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Windows

The applications which you work on will be framed in something called a window. You should remember this from the lesson Disecting a Window

You may sometimes wish to have a number of application windows open at the same time and will need to "toggle" between them. For example, you may be researching an essay and find a quote on the Web which you would like to use. You will be able to copy the text from your internet browser window to the word processor package; requiring you to switch between the two.

Action: Take a screen shot of the task bar, this is where your application windows can be accessed from.

Action: Take a screen shot of the top right hand corner of a window and note what function each of the three buttons there performs.

# 2.2.2.2: Colapse, expand, resize, move, close a window
# 2.2.2.3: Switch between open windows

Knowledge Items: 2.2.2.3 >>2.2.2.2 >>

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Where does it all go?

When you produce work on your computer, you will need to save it, this way you can easily open it later for futher work.

You should be able to complete all of these tasks without any problems as you will have had to work with files as you complete your work. It is important to understand that when you save a file it is stored within a series of folders. If you do not store your work in a logical way, you will find it difficult to locate it in the future. Even in a small office we have over 100,000 files so you must take care to save your work in an appropriate place.

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Take a screen shot of a window which displays all of the objects mentioned in point 2.3.2.3 below.

2.3.2.1: Navigate to a file, folder on a drive
2.3.2.2: Create a directory/folder and a further sub-directory/sub-folder
2.3.2.3: Open a window to display directory/folder name, size, location on drive

Knowledge Items: 2.3.2.1 >>2.3.2.2 >>2.3.2.3 >>

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Nineteen Eighty-Four

As we continue to think about the data protection act, and how it affects our lives. Data has become one of the most valuable resources in the world, it is used to sell us goods, to keep tabs on us, to make sure we pay our bills and our taxes. It is used to protect us from criminals, to give us access to services and even to help companies make financial descisions regarding us.

There are eight principals which all "data controllers" that is people or organisations who hold data on individuals (thats you) must adhere to.

These principles require the data controller to:

1. process personal data fairly and lawfully.
2. obtain personal data only for one or more specified and lawful purposes and to ensure that such data is not processed in a manner which is incompatible with the purpose or purposes for which it was obtained.
3. ensure that personal data is adequate, relevant and not excessive for the purpose or purposes for which it is held.
4. ensure that personal data is accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date.
5. ensure that personal data is not kept for any longer than is necessary for the purpose for which it was obtained.
6. process personal data in accordance with the rights of the individuals to whom the information relates.
7. ensure that personal data is kept secure.
8. ensure that personal data is not transferred to a country outside the European Economic Area unless the country to which the information is to be sent ensures an adequate level of protection for the rights.

Read about what the act means on the information comissioners website and also read a little about a book called 1984 which was written by a man called George Orwell, and use this as inspiration for your work.

Write an imaginative story about what the world would be like if we did not have the data protection act and similar laws to protect us. What would happen if these laws were taken away? If you are under 13 your story should be at least 400 words, 13 and over it should be 600.

http://ico.gov.uk/eventual.aspx?id=1037&expmovie=1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four

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File Concepts

Your computer stores the many files which you use every day, be they Word Processing Documents, Image Files, Web Pages, Presentations, Spreadsheets or many more they are all stored on one of a number of devices.

List four storage devices and find a picture of each.

On these disks the files are organised by your operating system in a hierarchical structure. Just like you might find in a paper filing system only this heirarchy can be extremely large. Files are stored within folders (directories), folders can also be stored inside other folders and so on.

Make a diagram depicting heirarchy of the following system.

Within a folder called Swiming Club are two folders, one called Accounts and another called Staff. Within the accounts folders are three folders one each for the years 2004 - 2006. Each of these folders contains a spreadsheet file called expenses and another called membership fees.

Within the Staff folder there are two folders one called Matt Smith and another called Amy Conifer. Both folders contain the following word documents: cv, job description & contract. In adition to this Amy Conifer's folder contains a file called Annual Appraisal 2005.

Knowledge Items: 2.3.1.1 >>2.3.1.2 >>

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Working with icons

Icons make using Windows easier and more fun! They help us to navigate without being presented with pages of text and they can be customized to help us to recognise them. We will cover a bit more about working with icons.

You may want to move a desktop icons to a more convenient place or change the order, you can do this simply by clicking the icon and dragging it to your desired location. You should do the following.

# 2.2.1.2: Select and move desktop icons
# 2.2.1.3: Open a file, directory/folder, application from the desktop
# 2.2.1.4: Create a desktop icon desktop menu alias

Knowledge Items: 2.2.1.2 >>2.2.1.3 >>2.2.1.4 >>

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Dissecting a Window

Using windows is a key skill when using your computer, start of by watching the MS Windows XP Tour.

You can access the tour by clicking Start > All Programs > Accessories > Tour Windows XP. You can choose either the animated or standard tour. Click the Grey menu item and then skip to the lesson on windows.

You should find some useful information here you can then continue to browse Windows Help and use the internet to search for the information you need.

Take a screen shot of a window of your choice using the print screen facility, copy this image into MS Word and label all of the following items:

1. title bar
2. menu bar
3. toolbar
4. status bar
5. scroll bar

Knowledge Items: 2.2.2.1 >>2.1.2.6 >>

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Text Editing

This lesson should be fairly straight-forward, the most important skill to learn is how to save and open files. This skill can be exported to almost any windows desktop application.

An important point to recognise is that when you save a file (in this case a text file), you are not saving it in the application, you use the application to save the file onto disk, whether this is on your local machine, on your desktop, in your my documents, or on a network shares, your file can be located again on disk.

It is not good to rely on the application you used to create the document to retrieve it, as the list of recent documents it stores is just that. It will not store old documents for you so it is important to have a logical filing system on disk so you can easily locate files.

You will need to complete the following tasks for this assignment, as word processing has been covered in the tasks for the other assignments we will focus on saving and retriving your file.

1. * 2.1.3.1: Launch a text editing application. Open, Create a new file
2. * 2.1.3.2: Save the file to a location on a drive
3. * 2.1.3.3: Close the text editing application

Knowledge Items: 2.1.3.1 >>2.1.3.2 >>2.1.3.3 >>

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Everyware Discussion

Read this document and then split into two opposing groups, one that is for this sort of technology and one that is against, it does not matter if you agree or disagree, you should argue the case you have been assigned. Spend 10 minutes researching the topic, 10 minutes coming up with points for a discussion and then there will be a 15 minute discussion, chaired by your tutor.

Everyware now an introduction

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Your Rights

Since the advent of the internet, information has started flying about all over the place, in the UK there is an act called the Data Protection Act, it defines our rights and responsibilities under law, as individuals and the rights and responsibilities of organisations holding our information.

In this lesson we are not going into depth about the act, Just look up the information commisioners office on google and find 2 rights that you have as a person whose information is held by an organisation. Write at least one paragraph on the points, describing them and also give your own point of view whether this is a good point or bad!

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Using Help

Most all Software Applications feature some sort of help articles, it is good to be able to find your way around these, after all it stands to reason that the people who made the software will be the best people to ask about how it works! There is a wealth of information in help so when you have a question you know where to go.

For this lesson I want you to find out how to create a simple chart, it can be to display anything you want (within reason), make sure you right down where in the help files you found the answers to your questions so someone else will also be able to find their way to the same article.

Knowledge Items: 2.1.2.7 >>

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More Settings!

During this lesson we will be changing and working together on the following. You cannot do these things on your own machines as you need local administrators rights.

# 2.1.2.3: Set, change keyboard language
# 2.1.2.4: Format removable disk media: diskette, Zip disk
# 2.1.2.5: Install, uninstall a software application

Knowledge Items: 2.1.2.3 >>2.1.2.4 >>2.1.2.5 >>

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customising your computer

From time to time you may need to check your basic system information or customize the look and feel or default behaviour of your operating system.

System information

You may need to check your system's basic information, most notably the following:

1. Operating System


2. Operating System Version


3. Installed Random Access Memory (RAM)

You can do this via the "Control Panel". Click "Start" and then "control panel" and then find the "System" icon and open it.

PATH: Start>Control Panel>System

Here you will find all the information listed above, take a screenshot and save it in word. Note your computers information next to the image.

Change some settings

We are going to change some settings now these are:

1. System Date/time
2. Volume
3. colour settings
4. screen pixel resolution
5. screen saver options

You can find the system date/time in the system tray (double click the date) or through Start>Control Panel>date and time, the volume control will also be found in the system tray or in Start>All Programs>Accessories>Entertainment. You will find the other settings in the "Display" Screen which can be accessed by right clicking the desktop and then selecting "properties" or via Start>Control Panel>Display.

Change a setting in each of these, and then show your tutor. You may need to be given special privilages by your Network administrator in order to complete this lesson

Knowledge Items: 2.1.2.1 >>2.1.2.2 >>

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Weblogs - Grassroots publishing

Technology moves extremely fast, it is important to keep up to date with latest developments. One of the greatest things about the internet is that it gives the power of publishing to ordinary people.

With that in mind I have set up a wordpress blog for Phoenix Academy. If you are reading this post and do not study at phoenix you can choose from a variety of blogging software and services see below:

How?

blogging is web-publishing for everyday people see the wikipedia definition. Now you know what it is heres how its going to work. I you study at phoenix head over to www.phoenixacademy.co.uk/students/blog and click register.

Once you have signed up and the admin has okayed you to author you can begin posting, it really is as easy as that!

Why?

So no one wants to hear about what you had for breakfast or which bus you got to school! blogs are informal but they are not just diaries of your day, you can post about INTERESTING (for interesting read things that people you don't know may acctually look at) things that have happened to you, ideas, thoughts, how you think the world should work, how you think your school should work, politics, science, maths, the merits of algebra or communism. You can tell the world about anything you want, but don't forget you have to give the world a reason to listen.


Blogging

• blogger
• wordpress
• wordpress*

software*

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Types of Computer

There are 5 main types of computer. They all have different typical users, speeds, storage and other special attributes. I have made 5 lists: types of computer, typical users, performance, storage & cost. You need to link up the options in the latter three to the computer types in the first list.

Now here are the lists!

Types of Computer:

• Mainframe
• Network Server
• Personal Computer
• Laptop
• Personal Digital Assistant

Typical Users:

• Student
• Bussiness Woman
• Office Worker
• Large Companies/Multinationals
• Small Bussiness
• School
• Home Users

Storage:

• Huge diskspace and memory
• high storage and memory
• Average
• A little less than average
• quite low

Speed:

• Extremely fast, processing huge amounts of data
• Fast, maybe processing large amounts of data
• Reasonably fast
• a little slower not processing large amounts of data
• Quite slow generally only processing one application at a time

Cost:

• Extremely Expensive
• Quite expensive
• reasonably expensive priced
• Good Value for performance

Knowledge Items: 1.1.2.1 >>

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Power up

This lesson is about powering up, turning off and restarting your PC.

Powering up

Check that there are no disks in any of the drives, this includes floppy disks, usb memory sticks, cd's and all other removable media.

Make sure all the leads are securely in place and turn on the monitor, then find the power unit on the base unit and turn it on.

Wait for the PC to load the operating system, for this course it is Windows. You may be asked to login, if you are using your computer at an office you may need to ask your network administrator for your account details.

Shutting down

From the start menu select "shut down" you will be presented with a list of options to turn off your computer select "shut down" or "turn off", you may also want to restart your machine. This is often a quick solution to problems you maybe experiencing with Windows.

Log off

Logging off becomes incredibly important in an office or school environment where many users share the same machines. Forgetting to log off can prevent other users from using the machine and give others access to company resources.

Shut down a non-responding application

From time to time an application, or number of applications which you are using may stop responding to your commands. You may want to force this application to stop running.

On your keyboard press CTR+ALT+DEL, and you will see the task manager, in some cases you may see a screen with other options including task manager, click through.
Click the applications tab and find the application that is not responding, select it and press End Task.
The status indicator can help you to decide which applications you want to stop. You can also terminate processes but it is recommended only for advanced users.

Knowledge Items: 2.1.1.1 >>2.1.1.2 >>2.1.1.3 >>2.1.1.4 >>

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buy a computer

You are a bussiness man/woman you travel alot and need to be connected to your information where ever you are you attend lots of meetings and often have to present ideas. email me a spec for a computer which you would like the company to buy you. You have to justify your choice and give a full specification.

email me your answer in a Word doc.

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Icons

In todays lesson we are going to learn about finding your way around the computer.

Switching on, make sure there are no disks in any drives and press the power switch. You may need to check that the monitor is switched on aswel.

If you are working on a network (you are when at school) you will probably be asked for a username and password.

Once you have logged in the computer will load your desktop, you will see a coloured background or more likely a picture and some sybols which are called icons.

To "print" a copy of your screen to the clipboard for pasting into any other document you can hit the print screen button on your keyboard and then paste the image into an application for editing or inclusion in a document.

Use print screen to paste images of the following into a word document and email them to me.

1. A Directory/folder icon
2. A file icon
3. The Desktop
4. An Application Icon
5. The Recycle Bin Icon
6. A Printer Icon
7. the task bar
8. the system tray
9. a tool tip

Knowledge Items: 2.2.1.1 >>

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Using the internet for research

You need to find some information, save it in a word file and then email me the file. Remember to include where you found the details.

The information I need you to find is listed below do as many as you can:

1. Who invented the world wide web?
2. How far is it from The eBASE to your house (with a map of your house.
3. Name two popular "Operating Systems"
4. What is a Notebook computer
5. What are the main principles of the Data Protection Act
6. What is a clipboard used for
7. Find and attatch a picture of the status bar in MS Internet Explorer

Knowledge Items: 1.1.1.1 >>10.1.1.1 >>10.1.1.2 >>10.1.1.3 >>

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