Sams Teach Yourself StarOffice® 5 for Linux in 24 Hours |
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Hour 3: Using the Explorer and the Desktop |
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The Desktop is the main viewing area of the StarOffice window. When you first start StarOffice, it appears as shown in Figure 3.7. This section describes the icons on the Desktop and shows how you can use them to get started with StarOffice.
Figure
3.7
The
StarOffice Desktop at
startup.
The idea behind the Desktop (and behind the Explorer window and icon bars, for that matter) is that you can have immediate access to most tasks in StarOffice without having to remember which menu they're located on. Often, you never have to view a standard menu. You can just choose an icon or an item on the ever-present Start menu to initiate an action.
In the sections that follow, the icons and tools on the Desktop are described in more detail so that you can use them to start creating documents in Hour 7.
Both the Desktop and the Work Folder in the Explorer window are places to store your work.
Normally, you store all your documents in the Work Folder. You can create subdirectories to organize your work and divide files into different types (such as spreadsheets and presentations).
However, some documents are always more active than others. Documents that you are working on from day-to-day are normally placed on the StarOffice Desktop so that they are only a click away when you start StarOffice. When a document is finished or less important than others, it can be moved back to the Work Folder for permanent storage, leaving the Desktop uncluttered for current projects.
In the sections that follow, you learn how to move files between these two areas of StarOffice.
Several types of icons are included on the default StarOffice Desktop:
New documents--Double-clicking on any of these icons opens a new document of the named type. One example is the icon labeled New Spreadsheet.
HTML documents (Web pages) --These documents are related to the StarOffice home pages at StarDivision, the creator of StarOffice. One example of these is the icon labeled StarDivision.
Programs--Programs can also be stored on the Desktop. One example is the icon labeled Printer Setup, which runs the program psetup.
Explorer links --Because some features, such as StarSchedule, can only be accessed via the Explorer, the Desktop includes links to those items. One example is the icon labeled tasks, which opens the Task List screen (see Hour 24, "Using StarSchedule").
The StarOffice Desktop isn't just for these default files. On the Desktop you're actually seeing the contents of a special subdirectory on your Linux system. You can see this in the URL window of the function bar when you're viewing the Desktop. The following URL is displayed (with your username, of course):
file:///home/dtaylor/Office50/Desktop/
Because the Desktop is always quickly available by clicking on the Desktop icon in the lower-left of the status bar, storing your daily work files on the Desktop makes them easy to access.
You can add any of your documents to the Desktop so that you can immediately find them. Just follow these steps:
1. Make sure on the View menu that both the Beamer and the Explorer windows are open.
2. In the Explorer window, open the Workplace folder.
3. Within the Explorer window, browse in the Beamer until you locate the work file that you want to move to the Desktop.
4. Click and drag the file's icon from the Beamer, dropping it on the Desktop (see Figure 3.8).
Figure
3.8
The StarOffice Desktop with a user file added.
You can add many files to your Desktop, arranging them to suit your work needs. You can even delete some of the help files on the Default Desktop and use the Help menu instead when you need to open an Online Help file. Figure 3.9 shows a sample Desktop with a collection of personal files.
Figure
3.9
The StarOffice Desktop with a collection of personal work files.
The easiest way to move a document from the Desktop to a folder in your Workplace is to drag the icon from the Desktop to a folder in your Workplace (within the Explorer).
If you want to delete a file that's stored on your Desktop, another choice is to drag and drop the icon from the Desktop to the Recycle Bin icon in the Explorer window.
If you want to delete a file directly from the Desktop, however, you can follow these steps:
1. With the mouse pointer over the icon of the file that you want to delete, click the right mouse button. The pop-up menu shown in Figure 3.10 appears.
2. Choose Delete from the pop-up menu.
3. Use the Confirm Delete dialog box to confirm that you want to erase this item from the Desktop and from your filesystem. The icon and the file it represents are deleted.
Figure
3.10
A pop-up menu appears when you right-click on a Desktop icon.
The right-click menu that you just used to delete a Desktop icon has many other uses. The menu changes depending on the type of icon that you right-click. In general, however, the menu shown in the previous figure applies.
One of the things that you'll use the right-click menu for is to view the properties of a document on your Desktop--to see its size, its date of creation, and so on.
When you right-click on any Desktop icon, you can choose the Properties item from the pop-up menu. The dialog box in Figure 3.11 appears. Different types of files have slightly different dialog boxes.
From the Properties dialog box, you can view properties such as
The type of document (StarWriter, subdirectory Folder, HTML, StarCalc, MS Word, and so on)
The size of the document
The date and time that the file was created and when it was last modified
Information about accessing the document on the Internet (if appropriate to the file type)
Figure
3.11
The Properties dialog box tells you all about any file on your StarOffice Desktop.
In addition to the Properties item, you can see many other options on the right-click menu that you can explore to arrange the icons on your Desktop and work with your Desktop files.
With all your key working documents stored on your StarOffice Desktop for easy access, you might be asking what makes the Desktop so convenient.
You can always switch to the Desktop by selecting it from the Window menu. The easier way, usually, is to click on the Desktop button on the left end of the Start bar (see Figure 3.12). Because this button is always visible, you're always just one click away from viewing all the files on your Desktop.
Figure
3.12
The Desktop button on the status bar means you're always just one click
away from viewing the StarOffice Desktop.
When you have multiple documents open in StarOffice, you can display each one in a window smaller than the main StarOffice window so that parts of multiple documents are visible at the same time.
These floating windows each include a Status bar for the document in that window.
Use the small buttons on the upper-right corner of the document window to create a floating window while viewing a document. As with non-floating, full-sized windows, you can use the Windows menu or the buttons on the Start Bar to make any document visible.
The Start menu is a great way to access many StarOffice features. Not only are menu items provided to start new documents of many types, but you can also use the Start menu to open recently edited documents (their names are saved and shown on the Documents submenu), just as you do in Microsoft Windows 98.
Bookmarks and Help files are also listed in separate submenus on the Start menu for quick access.
If you're using KDE on your Linux system, and you selected KDE Integration when you installed StarOffice, you have two other features available in the Start menu:
The Program Files submenu includes everything from the KDE Main Menu, so you can start any program on the KDE menu directly from within StarOffice.
The KDE Control Center is included in the Settings submenu, so you can configure KDE from the Start menu selections.
Sams Teach Yourself StarOffice® 5 for Linux in 24 Hours |
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Hour 3: Using the Explorer and the Desktop |
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