Welcome back. In Lesson 1, you learned about the nuts and bolts of Windows Vista -- the various editions, the hardware requirements, and so on. In this lesson, you'll take a tour of the new Windows Vista interface and find out how the familiar features from Windows XP translate to the new operating system.

Let's start by taking a look at the Windows Vista Start menu. Like the one in Windows XP, it has two columns, and the right column contains shortcuts to popular folders and features. The first thing you probably notice in the right column in Vista is that the names of most of those popular folders and features have changed. The word "My" has been removed in most cases, for example, so My Computer becomes Computer, My Documents becomes Documents, and so on. Figure 2-1 shows the Vista Start menu.

Figure 2-1: The Start menu in Windows Vista is a two-column display with shortcuts for applications and utilities.

On the left side of the Start menu are two sections. The upper portion consists of shortcuts that have been "pinned" to the Start menu so that they're permanently available there. You can pin any shortcut there by dragging it into the section. The lower portion consists of shortcuts for recently used programs. This list updates constantly as you use different programs.

To pin an item to the upper-left part of the Start menu, right-click its shortcut (elsewhere on the Start menu) and select Pin to Start Menu from the menu that appears.

The real difference in the Start menu, however, comes when you start looking for programs on it. Clicking All Programs in Figure 2-1 displays the menu shown in Figure 2-2. Notice that no fly-out submenu is visible. Instead, a list of top-level folders and shortcuts appears. You can click any of these folders to expand their contents. For example, in Figure 2-2, HyperSnap 6 has been expanded.

Figure 2-2: The All Programs menu is contained within the standard Start Menu pane.

At the bottom of the Start menu are some buttons. From left to right in Figure 2-3, they are Standby (circle), Lock (lock), and Shut Down (arrow).

Figure 2-3: The Standby, Lock, and Shut Down buttons appear at the bottom of the Start menu.

• Standby: Puts the PC in low power mode and turns off most components; click the mouse or press a key to wake it up again.
• Lock: Locks the PC against unauthorized access; you must type your password to unlock it.
• Shut Down: Opens a menu with several shut down options, including Switch User, Logoff, Lock, Restart, Sleep, and Shut Down.

Searching the Start Menu

Also at the bottom of the Start menu is a Search bar. You can use this to search for a program if you don't know exactly where on the Start menu it's located. Suppose you want to use the Calculator, but you aren't sure where it is. You can begin typing calculator in the Search box, and the list of shortcuts narrows down to show only those that match. For example, after you type C, the list narrows down to programs that have at least one word in them beginning with that letter, as in Figure 2-4.

Figure 2-4: You can find a program on the Start menu with the Search bar.

Performing Other Searches

You can also search for files, folders, and Outlook items (e-mail messages, tasks, contacts, and so on) anywhere on your system. To perform a general search, select Start > Search. A Search window opens. Type a word in the Search box and press Enter, and all files that are related to that word appear. "Related" is rather loosely defined; the file might have that word in its title, as a keyword, or in its content, or if you typed a number as the search term, it might be that size or be created on that date. Figure 2-5 shows a sample Search Results window.

Figure 2-5: Search for files or folders using the Search command from the Start menu.

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For more complex search capabilities, click the Advanced Search button to open the Advanced Search pane at the top of the window, as shown in Figure 2-6. From here, you can specify criteria more precisely, such as limiting the search to certain file types or certain dates.

Figure 2-6: Search for files or folders using the Advanced Search options.

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Next, explore Windows Vista's Computer window.

The Computer window (called My Computer in earlier versions) is a Windows Explorer interface that starts at the top level of your system's file hierarchy. The Computer window shows icons for each of the available drives, plus an icon for accessing shared folders and any Web sites you've set up (for example, via a Web editor such as Microsoft FrontPage). Figure 2-7 points out some of the parts of the Computer window.

Figure 2-7: The Computer window enables you to access your system's drives and folders.

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This Computer window is actually a Windows Explorer window that displays the Computer level of the file system hierarchy. Windows Explorer is the generic name for file and folder management windows. Many of the shortcuts on the right side of the Start menu are shortcuts to various folders that open in Windows Explorer windows, such as Documents, Pictures, and so on.

No matter which location you're looking at, the Windows Explorer window itself is fairly consistent in its interface. For example, in Figure 2-7, notice the following parts of the window:

• Favorite Links list: This list provides shortcuts to common locations. You can add your own favorite locations to this list by dragging a folder to the list.
• Address bar: This shows the current location, and if it's within some other location, the path appears here as well. (You'll see a better example of this later in this lesson.)
• Search box: You can use this to do a quick search at any time, so you don't have to open up the full Search window.
• Details pane: You can get information about the selected location, folder, or file here.
• Folders list: By default, the Folders list is collapsed; click its arrow, as indicated in Figure 2-7, to open it, as shown in Figure 2-8. It provides a tree-like structure, similar to that of the folder tree in previous Windows versions, from and to which you can drag-and-drop.

Figure 2-8: The Folders list is expanded.

You can customize which of the previously listed elements appears in a file management window. Click Organize, point to Layout, and then select the element to turn on/off. The Favorite Links and Folders areas are collectively called the Navigation pane in this area.

Now that you're familiar with the Windows Vista interface, learn how to navigate in Windows Explorer.

One of the most significant changes in Windows Explorer under Vista is in the techniques used to move from location to location.

To move to a different location (for example, to open the contents of a drive, or to jump to one of the locations in the Favorite Links list or the Folders list), double-click where you want to go.

After you've moved to another location, a Back button (a left-pointing arrow) becomes available in the upper-left corner. After you've clicked it to go back to a previous location, a Forward button (a right-pointing arrow) becomes available. These work just like in a Web browser window, but they're for your local PC. You can also click the down arrow to go back more than one step at a time by selecting a menu option. See Figure 2-9 for a closer look at these buttons.

Figure 2-9: Back and Forward buttons help you navigate between locations.

You can also use the path in the Address bar for navigation. Each step of the path is represented by name with a drop-down arrow. To go back to a level, click that name; to go to another location under that level, click its down arrow and select from the menu. See Figure 2-10 for an example of the drop-down menus.

Figure 2-10: Each step of the path in the Address bar is clickable and opens a menu.

The << button at the left side of the Address bar opens a top-level menu, displaying the same items as in the Computer window shown in Figure 2-11. You can use this to go all the way back up to the top of the hierarchy in a single step.

Figure 2-11: Jump back to the top level with the << button.

The Back button takes you back to previous locations only within the current session (that is, locations you've been to since you opened the current window). To quickly access previously visited locations that don't meet this criterion, click the down arrow at the right end of the Address bar and then select one of the paths from the history list as shown in Figure 2-12. This list contains not only local locations but also Web sites you've visited.

Figure 2-12: Use the history list to jump back to previous locations.

The next section shows you how to access commands and menus.

In Windows Explorer under Vista, a blue bar appears across the top, providing Organize and Views buttons. Each of these buttons opens a menu. (Other buttons are on this bar as well, but they vary depending on the location you're viewing.)

The Organize menu, shown in Figure 2-13, contains commands for common file operations. From here you can cut, copy, paste, delete, undo and redo, rename, and create new folders.

Figure 2-13: Use the Organize menu for common file operations.

The View menu, shown in Figure 2-14, offers options for adjusting the icon sizes and positions. Drag the slider up and down to set an icon size, or click directly on one of the sizes. (The purpose of the slider is to enable you to select a size that is midway between two sizes.) The larger sizes of icons make it possible to see previews of the file's content (for supported file formats only, such as graphics and word processing documents).

Figure 2-14: Use the View menu to adjust icon size.

If you were accustomed to managing files in earlier versions of Windows Explorer, you might wish that you had the old-style menu system back. Well, it's still there -- it's just hidden by default. In fact, some of the new Vista-specific commands are available only from this menu system (such as stacking, which you'll learn about in the next section).

Press the Alt key to make the menu bar appear, as shown in Figure 2-15.

Figure 2-15: An old-style menu bar is available by pressing Alt.

If you want the old-style menu bar to always be available, you can set the window up for that. Just select Organize > Layout > Menu Bar.

Next, learn about stacking, sorting, and grouping files.

As mentioned in Lesson 1, one of the improvements that Vista offers in file-handling is the ability to create different views of file listings, called virtual folders. A virtual folder shows content from multiple locations as if they were a single location (such as the results of a search operation) or shows the content from a location in a certain way (stacked, sorted, or grouped for example).

If you're familiar with database concepts, it might be helpful to think about a virtual folder as a type of query. It takes the raw data (the file and folder names) and shows it to you in a differently organized or presented format.

To use stacking, sorting, and grouping, you must use the old-style menu system. Hold down Alt to make it appear, and then open the View menu and use the Sort By, Stack By, or Group By command submenu. For example, in Figure 2-16, the listing is being set to sort by Date Modified.

Figure 2-16: You can sort, stack, or group using the View menu's submenus.

Sorting is pretty straightforward; the listing simply appears in the specified order. Stacking and grouping require a bit more explanation, though.

Grouping organizes the listing into clusters based on the criteria you specify. For example, in Figure 2-17, the files are grouped by type.

Figure 2-17: When you group files, the files appear in sections based on the criteria by which you group.

Stacking is like grouping except that each group appears as a single icon. You can double-click an icon to open a virtual folder showing only the items represented by that stack, as shown in Figure 2-18. This is considered a type of search; notice in the Address bar it displays the words "Search results."

Figure 2-18: When you stack files, you create groups and collapse each group to an icon.

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By this point, you know the basics of the Windows Vista interface and how to navigate it efficiently. You'll put those new skills to work in the next two lessons.

Moving On

In this lesson, you learned some of the ways in which the Windows Vista interface differs from that of earlier versions. You learned how to find and run programs on the Start menu and how to navigate a Windows Explorer file listing. In Lesson 3, you'll learn how to customize Windows Vista via the Control Panel and display settings. Before you move on, complete the assignment and quiz for this lesson, and then head over to the Message Board to join the discussion on the Windows Vista interface.