you change the font and the font’s size and create underlines, boldface, italics, and strikethrough.

Finish When you finish creating and editing the text box, tap “Home” (which is near the screen’s top-left corner) then the icon above “Brushes”.

Select

Here’s how to alter part of your picture.

First, say which part of your picture to alter, by using one of these methods.…

Then say what to do to that part of your picture. You have these choices:

Finish When you finish playing with selections, tap the icon above “Brushes”.

Color 2

The computer can handle two colors simultaneously. The main color is called Color 1; the alternative color is called Color 2.

To draw, the computer normally uses color 1. To use color 2 instead, do this.…

Tap “Color 2”. Then tap a color you want to become color 2; for example, try tapping yellow.

To draw using color 2, use one of these methods:

When you erase (by using the Eraser button), the computer will make the erasure be Color 2 (instead of white).

Fill To make a shape’s middle be color 2 (instead of transparent), do this:

Changing color 1 again After you’ve tapped “Color 2”, any color you tap will become color 2. To change color 1 instead, tap “Color 1” before tapping a color.

Zoom slider

At the screen’s bottom-right corner, you see a plus sign (+). Left of it, you see a minus sign (-). Between those signs, you see the zoom slider, which is a pentagon.

Try this experiment: drag the zoom slider toward the right. That makes the picture appear bigger, so you can see it even if you’re sitting far from the screen and have poor vision. It’s like looking at the picture through a magnifying glass: the picture looks enlarged, so you can see the details of each brushstroke more clearly; but not as much of the picture fits on the screen. (To see the rest of the picture, drag the scroll bars, which are dark gray, at the screen’s right edge and bottom.)

When you finish playing with the zoom slider, drag it back to its normal position (the middle), so the number left of the minus sign is “100%”.

 

Windows has nifty features.

Force an update

To shut down the computer, I told you to do this:

Every few days, Microsoft invents improvements to Windows 10. When Microsoft thinks it’s very important for you to install those updates, it warns you, but I recommend you update more often (at least once a week), by forcing an update. Here’s how to force an update.

Windows 10 Tap the Windows Start button (which has the Windows logo) then the Settings service’s symbol (a gear, which looks like a bumpy circle).

You see a Settings window. Maximize it (so it consumes the whole screen). If the screen’s top-left corner has a left-arrow
(“ß Settings”), tap that arrow (so the screen’s top-left corner says just “Settings”).

You see 13 choices:

Tap “Update & Security”. Tap the “Windows Update” that’s at the screen’s left edge. If you see “Check for updates”, tap that. If the computer finds updates, it will say “Downloading” then “Installing”.

When the process is done, close the Settings window (by tapping its X).

Windows 11 On the Start menu, tap the Settings tile (which is normally the 3^rd tile in the 2^nd row). You see the Settings window, which consumes the whole screen. Tap “Windows Update” (which is at the screen’s bottom-left corner).

At the screen’s right edge, you see a blue button (which says “Check for updates” or “Install now”. Tap it.

When the process is done, tap whatever’s at the screen’s top-right corner (an X or “Restart now”).

Warranty

Just on the HP desktop:

Taskbar

As I mentioned before, the taskbar is a gray bar that runs all the way across the screen’s bottom. The taskbar includes the Windows Start button, the time & date, and everything else in that gray bar.

Windows 10 On the Lenovo laptop, the taskbar includes 19 icons:

On the HP desktop, the taskbar includes 20 icons:

Most of those icons are part of Windows 10, but the icons I wrote in boldface are extras from the computer’s manufacturer.

Windows 11 On the Lenovo laptop, the taskbar includes 20 icons:

On the HP desktop, the taskbar includes 19 icons:

Most of those icons are part of Windows 11, but the icons I wrote in boldface are extras from the computer’s manufacturer.

Underline While you’re running a task (app), the taskbar shows an underlined button for that task. For example, while you’re running the News app, you see an underlined News button on the taskbar. While you’re running the Weather app, you see an underlined Weather button on the taskbar.

Simultaneous apps Try the following experiment.

Start running the News app (by tapping the Windows Start button then the News tile). Now the taskbar includes an underlined News button (which is red).

While you’re still running the News app, start running the Weather app (as I explained on page 76). Now the taskbar includes an underlined News button and also an underlined Weather button, because News and Weather are both running simultaneously: they’re both in the computer’s RAM memory chips. The Weather window is blocking your view of the News window, but News is still running also: the News window is hiding behind the Weather window.

To see the News window better, tap the News button on the toolbar. Then you’ll see the News window clearly, which will block your view of the Weather window.

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

 

Try this trick: while both programs are running, tap the
Task View button. That button is on the taskbar.

Then the screen’s top shows miniature copies of the News and Weather windows, side-by-side: the News window is on the right; the Weather window is on the left. If you tap one of those windows, it enlarges to fill the whole screen.

Clipboard

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 For a fun experiment, tap the
Print Screen key. It’s on the keyboard’s top row, next to the F12 key.

(If the computer says “OneDrive”, I recommend you tap “No thanks”, to keep things simple.)

That makes the computer secretly take a snapshot of your whole screen and put that photo onto the Clipboard.

Instead of just pressing the Print Screen key, try these variants:

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

Microsoft Store

To access the Microsoft Store (where you can buy apps and get some free), choose one of these methods:

You see the Microsoft Store window. Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button if not maximized yet).

You see Microsoft’s app store, which lets you buy (or get free!) apps from the Internet and copy them to your computer.

You see the top apps (in an area called “Home”). If you put your finger in the screen’s middle and swipe up, you see these category names:

Below (or to the right of) each category name, you see some apps in that category. To see even more apps in a category, tap “See all”, which is below a category’s name (or to the right of a category’s name, at the screen’s right edge).

At the screen’s top-left corner, you also see this menu:

Go explore! Tap whatever interests you, or do this:

Whenever you want to return to the previous screen, tap the left-arrow at the screen’s top-left corner. Whenever you want to stop browsing through the app store, close the Store window by tapping its X (at the screen’s top-right corner).

For each app, you see its price, or it says “Installed” (which means you already got it) or “Free” (though the typical “Free” app will encourage you to spend money later to add extra features).

When you find an app that interests you, do this:

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

System about

To find out what kind of computer you have, do this:

You see a message about your computer.

What you see For example, my Lenovo laptop using Windows 11 said:

My HP desktop using Windows 11 said:

What it means Here’s what the message means.

Finish When you finish admiring your computer’s message, close the window (by tapping its X button).

Drive letters

Each drive has a letter.

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

A typical computer has these drive details:

The Lenovo laptop includes just 1 drive:

The HP desktop includes 2 drives:

But you can buy extra drives and insert them!

Here’s how drives are named:

File Explorer

To find out what drives are in your computer and how they’re lettered, tap the File Explorer button. (It’s yellow, looks like a manila folder, and is at the screen’s bottom on the taskbar.)

You see the File Explorer window. Maximize it (by tapping its maximize button if not maximized yet).

Tap the up-arrow (which is left of “Quick access”). Double-tap “This PC”.

Under the heading “Devices and drives”, you see an icon (little picture) labeled “C:” (for the solid-state drive or hard drive’s main part). You see icons for any other drives also.

Drive C’s files Below the “C:”, you see a message about drive C, such as “193 GB free of 237 GB” (which means 193 gigabytes are still unused & available, out of drive C’s 237-gigabte total size). You also see a wide box, which represents the entire drive C: the blue part is what’s used; the gray part is what’s unused (free).

Above that list of drives, you see this list of popular folders:

Those popular folders are all part of drive C.

To find out more about drive C, double-tap the “C:”. You see the C window, which lists files that are on drive C.

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

Your computer can handle 3 popular kinds of files:

In the C window, the 3 main folders are called
“Program Files” (which contains programs), “Users” (which contains info about users and what documents they stored), and “Windows” (which contains the parts of Windows).

Most computers include an extra folder called
“Program Files (x86)”. It contains programs’ older versions (called “32-bit versions” instead of “64-bit versions”).

If you double-tap a folder, the File Explorer window shows you what files are in the folder. When you finish examining those files, you can go back to the previous view by tapping the Back button, which is the left-arrow near the screen’s top-left corner.

If you double-tap a file’s icon, here’s what happens:

To find the documents you wrote using WordPad, you can choose one of these methods:

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

Tap “View” then choose one of these 8 views:

Windows 11 has this extra feature: after tapping Details (or anything similar), if you tap View again then put a check mark before “Compact view” (by tapping there), the computer will put less blank space between the lines, so more lines fit on the screen.

Hidden files The computer is afraid you’ll wreck some important files, so it hides those files from your view. If you want to peek at them, do this:

Then hidden items will appear, but with paler icons than regular items.

To make hidden items become invisible again, remove the check mark from “Hidden items”, by tapping there again.

Close the window When you finish examining the files that are on drive C, close the File Explorer window by tapping its X.

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:

Another way to get a file’s icon onto the screen is to run File Explorer and tap icons for drives & files until you find the file you want.

 

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 (which you must buy separately).

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

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

Which file do you want to copy to the USB drive? Right-click that file’s icon, by choosing one of these methods:

 

Then you see a file-choice menu.

From the Windows 10 menu (or Windows 11 long menu), tap “Send to” then “USB Drive”.

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

Send to Documents folder

Here’s how to copy the file to your hard disk’s Documents folder (if the file isn’t there already):

Send to Desktop screen

To copy the file to your Desktop screen, do this:

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

On the Desktop screen, 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).

That shortcut icon has the file’s original name but with
“- Shortcut” added afterwards. For example, if the file’s original name was “Love”, the shortcut icon’s name is “Love - Shortcut”.

If you double-tap that shortcut icon, the computer will try to find the original file and run it. If the original file was on a USB drive, that works just if the USB drive is still in the computer.

Send to a different location

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

Rename

To change the file’s name, do this:

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 drive C’s Recycle Bin (which holds drive C files you said to delete), double-tap the Recycle Bin icon (which is at the Desktop screen’s top-left corner). You’ll see the Recycle Bin window, which shows a list of drive C 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 more details about a certain file, right-click the file’s icon and then tap “Properties”. When you finish admiring the details, tap “OK”.

If you change your mind and do not want to delete a certain file, tap the file’s icon then “Restore the selected items”. 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, tap the file’s icon then press the Delete key then press Enter. The file will disappear.

To delete all files from the Recycle Bin, tap “Empty Recycle Bin” (which is at the screen’s top). Then press Enter.

When you finish admiring the Recycle Bin window, tap its X (which is at the screen’s top-right corner).

Shift Delete You’ve learned that to delete a file, the usual procedure is to tap the file’s icon then press the Delete key. If the file was on a solid-state drive or hard drive, that procedure moves the file into the Recycle Bin. Notice that the procedure involves pressing the Delete key. If instead you tap the Delete key while holding down the Shift key, and then press the Enter 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, by using one of these methods:

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.

Pin

Try this experiment.

Windows 10 Tap the Windows Start button. You see a list of apps. Right-click one of those apps (such as “Calculator”). Then you typically see this menu:

If you tap “Pin to Start”, here’s what happens:

If instead you tap “More” then “Pin to taskbar”, here’s what happens:

Windows 11 On the Start menu, tap “All apps”. You see a list of apps. Right-click one of those apps (such as “Maps”). Then you typically see this menu:

If you tap “More” then “Pin to Taskbar”, here’s what happens:

If you tap “Pin to Start” (instead of “More” then “Pin to Taskbar”), the result is more complicated:

Uninstall

If you totally hate an app and want to completely destroy it from everywhere in your computer, make sure no friends sharing your computer want that app! Then destroy the app by doing this:

 

“Settings” depends on whether you have Windows 10 or Windows 11.

Windows 10

Here’s how to use “Settings” in Windows 10.

Tap the Windows Start button (which has the Windows logo) then the Settings service’s symbol (a gear, which looks like a bumpy circle).

You see a Settings window. Maximize it (so it consumes the whole screen). If the screen’s top-left corner has a left-arrow
(“ß Settings”), tap that arrow (so the screen’s top-left corner says just “Settings”).

You see 13 choices:

System If you choose “System” (from the Settings window), you could see 14 choices at the screen’s left edge:

Exceptions:

If you choose “About”, you see info about your computer.

If you choose “Power & sleep”, you can change how long the computer waits until it blackens the screen and sleeps. (Details are on page 75, in the section called “Sleep”.)

When you finish using System, tap the left-arrow (at the screen’s top-left corner), which returns you to the Settings window.

Personalization If you choose “Personalization” (from the Settings window), you see 7 choices at the screen’s left edge:

I recommend the background color be dark blue. (That will help you see desktop icons more clearly, so you can get work done faster, with fewer distractions.) Here’s how to accomplish that (if the background color isn’t dark blue already).

Choose “Background”. Tap the “v” (which is in a box). You see 3 choices:

Choose “Solid color”.

When you finish using Personalization, tap the left-arrow (at the screen’s top-left corner), which returns you to the Settings window.

 

Update & Security If you choose “Update & security” (from the Settings window), you see 10 choices at the screen’s left edge:

If you choose “Windows Update”, the computer checks whether any updates are available now, to improve Windows 10, free! Follow the instructions on the screen.

If you choose “Activation”, the computer lets you switch to a more powerful version of Windows.

When you finish using Update & Security, tap the left-arrow (at the screen’s top-left corner), which returns you to the Settings window.

Windows 11

Here’s how to use “Settings” in Windows 11.

On the Start menu, tap the Settings tile (which is normally the 3^rd tile in the 2^nd row).

You see a Settings window. Maximize it (so it consumes the whole screen).

The screen’s left edge shows 12 choices:

System The computer automatically assumes you want the first choice (System), so the screen’s middle starts showing these 15 subchoices:

(Exception: desktop computers say just “power” instead of “power & battery”, since they have no battery.) To see all of those 15 subchoices, put your finger in the screen’s middle and swipe up. If you choose “about”, you see info about your computer.

If you choose “About”, you see info about your computer.

If you choose “Power & battery”, you can change how long the computer waits until it blackens the screen and sleeps. (Details are on page 75, in the section called “Sleep”.)

When you finish using System, tap the left-arrow (at the screen’s top-left corner), which returns you to the Settings window.

Personalization If you choose “Personalization” (at the screen’s left edge), the screen’s middle starts showing these 9 subchoices:

I recommend the background color be dark blue. (That will help you see desktop icons more clearly, so you can get work done faster, with fewer distractions.) Here’s how to accomplish that (if the background color isn’t dark blue already).

Choose “Background”. Tap the “v” (which is in a box). You see 3 choices:

Choose “Solid color”.

Windows Update If you choose “Windows Update” (at the screen’s left edge), the computer checks whether any updates are available now, to improve Windows 11, free! Follow the instructions on the screen.

 

If you right-click the screen’s Windows Start button, you see the Start-right menu, which could give you these choices:

Exceptions: