Windows Explorer is a program used to browse files and folders on a computer. It allows viewing files in different drives, folders, and subfolders in a hierarchical structure. Files and folders can be opened, copied, moved, renamed, or deleted using various methods like menus, keyboard shortcuts, and drag-and-drop. Shortcuts provide another name linked to an existing file without taking up additional storage space. The view of file contents can be changed between icon, list, details, tile, and thumbnail views.

1. 1
WINDOWS EXPLORER BASICS
Mr. ALOYCE M. NYAMWESA
30/07/2014

2. 2
What is Windows Explorer
Windows Explorer is the program that you use to:
– Browse through the files on your computer and
connected devices.
– You can use it to browse network locations.
– Manage your files, and much more.

3. 3
Working with Windows Explorer
Steps to access window explorer:
Step 1.Use the Start menu.
– Click Start → Computer (Windows 7) or
– If you are using Windows 8, you can click the folder
icon in the bottom left corner of Desktop mode.

4. 4
Working with Windows Explorer

5. 5
Working with Windows Explorer
Step 2: Use the keyboard shortcut. Pressing ⌘ Win+E will open
the Windows Explorer screen.

6. 6
Working with Windows Explorer
Step 3: Start using Windows explorer.
– You can start using it to navigate through your files.
– You can copy and paste files, and clean up old files you don't
need anymore.

7. 7
Drives, folders and files
• Windows Explorer displays a hierarchy comprised of the following
items under the "My Computer" icon:
-disk drives
– folders
– files

8. 8
Disk Drives
• Disk Drive is a device which allows a computer to read from and
write on to computer disks.
• Information on a computer is stored on one or more disk drives
• Each disk drive has a unique name that is comprised of a single
letter followed by a colon. For example:
– A: -C:
– D: -E:
– F: -H: etc.
• Drive letter names are case-insensitive (i.e. a: and A: are the same
thing)

9. 9
Standard Drives
• On most Microsoft Windows computers:
-A: is generally the floppy disk drive
-Drive B is a second floppy disk (obsolete)
-C: is generally a hard drive on the computer that occupied OS
-other letters refer to
• additional hard drives on the computer
• a CD-ROM, DVD or other type of drive on the computer
• a "networked" drive that is on another computer but is
accessible from the current computer

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Descriptive Names
• In addition to the drive letter, Windows Explorer also
displays descriptive names for drives
• These names are NOT used much. You will usually
use drive letters to identify a particular drive.
• In the screenshot at the right, the following descriptive
names are used:
– “3 ½ inch floppy” for A: (This is a description that
Windows “made up”)
– "Local Disk" for C: (This is also a description that
Windows “made up”)
– "DISE_BACKUP" for D: (This is a “volume name”.
Volume names are assigned to a drive by the
administrator of the machine. Each floppy disk, CDROM
disc or DVD disc may have its own volume name that is
displayed when the media is inserted into the drive. If a
drive or disc was not given a volume name then windows
“makes up” its own descriptive name to display in
windows explorer.)

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Hierarchy
• A disk drive contains many folders and files
• Each folder can contain both :
– files
– other folders

12. 12
Viewing the folder hierarchy
The left hand pane shows the
folder hierarchy. The
currently selected folder is
highlighted.by Windows
Explorer
The right hand pane shows the contents of the folder which
is currently selected in the left hand pane. As you can see,
the contents of a folder is other folders and files. If you click
on a different folder on the left you will see the contents of
that folder on the right.
These folders and files are
stored in the folder that is
selected in the left hand
pane (i.e. NTFSDOS3)
The currently selected folder

13. 13
Expand/Collapse View
Click on “–” to
collapse
Click on “+” to
expand
•Expand or collapse the view of the
hierarchy by clicking on the + or – sign
icons next to folder names.
•Double click on a folder or drive to expand
AND select it at the same time
Double-
Click a
collapsed
folder or
drive to
expand
AND
select it.

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Hierarchy - example
• The level of indentation indicates the position of a folder in the hierarchy
• From the snapshot we can get the following information:
– these folders are contained in the top
level of the hierarchy on the D: drive
• otherStuff
• PQIMAGE
– these folders are stored in the
"otherStuff" folder:
• NTFS98RO
• NTFSDOS3
• Personal
• SAVE
– these files & folders are stored in the NTFSDOS3 folder
• folders: lowLevel
– these folders are contained in the "Personal" folder
• homework
• letters

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Opening Files
• To open a file, double click on it.
• This will start the program that uses this file.
Double-click on the “readme.txt” file
to start the “notepad” program that is
used to create/modify it.

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COPYING AND MOVING
FILES & FOLDERS

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Copying vs. Moving a file or folder
– Copying a file or folder:
When you copy a file or folder from one location (i.e. folder) to
another you create a new copy of the item being copied (i.e. file
or folder). When you are done, separate copies of the item exist in
the original folder and the new folder.
– Moving a file or folder:
When you move a file or folder it is moved from one location
(i.e. folder) to another. When you are done, there is only one copy
of the item that was moved (i.e. in the new folder).

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Copying with menu
1. Click on folder that
contains item you want to
copy
2. Right-click on a file or a
folder
3. Choose “copy” from
context sensitive menu.
4. Select folder where you
want to place a copy.
5. Right click in empty space
in the right hand pane
6. choose “paste”

19. 19
Copying with hot keys (Ctrl-C, Ctrl-
V)
• Same as with menu, but press “hot keys” instead of choosing from
menus
1. Click on folder that contains item you want to copy
2. Click on a file or a folder
3. Press Ctrl-C to copy the file
1. Select folder where you want to place a copy.
2. Press Ctrl-V to paste the file

20. 20
Moving
• Same procedure as copying, except:
– When using the menu method:
choose “cut” instead of “copy” from menu
– When using the hotkey method:
press Ctrl-X instead of Ctrl-C

21. 21
Copying/Moving with drag & drop
• How to Drag & Drop
– Click on an item (i.e. file or folder) and drag it over the icon for a different folder.
– Let go of the mouse button.
• What will happen depends on if the two locations are one the same or different drives
– SAME DRIVE
• If the new folder is on the same drive as the original folder it will MOVE the file to the new
folder (removing it from the original folder)
• Hold down Ctrl key while you drag & drop to COPY the file instead of moving it. (Make
sure to release the mouse button BEFORE you release the Ctrl key).
– DIFFERENT DRIVES
• If new folder is on a different drive than the original folder it will COPY the file to the new
folder (leaving two copies, one in each folder)
• Hold down Shift key while you drag & drop to MOVE the file instead of copy it. (Make sure
to release the mouse button BEFORE you release the shift key).

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Select Multiple Items (Shift-Click)
• To copy or move multiple items at the
same time you must select them as a
group.
• To select multiple files or folders
1. click on the first one
2. Hold down the shift key and
click on the last one
(don’t let go of the shift key
until you click on the 2nd item)
3. all files/folders in between will
be selected
• You can then copy or move all the
selected items at once using any of the
methods described above (i.e. menu,
hot-key, drag&drop).

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Select Multiple Items (Ctrl-Click)
• Press the Ctrl key while clicking an item
to select or unselect individual items.
– This is different from the Shift-Click
technique described on previous slide
since Shift-Click selects ALL the
items between the first and the last.
– You can use Shift-Click to select a
whole range and then use Ctrl-Click
to unselect the items you don’t want
in the selection.
– You can then copy or move all the
selected items at once using any of
the methods described above (i.e.
menu, hot-key, drag&drop).

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Renaming and deleting files
and folders

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Renaming
• To rename a file or folder, right-click on the name in the
right pane of windows explorer and choose “rename”.
• Then type in the new name and press ENTER.

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Deleting
• To delete a file or folder
– right-click on the name in the right pane of windows
explorer and choose “delete”.
OR
– select it by clicking on it once in the right hand pane of
windows explorer then ...
– Press the “Delete” key on the keyboard.

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Shortcuts vs. Files

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What is a shortcut
• A shortcut is a second name for an existing file.
• If you double-click on the shortcut you will see the original file.
• Any changes that you make to the file by either double-clicking on
the original file name or the shortcut is actually being made to the
SAME underlying file. You will see the new version when you
open the file through either the original name or the shortcut.
• This is DIFFERENT than a copy. A copy creates a 2nd copy of a
file. Changes to one copy will NOT affect the other copy.

29. 29
Creating a shortcut
• Press the Alt key while
dragging&dropping a file to
create a “shortcut” to that file.
• While you drag&drop, the
cursor will show an arrow next
to it
• You can also create a shortcut
by right-clicking in a blank
area on the right side of
Windows Explorer and
choosing “new | shortcut” from
the menu.
• Or you can select the file by
rifght- clicking and choose
send to –desktop (create
shortcut)

30. 30
Recognizing Shortcuts
• The new item will be a
“shortcut”. To show it is a
shortcut it will have an
arrow next to its icon.

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CHANGING THE VIEW

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Changing the default view settings
• The contents of the right hand pane can be displayed using different views.
• Choose the view you want from the “view” menu.
• Each view displays the information in the right pane in a slightly different format
5 possible
views:
•Thumbnails
•Tiles
•Icons
•List
•Details
Choose view
you want.

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Icon View
Icon view: Icons display in right pane.

34. 34
Details View
Details view: Details display in right pane (name, size, type, date modified)

35. 35
Details View – sorting, resizing columns
• Sorting: Click on any column heading to sort by info from that column. Click
twice to sort in opposite order. Use this to find big/small files or files that were
recently modified or modified on a specific date
• Resize Column: To make any column wider (or narrower), click on the column
separator in the heading and drag it to the right or left. Double click the column
separator to make the column exactly the right size.
click
here to
sort by
size
To resize the column,
click and drag (or
double click) the
column separator

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Data Size Units
Common Sizes
• 1 Byte
– basic unit of size. Rough rule of thumb: one byte
can store one character. Maybe more or less
depending on the file format.
• 1 KiloByte (KB)
– 1024 bytes
– Same as 210 bytes
– sometimes is approximated as one thousand
bytes
• 1 MegaByte (MB)
– 1024 KB
– Same as 1,048,576 bytes
– Same as 220 bytes
– sometimes is approximated as one million bytes
• 1 GigaByte (GB)
– 1024 MB
– 1,073,741,824 bytes
– 230 bytes
– sometimes is approximated as one billion bytes
Large Sizes
• 1 TeraByte (TB)
– 1024 GB
– 1,099,511,627,776 bytes
– 240 bytes
– sometimes is approximated as one trillion bytes
• 1 PetaByte (PB)
– 1024 TB
– 1,125,899,906,842,620 bytes
– 250 bytes
– sometimes is approximated as one quadrillion
bytes
• 1 Exabyte (EB)
– 1024 PB
– 9,223,372,036,854,780,000 bytes
– 260 bytes
– sometimes is approximated as one quintillion
bytes

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Saving View Settings
• If you change the view settings then by default they will only apply
to the current folder.
• To save the view settings for all folders do the following:
– Choose the following menu choice
• tools | folder options
– Press the "view" tab
– Press the "apply to all folders" button

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Other Topics
• Other view settings
• filename extensions
• file names
– full path
– relative path
• compressed folders (i.e. .zip files)

39. File names
• The name you give a file can contain up to 255 characters,
including spaces.
• It can’t contain any of the following characters: / : * ? "
< > |
• Filenames can also have extensions.
• No 2 files in the same folder can have the same name.

40. Extensions--what they are and how
they’re used
• Extensions are strings of (typically) three to four
characters preceded by a period that are added to the file
name.
• They are usually used to identify the application that
created the file and/or should be used to modify or
display the file.
• The operating system uses the extension to identify and
launch the appropriate application.

41. Common File Extensions
• .doc Word document (97 -2003)
• .docx Word document (above 2003)
• .txt ASCII text file (open in Notepad)
• .htm Web document (open in IE)
• .xls Excel spreadsheet
• .xlc Excel chart
• .mdb Access database
• .ppt PowerPoint presentation
• .exe Application program
• .mp3

42. Working with Compressed Files
• Files stored in a compressed (zipped) folder take up less
disk space
– Allows you to transfer files more quickly
• Extracting a file creates an uncompressed copy of the file
in a folder you specify, while the original file remains in
the compressed folder
• Compression programs
– WinZip
– PKZIP
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New Perspectives on Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007