Windows User Interface – the Desktop and the Taskbar

After you login to your computer, Windows user interface appears: Windows Desktop with Desktop Icons and Taskbar. As shown in the screenshot below, the Desktop is the large upper area of the computer screen, serving like the top of a desk for you to work with the computer. The Taskbar is the horizontal strip across the bottom of the computer screen and it includes the Start Button, the Quick Launch Area, the Open Application Area and the Notification Area. As Windows user interface is normally the place you begin to interact with the computer, we will help you get familiar and be comfortable with the Desktop and the Taskbar.

Windows Desktop

On the Desktop, mostly likely you see Desktop Icons, which are the small images with labels such as “My Computer”, “My Network Places”, “Recycle Bin”, “Internet Explorer”, and so on. There are different types of Desktop icons: program icons, folder icons, file icons, and shortcut icons. Basically, the Desktop is just a folder inside the Windows folder. Therefore, you may put anything on the Desktop the same way you do to a computer folder.

By double-clicking a Desktop icon, you either start an application or open a folder, depending on the nature of the icon. Therefore, the Desktop provides a convenient entry for you to access folders and launch applications and, when you put the most frequently used applications and folders on the Desktop, you work more efficiently with your computer.

Tips to organize your computer Desktop and work effectively with your computer:

• Do not over-crowd the Desktop with everything – only put applications and folders that need frequent access. A tidy and well-organized Desktop makes you work more efficient.
• Software companies have a habit to automatically put an application shortcut to the Desktop when the application is installed on your computer. Take a few second to delete the shortcut if the application is not a daily must to you. Keep in mind that you may always launch an application from the Start Menu.
• To create a shortcut for a frequently used application, you need to locate the application first and then right-click on the application. On the pop-up menu, select “Create Shortcut”. The resulting shortcut icon will be sitting in the same location holding the application. For example, if you have Microsoft Office installed on the computer, you may try clicking Start Menu -> All Programs -> Microsoft Office, right-clicking Microsoft Office Word, and then selecting “Create Shortcut”. Another Microsoft Office Word icon with an appendix “(2)” will appear. You may drag the new Word icon and put it on the Desktop. And you may change the name of the shortcut icon by right-clicking on the icon and selecting “Rename” from the pop-up menu.
• When you delete a shortcut icon on the Desktop, only the shortcut will be removed, not the application or the folder the icon represents. But if you delete an application or folder icon, the application or the folder itself will be lost. Windows differs a shortcut icon from the original item with an upright arrow at the low-left corner, as shown in the screenshot below.

• Do not put files on Desktop, as you might mistake files for shortcuts to applications and delete them unintentionally. Instead, create a folder for files and organize the files within the folder. This will not only prevent the file from being deleted mistakenly, but also help you locate the file easily.
• “Recycle Bin” holds deleted items of the computer. You may double-click the “Recycle Bin” icon to open the “Recycle Bin” folder and recover a deleted item by removing it from the folder. You may also right-click on the “Recycle Bin” icon and select “Empty Recycle Bin”. Once you click “Yes” in the “Confirm Multiple File Delete” dialog box, all items in the “Recycle Bin” folder will be permanently removed from the computer.
• Often times, you may find yourself trying to access an item on the Desktop while the Desktop is covered with layers of applications. Windows provides a handy command to clean up the Desktop: Show Desktop. Normally, a shortcut to the “Show Desktop” command is already placed in the Quick Launch Area for you. We will talk about the Quick Launch Area next.

Quick Launch Area

When you work on the computer, the Desktop area is often covered with layers of applications, making desktop access a little inconvenient. On the Taskbar, the Quick Launch Area, being visible all the time, is a handy location to keep shortcuts of the most frequently used applications and folders. Thus, even if the Desktop is buried in layers of applications and documents, you lose no time in accessing the right folder or launching the application you want by putting the folder or application shortcut on the Quick Launch Area.

To add a shortcut to the Quick Launch Area, point the mouse on the desired item, hold down the mouse, drag the item to the Quick Launch Area and then release the mouse. To remove a shortcut from the area, simply right-click on the shortcut icon and select “delete” from the pop-up menu.

You may expand the Quick Launch Area by moving the vertical bar at the right of the area to the right. This will shrink the Open Application Area. If there are more shortcut icons than the small space can hold, a double arrow will appear next to the vertical bar. Click the double arrow will bring up a small pane with the rest of shortcut icons, as shown in the screenshot below.

Once you are settled with the Taskbar setting, you may lock the Taskbar by right-clicking on a blank area on the Taskbar and selecting “Lock the Taskbar” from the pop-up menu, as shown in the screenshot below.

Start Button

The Start button, labeled with a “Start” and a Windows logo, sits in the lower left corner of the computer screen and on the far left of the Taskbar. When you click on the Start button, you bring up the Start Menu, as shown in the screenshot below.

Windows Start Menu basically consists of two columns: the left column lists applications you recently used so you may quickly re-launch one of the applications (such as Word, Excel, Adobe Reader, etc.) at a later time, and the right column provides convenient accesses to common folders (such as My Documents, My Music, My Computer, etc.) and system functionalities (such as Control Panel, Search, Run, etc.).

The bottom part of the Start Menu holds two every-one-knows buttons: the “Log off” button and the “Shut Down” button.

When you click “All Programs” on the Start Menu, you will see a cascade-style menu listing applications installed on the computer, as shown in the screenshot below. Once the menu opens up, you may navigate the mouse among applications and click on the desired application to launch it.

If there are many applications installed on the computer, the “All Programs” menu could be too messy to locate an application to launch. You may organize the applications on the menu by right-clicking on any application and selecting “Sort by Name” on the pop-up pane. The resulting “All Programs” menu will be in an alphabetical order.

The “Run…” command on the Start Menu is a very useful and very handy Windows function, although it is mostly untouched among many computer users. Basically, you may launch an application, access a folder, document, or resource from the “Run” dialog box shown in the screenshot below.

When you use the “Run…” command to launch an application or access an item, you need to know the path of the application or the item, unless the path is included in the “Run…” environment. For example, when you type “My Documents” in the “Open” box and hit “OK”, “My Documents” folder will appear. If you try “regedit”, you open Registry Editor. In these two cases, the “Run…” environment already includes the paths for “ My Documents” and “regedit”.

If the path of an application is not in the “Run…” environment, you may click the “Browse…” button to locate the application on the computer and launch it.

By now, you see that Windows provides alternative ways to start applications, access folders or documents. By getting familiar with Windows features and using them more often, you will be comfortable working with the computer and get things done efficiently.

Open Application Area

The Open Application Area locates in the center of the Taskbar and displays buttons representing applications you are currently working on, as shown in the user interface screenshot above. Every time you launch an application or open a document, Windows adds a button of the application or the document to the Open Application Area. Windows also automatically groups buttons of the same applications into one single button when there are too many applications to fit in the limited space.

If you prefer application buttons line-up in their launch order, you may right-click a blank area on the Taskbar and select “Properties” from the popup menu. A “Taskbar and Start Menu Properties” dialog box will appear, as shown in the screenshot below.

Uncheck the “Group similar taskbar buttons” checkbox and click the “OK” button, the application buttons will spread out on the Taskbar in their launch order. When there are quite a few applications running on the computer, the Open Application Area could be quite messy if they are not grouped together.

Notification Area

As shown in the above user interface screenshot, the Notification Area, also referred to as the System Tray, sits on the far right of the Taskbar and displays computer clock, status information such as internet access or a print job, up and running anti-virus programs, new mail arrival notice, and so on. You may modify the setting of the Notification Area by right-clicking on the Taskbar and selecting “Properties” from the pop-up menu. When the “Taskbar and Start Menu Properties” dialog box appears, you may choose to show or hide the clock and inactive icons. You may also click the “Customize” button to further customize notifications.