What's in store for Windows 4? - Microsoft Windows 4.0 graphical user interface - Windows Watcher - Column

Home Office Computing, March, 1993 by Kay Yarborough Nelson

We'll start this column with a most welcome rumor, and then take a look at some solid Windows tips, both fun and practical.

Windows 4.0? Rumors are that version 4 will be much, much easier to use than any incarnation of version 3 (3.0, 3.1, or 3.2, if there is one). Apparently, you won't have to figure out the system of files and subdirectories--you'll simply be able to request a document with an easy-to-use query system to get the document from the database (your hard disk). Then the system will find it for you and figure out what program to start running, and up will pop your document. Farewell, File Manager. I for one won't be sorry to see it go.

Using long icon names. In Windows, you can use icon names that are longer than DOS's silly eight-character limit, but if you do, icon names can overlap on the screen--making icon names appear even more cryptic. To read long icon names clearly, click on the Desktop Control panel and change the setting for icon spacing to a number over 100. Experiment until your icons are spaced out enough to be able to read their names. (This trick works with both Windows 3.0 and 3.1 .)

Clean up your .INI files. Every time you install a new Windows program, your WIN.INI file gets changed. You may have deleted a lot of these programs, but their settings will still be there, cluttering up your WIN.INI file. As a result, Windows takes longer and longer to start because it's reading everything in the .INI file. Here's the trick for editing your WIN.INI file (or any other .INI file, for that matter). First, make a copy of WIN.INI and name it something like WIN.BAK so if anything goes wrong, you can retrieve the original WIN.INI (by renaming WIN.BAK as WIN.INI). Then choose Run from the Program Manager's File menu and enter WIN.INI. All files ending in .INI are associated with the Notepad, so Notepad will start and open your WIN.INI file (or any .INI file specified). Look for the names of programs you've deleted in brackets. Then delete all the stuff that applies to a program you've already deleted.

Change icons. In Windows 3.1, highlight the icon you want to change and then choose Properties from the Program Manager's File menu. Click Change Icon. If there are any ready-made icons that are available for that item, you can scroll to see them. If there aren't any, don't despair. Try this trick instead: in the File Name box, enter C:\WINDOWS\ PROGMAN.EXE; then click OK. Hidden in MORICONS.DLL are all kinds of icons to choose from. There's a safe, an optical disk, pointing hands, a Swiss army knife, a camera, shaking hands, a film can, letters ... and plenty more.

Set up shortcut keys. All you have to do to assign a hot-key combination to a program in Windows 3.1 is use the Properties dialog box. With the insertion point in the Shortcut Key box, press the combination of keys you want to assign as the program's shortcut. Windows will add the Alt key for you, so pressing Ctrl-T, for example, assigns the shortcut Alt-Ctrl-T. From then on, you can just press Alt-Ctrl-T to start that program or switch to it while it's running.

Find the Program Manager. In version 3.0 of Windows, it's easy to lose the Program Manager. The easiest way to find it is to bring up the Task List or double-click on the desktop. Windows 3.1 has provided Control icons on all the Program Manager's group windows, so you can close them one by one and get back to the Program Manager window.

Specifying what to star with. With Windows 3.1 's StartUp group, all you have to do is copy the icons of the programs you want opened automatically when Windows starts into the StartUp group. Press Ctrl and drag to make a copy of an icon instead of moving the original.

Drag and drop to open files. With the improved 3.1 File Manager, drag a file's icon into an application window or drop it onto a program's minimized icon, and the file will open (if that program can open that file). Just drag a file's icon to the Print Manager window to print it, too.

Next column: Spring-cleaning with Windows.