Creating a Clear and
Simple Filing System
By Lou Dolinar; Staff Writer
WINDOWS 95 IS an amazing collection of construction materials. Using the simple building blocks of folders and files, shortcuts and menus, you can create a custom workspace unique to your needs. And you'd better.
In the state it arrives from your vendor, Windows is a lot like a pile of lumber that hasn't been nailed together into a house. It has to be organized into something you can live with.
Meanwhile, of course, it can make you crazy.
You can, for example, easily create a new document of any registered type by right-clicking on the desktop or you can bring up the program and select New from the File menu or you can create stationery and double-click on it. Much as I like the idea of shortcuts (small s) for doing things, fewer options might be a little less confusing.
Just keep in mind that there's no one right way to organize your computer. It's often better, especially for beginners, to have a simple and consistent system.
First, wean yourself from the document menu under Start, which gives you a list of the files you've accessed most recently, with the newest at the top of the list (your individual programs have a similar list of recent documents in the file menu.). While it's a wonderful crutch for beginners, it encourages you to strew documents all over your hard disk. And you can't click and drag entries into a meaningful filing scheme. About the time you're absolutely relying on the Documents menu, you'll fill it up accidentally and bump a key document off the end of it.
In other words, the Document menu (not to mention the Find function) is for emergencies, not for day-to-day work. Similarly, the Find command is something to use when organization fails.
There's no substitute for a well-thought-out folder-based scheme. The simplest -- some programs do it for you automatically -- is to create a document folder on the desktop.
By and large, individual programs allow you to set a default directory where files are always saved. You can always save the file into another directory on a case-by-case basis by using the Save As command, but the default you set up is where things go automatically. How you do this depends on the individual program-look for internal menu headings such as "Customize," "Options" or "Preferences."
You could have a separate folder for each program's documents, or you could create a folder on the desktop and point all of your saved files at it. You can sort by date to find the most recent files, or by kind to associate them with specific programs. At some point, perhaps, you should sort through the material in the Documents folder, throw some of it out and rearrange the rest into subfolders.
Maybe you don't want a Documents folder. If all you do is surf the Internet and write an occasional memo, you may find it easier to point all your saves directly at the desktop. At the end of the day, sort your files into individual folders on the desktop.
The other reason to containerize your files: It's easier to make copies of them and back them up. For home users, odds are that you can save virtually all your important documents on a couple of floppy disks. If you use the briefcase as we showed you last week, you'd automatically update your backups every time you insert the disk and synchronize files.
How to reorganize the Start menu: As shipped from the factory, your bundle's Start menu is a mess. You'll rarely use more than three or four programs every day. Odds are, those programs are stuck two or more levels down in the menu structure and comingled in menus with utilities you rarely use.
By now in this course you've gotten some idea of which programs are the most important to you. For convenience, you can create shortcuts to those specific programs and install them at the highest level of the Start menu. Right click on Start, then Explore. You can just drag the shortcuts into the Start Menu folder, and they'll appear on their own high-level menu above programs. A good choice would be your Works package, your Web browser and your finance program.
Programs aren't all you can install on the Start menu. You can create a shortcut to any valid object and place it on the menu, too.
Most programs, for example, allow for the creation of stationery. As we explained very early in this series, you can create the shell of a letter and letterhead that fits a window envelope for quick notes, or a spreadsheet that mimics your company's expense account forms. Create shortcuts to these items and install in the Start menu. There are variations on this theme: If you have a lot of stationery items, you might want to create a folder in the start menu and store them there.
If you're a regular Internet user, you can stash a few of your favorite Web sites on the Start menu, too. When you're inside your Web browser, you should be able to click and drag individual site addresses to the desktop, where each site becomes a shortcut. Drag that shortcut into the Start menu; even if you're not online, clicking on the name of the Web site will launch your dialer, connect to the Internet, start your browser and take you to the Web site.
Next question: Do you want to modify the original Start menu? Consider creating a new folder under the Start menu entitled "Old Programs Menu" and dragging the contents of the Programs menu there; that way you'll preserve the original, while demoting it so it doesn't clutter your desktop. Then build new, more compact menus with more frequently used programs.
You write and use Quicken; the kids play games. Should you create custom user profiles or not? You can use the Password control panel to give everyone in your family their own account, which they will access by typing in their name and password when the computer starts up. This has the potential to prevent, for example, your 6-year-old from trashing the Start menu, or rearranging your desktop. On the downside, the family tech support person now has, in effect, more than one computer to administer.
What else goes on the desktop? There's no law that says program shortcuts have to reside in the Start menu. The icon that switches you to DOS, Control Panel items you use frequently and even disk-drive icons from inside My Computer may be of some use.
Lou Dolinar's "Smart Systems" column appears regularly in Tuesday's Health & Discovery section in Newsday.