Another metaphor important for the OS is called "the Window." You might wonder why we don't use "sheets" of "paper" to show information. The reason is because the information we look at is usually larger than the size of your computer screen. For example, you might have a ten-page essay, but you cannot see all ten pages at the same time.
There are two types of windows: file and folder windows, and application windows.
A file and folder window shows what is inside a "container" like a folder or a volume. In this type of window, you can see more files and folders.
When you open a program, it also has a window: the application window. This window contains the program's activity.
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In order to view the document in a way you can understand, we use the idea of a window. As you can see in the illustration at right, the window in the wall allows you to see a small part of the full picture.
This is the same as viewing a small part of a large document.
There is a problem, however: what about when you want to view other parts of the document? It doesn't make sense to move the window up and dow; instead, you have to move the document up and down (or left and right).
To make this work, we use "scrolling."
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Here, we use the metaphor of the document being a "scroll." A scroll is a long piece of paper rolled up at the ends. To view information above or below, you roll the scroll one way or the other.
Combined with the Window metaphor, the Scrolling metaphor helps us understand the idea of viewing a small area of a larger document.
Although this mixes two different and even separate metaphors, people tend to get the idea fairly quickly. See the graphic below to see how this works with a window viewing a visible area too large for the screen:
Here is an image of a window in the Windows XP environment, with the parts labeled:
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1
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The Title Bar |
5
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Task Management Area |
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2
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Minimize, Maximize/Restore Down, Close buttons |
6
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Scroll Bar (for up/down; notice the left/right scroll bar below) |
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3
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The Menu Bar |
7
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The Resize Tab |
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4
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The Toolbar |
8
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Status Bar |
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9
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Window Button for this window (part of the Task Bar) | ||
The Title Bar
The Minimize, Maximize/Restore Down, and Close Buttons control the appearance of the window.
The first (left) button will minimize (also called "hide") the window. This makes the window disappear, but it is not closed. Instead, it is "hiding inside" the window button in the task bar, and can be brought out again by clicking on the window button (see #9).
The middle button will maximize or restore down the window; if the window is full-screen, then the button will "restore down" the window so it is smaller than the full screen; if the window is small, the same button will "maximize" the window, expanding it to fill the whole screen.
The third (right) button will close the window; if it an application window, it may quit the application.
If the window contains a running program, you may see two sets of these buttons. In that case, the top set controls the window for the program, and the lower set controls an inner window for a document.
Remember those names: (1) minimize, (2) maximize/restore down, and (3) close.
The Menu Bar contains the menus; click on one and a list of commands will come down. Each window has its own menu bar. (On the Macintosh, there is only one menu bar at the top of the screen which changes when you change the window.)
The Tool Bar(s) contain(s) buttons which will activate commands. Usually only the most commonly-used commands can be found here. Tool bars are a second way to do a command, the first way being the menu. A third way is by using hotkey shortcuts.
A Scroll Bar allows you to change the view in a window to show things that are outside the window's viewing area. For example, you might open an MS Word document which is four pages long. Of course, you cannot see all four pages at once. Instead, you see a part of that document through the "window." The scroll bar moves the pages of the document past the window, so you can see different pages. Scroll bars on the right side of a window can go up and down. Scroll bars at the bottom of a window can move things to the left and right.
The Status Bar shows details about what is in the window. The information changes from window to window. For example, in a window showing the contents of a volume or folder, the status bar will show how many items there are and what size they are. In a window showing a text document, the status bar may show the page number, the total number of pages, spellchecking information, and so on.
You can always see which window is open by looking at the Window Button, in the task bar at the bottom. The active window is a different color from the other buttons, and looks like it has been "clicked down."
Window Views
In the toolbar, there is a special button to change the way you see the icons in the window:
If you click the button, you will see a special menu with several choices:
Go ahead and try the different views. Thumbnails is best with photos. Icons might look the simplest. For a plain view, try List. For more information on each file, try Details.
The window in the Mac OS is similar, but there are many differences in style and function:
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1
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The Title Bar |
5
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The Sidebar |
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2
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Close, Hide, Resize buttons |
6
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Files |
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3
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The Toolbar |
7
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The Scroll Bar |
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4
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The Search Window |
8
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File Path |
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9
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Status Bar | ||
The Title Bar (1) here has the title in the center (not the left); if you Command-click on the title, you will see the folders which this folder is located in. The buttons for the window (2) are different on the Mac: the red button closes the window (but not the program, usually!), the yellow button hides the window into the Dock, and the green button resizes the window--but it does not take up the whole screen, like in Windows.
The Toolbar (3) on the Mac is more powerful, and it is customizable; you can change the toolbar to include whatever you want. You can even put documents in the toolbar, so you can click on them and open them instantly--like a small Quick Launch area. The Search Window (4) on the right will quickly find any document on the computer. Once you type something to search, you can limit the search to this folder only or the whole computer, or you can search for filenames only or choose to search for content.
The left side of the window has the Sidebar (5), which allows you to jump to anywhere on the computer. You can jump to devices (like disks or other volumes), places (any folder you choose to add), network places (open folders on other computers in your network automatically appear in the Sidebar), and "Search" or "Smart" folders, which automatically search for all documents from a certain time or of a certain file type.
The Files area (6), Scroll Bar (7) and Status Bar (9) are very similar to Windows XP. But notice the File Path area (8); this shows the folders which contain the icon you selected; double-clicking on a folder in the path will open it.
Just like in Windows, you can change the window view in the Mac OS. For example, the view shown above is "List" view. Below is "Icon" view.
Below you can also see icons in "Cover Flow" view, just like album cover art in iTunes.
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