SeniorNet
Exploring
Windows
Lesson Seven: Gadgets, File Types and User Accounts
In the last lesson you learned to use some basic programs that are supplied with Windows Vista.
In this lesson you will learn about Gadgets and file types, how to manage which specific program opens a given file type and how to set up and mange new user accounts.
In this lesson you will:
· Learn about the properties of the Sidebar
· Learn about Gadgets, how to add, remove and adjust settings
· Understand the concept of File types and file associations
·
Learn how to add, remove and personalize
User accounts.
Contents Page
Objectives...................................................................................................................................... 1
Start Windows............................................................................................................................... 3
Gadgets........................................................................................................................................... 3
Sidebar Properties........................................................................................................................ 3
Detach a Gadget............................................................................................................................ 5
Turn off the Sidebar..................................................................................................................... 5
Restore the Sidebar...................................................................................................................... 6
Attach the Gadget back to the Sidebar...................................................................................... 7
Setting Gadget properties............................................................................................................ 7
The Gadget Gallery – adding Gadgets....................................................................................... 9
Removing Gadgets..................................................................................................................... 10
File type associations................................................................................................................ 10
Another way to change file association.................................................................................. 13
View file extensions.................................................................................................................. 14
Make file extensions visible..................................................................................................... 16
View file properties................................................................................................................... 17
User accounts.............................................................................................................................. 17
Changing an account.................................................................................................................. 18
Creating a new account............................................................................................................. 19
Log off and change user accounts........................................................................................... 20
Deleting an existing account.................................................................................................... 21
Startup programs........................................................................................................................ 23
Close the windows..................................................................................................................... 25
Turn off the computer................................................................................................................ 25
Now you can............................................................................................................................... 25
1 Power up your computer and log on (if
necessary) to
Windows Vista starts up and the desktop appears.
Windows Vista incorporates a new feature called Gadgets. Gadgets are mini-applications (sometimes known as applets) that reside on your desktop and provide useful at-a-glance information. Examples of gadgets are a clock, calendar, reminder note pad, weather report, stock market update and more. Gadgets appear in an area of the desktop known as the Sidebar (see Figure 7.1). Although attached to the Sidebar, they can be placed anywhere on the desktop if you so desire. The Sidebar and any gadgets it holds are displayed by default but can be turned off.
Vista comes with a number of built-in Gadgets: three
appear as defaults when you first run
Before discussing the Gadgets themselves, you will first set the properties of the Sidebar.
1 Click the Start button and click Control Panel.
2 Click Appearance and Personalization heading and then click Windows Sidebar Properties.
The Windows Sidebar Properties dialog opens (Figure 7.2).
Figure 7.2 Windows Sidebar properties
3 Examine the options presented. You can have the Sidebar start when Windows starts (the default), have it appear on top of other windows, display it on the left or right hand side of the desktop and more.
4 Click the View list of running gadgets button. A new dialog opens with a list of all running gadgets. Click the Close button on this dialog.
5 Do not make any changes on the learning center computer, but feel free to customize the properties of the Sidebar on your computer at home.
6 Click Cancel to close the Windows Sidebar properties dialog. Close any remaining windows to return to the desktop.
Tip: you can also call up the Windows
Sidebar Properties dialog by right clicking the Sidebar icon found in the
taskbar Notification area. Right click this icon and then click Properties.
Tip: to view
the gadgets hidden by an application window, press the Windows key and
simultaneously hold down the spacebar. Clicking anywhere in the application
window will send the gadgets back to the desktop.
On the desktop you should see the Sidebar with its Gadgets. If you do not see any Gadgets, either the Sidebar is turned off or all Gadgets have been removed. To remedy this, skip ahead to the section on The Gadget Gallery – adding Gadgets. If your computer shows the sidebar with one or more Gadgets, proceed with the following.
To detach a Gadget from the sidebar and place it on the desktop, simply drag the gadget off the Sidebar onto the desktop.
1 Place the pointer on the Clock Gadget (if this is not on your screen, choose any other gadget). Click, hold and drag the gadget onto the general desktop area and release the mouse (see Figure 7.3).
The Gadget is now floating on the desktop. Turning off the Sidebar will not affect this gadget; it will remain visible.
Figure 7.3 Clock Gadget detached from Sidebar
1 Right-click in an open area of the Sidebar.
A drop-down menu appears (see Figure 7.4).
Figure 7.4 Right click in Sidebar
2 Click Close Sidebar.
The Sidebar closes along with any Gadgets pinned to it. The Clock (or other) gadget you moved to the desktop remains visible. Note the Sidebar is still “running” as a program, it is just not visible.
There are a couple of ways to restore the Sidebar. You can try one or both in class.
1 If there is a Sidebar icon 
in the Notification area of the task bar,
right-click this icon.
A pop up menu appears (see Figure 7.5).
Figure 7.5 Right click Sidebar icon in Notification area
2 Click Open.
The Sidebar is restored to the Desktop.
If there is no Sidebar icon in the Notification area, it means the Sidebar is not running at all (and not just closed).
3 Click the Start button, click Control panel, click Appearance and Personalization and click Windows Sidebar Properties.
The Windows Sidebar Properties dialog opens. Click the How do I customize Windows Sidebar? link at the bottom of the dialog (Figure 7.6). A new window opens. Scroll down and follow the instructions to open the Sidebar.
Figure 7.6 Link at bottom of Sidebar Properties dialog
Following this link also leads to other links helpful in managing the Sidebar and Gadgets.
4 Close all open windows by clicking the X in the title bar.
Attach the Gadget back to the Sidebar
There are two easy ways to attach a gadget back to the Sidebar. Try one, or both on the Clock gadget now floating on the desktop.
1 Method 1: place the pointer on the clock gadget, click hold and drag it over to the Sidebar and release the mouse button.
The Clock gadget is now attached to the Sidebar.
2 Method 2: Place the mouse pointer on the clock gadget, right click and click Attach to Sidebar.
The Clock gadget is now attached to the Sidebar.
Each Gadget has a different set of properties that can be customized. As an example, you will adjust the properties of the Clock gadget.
1 Place the mouse pointer on the clock gadget.
A set of small icons appears in the top right corner (see Figure 7.7).
Figure 7.7 Gadget and control icons at top right corner
2 Click the icon that looks like a “wrench tool”. A properties window opens (see Figure 7.8).
Figure 7.8 Clock Gadget Properties
3 Click the face of the clock to cycle through the choice of clock faces offered. You can also name the clock (the name you assign appears on the clock face), and change the time zone.
Tip:
you can also open the gadget properties by placing the mouse pointer on the
gadget, then right click and click Options to open the properties dialog.
4 In the
Challenge:
review the properties of another Gadget as you did for the clock. Place the
mouse pointer on the Gadget, find the “wrench tool” icon and click it to open the
gadget’s properties dialog. Review the options available for that Gadget. Do
not make changes on the
The Gadget Gallery – adding Gadgets
1 With the Sidebar open on the desktop, right click in an open area of the Sidebar.
A drop-down menu appears.
2 Click Add Gadgets.
The Gadget Gallery opens (see Figure 7.9).
Figure 7.9 Default Gadget Gallery
3 Alternately, you could click the + (plus sign) at the very top of the Sidebar (as the mouse pointer approaches this, the word Gadgets appears – Figure 7.10).
Figure 7.10 Add Gadgets icon
The Gadget Gallery displays the
default gadgets supplied with
4 Double-click the Calendar gadget to add it to the Sidebar. Click the X at the top right of the Gadget gallery window to close it.
Challenge: At
home, follow the Get more gadgets online link at the bottom right of the
Gadget Gallery to find gadgets that can be downloaded from the Internet But do
not download anything from a source you
do not know or trust.
You have added the calendar gadget to the sidebar and will now remove it.
1 Place the mouse pointer on the Calendar gadget. A set of small icons appears in the top right corner.
2 Click the x icon to remove the calendar gadget. Alternately, you can right click in the Calendar gadget and click Close Gadget to remove this gadget.
And that is a primer on Gadgets. Have fun!
The files on your computer can be of many different types such as documents, photos, music, spreadsheets and databases. Perhaps certain files are specific to a single application like that finance or genealogy program you use. Even then, within a given category of application, there can be many different variations of file type. For example, a document may be either plain unformatted text, Rich Text Format, Microsoft Word format (and there are variants of this), WordPerfect format, Works word processor format and more. Similarly, there are many different file formats for images (photos); the most common is JPEG, but you may also see GIF, TIFF, BMP and others. Each file type has a unique file extension appended to the file name.
Figure 7.11 lists some file types and application programs commonly associated with them. By no means is this comprehensive; there are hundreds of different file types. As stated earlier, common file types can usually be read by more than one program.
|
File type |
File Extension |
Commonly Associated
program |
|
Bit map |
.bmp |
Windows Photo Gallery or
Paint |
|
MS Word document |
.doc |
Microsoft Office Word 2003
or earlier |
|
MS Word Document |
.docx |
Microsoft
Office Word 2007 |
|
Application program |
.exe |
Executable file – runs itself |
|
Web Browser Source code |
.htm |
Internet Explorer |
|
JPEG image |
.jpg |
Windows
Photo Gallery |
|
Music File |
.mp3 |
Windows
Media Player |
|
Read only document or form |
.pdf |
Adobe
Acrobat |
|
PowerPoint Presentation |
.ppt |
PowerPoint or PowerPoint viewer |
|
Quicken data file |
.qdf |
Quicken |
|
Document in Rich text format |
.rtf |
Microsoft Office Word |
|
Text file |
.txt |
Notepad |
|
MS Works Database |
.wdb |
MS Works Database |
|
Windows Movie |
.wmv |
Windows Media Player |
|
MS Works Word Processor |
.wps |
MS Works Word Processor |
|
Spreadsheet |
.xls |
Microsoft Office Excel |
|
Compressed file |
.zip |
WinZip or Windows |
Figure 7.11 Some common file associations
When you open a file,
When you install a new program on your computer, it may associate itself with a specific file type, overriding the association currently set in your computer. This is particularly common when installing photo editing or graphic programs that can read JPEG files. When you install a new photo viewing or editing application, you may find that double clicking on a JPEG file now launches the new program instead of the program it was associated with prior to installing the new program. This may be your intent, but if it is not, you need to know how to change file type associations.
1 To see the file association table, click Start, click All Programs then click Default Programs found at the top of the All Programs list (you may have to scroll up to see this entry).
A Control panel dialog opens (see Figure 7.12).
Figure 7.12 Default Programs in Control Panel
Note:
This same window is also accessible through the click sequence: Start > Control
Panel > Programs > Default Programs.
2 Click Associate a file type or protocol with a program.
The file association table opens in a window as shown in Figure 7.13. It may take a few seconds to load as it scans the computer for file types.
Figure 7.13 File Association table
3 Watching the name column, scroll down to the .jpg entry and click to select it. The .jpg file extension is appended to JPEG files – the type of file that commonly comes out of your digital camera and used to share images.
4 Click the Change Program button. An Open With dialog appears (Figure 7.14).
Figure 7.14 Open With dialog
In the example shown in the above figure, the default program for .jpg files is Windows Photo Gallery (it is highlighted indicating it is the current default). The example shows two other programs that can be set: Microsoft Office Picture Manager and Paint. There may be more programs that can associate with a .jpg image file type on your computer and the default may be set different to the example shown. You need to decide which program you want to open when you double click a JPEG file - that new photo editing program you are just learning or a simple file viewer? – and set the file association accordingly.
5 To make a change at home, select the program you want associated with a given file type and click OK. Make sure the box “Always use the selected program to open this kind of file” is checked so that the change applies to all files of that type.
6 Do not make any changes on the
computer at the
7 Close the Set Associations window by clicking the “X” in the title bar.
You should now be back at the desktop.
Another way to change file association
1 Click the Start button then click Pictures in the right hand column.
Windows Explorer opens to the Pictures folder; the contents appear in the file list. If there are no files present, open a sub-folder and locate any image in the file list.
2 Place the pointer on the image file in the file list and right-click.
A drop down menu opens (see Figure 7.15).
Figure 7.15 Menu on Right click of file
3 Point to Open With and a fly-out menu appears. This allows you to specify the program to open the file with. If you click one of the program entries, the file opens with that specific program this one time only.
4 Click the Windows Photo Gallery entry.
The image opens in Windows Photo Gallery.
5 Close Windows Photos Gallery by clicking the “X” in the title bar.
By the same token, any of the listed programs could have been selected to view or edit the file.
6 To permanently choose the default program that is to be associated to this file type, repeat step 3 and then click Choose Default Program.
The Open With dialog opens (see Figure 7.16). This is the same dialog you saw in the previous section.
Figure 7.16 Open With dialog
7 As before, if in the
8 Close any open windows and return to the desktop.
1 Install the Student CD in the DVD/CD tray and close it.
If the Autoplay option is set (which is the default) a dialog will open asking how you want to view or manage the contents of the CD (Figure 7.17 or similar, depending on what programs are on your PC)
Figure 7.17 AutoPlay dialog
2 Click Open folder to view files under General options.
An instance of Windows Explorer opens pointing to the contents of the Student CD (Figure 7.18). Maximize the window.
Figure 7.18 Windows Explorer viewing contents of Student CD
3 Double click the Class Files folder in the files list.
The contents of the Class Files folder appears in the file list.
Note: if inserting the Student CD did not open the Autoplay dialo