SUMMER 2016INTERMEDIATE COMPUTER CLASS

LESSON 3COMPUTER FILE SYSTEMS

FILE EXPLORER

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN IN THIS LESSON:WHAT A FILE SYSTEM ISWHERE FILE SYSTEMS RESIDEWHAT A FILE ISWHAT A FILE NAME ISWHAT A FOLDER ISWHAT A FILE PATHNAME ISHOW TO USE WINDOWS EXPLORER TO:

• FIND A FILE (PROGRAM OR DATA)• DELETE FILES• COPY FILES• MOVE FILES• RENAME FILES• CREATE FOLDERS• CREATE DESKTOP SHORTCUTS

WHAT IS A FILE SYSTEM?

A file system is a collection of files, folders, directories and associated pointer data, security data and other information necessary to manage the files.

WHAT ARE COMMON FILE SYSTEMS?• NTFS (NEW TECHNOLOGY FILE SYSTEM) WINDOWS NT, XP,

VISTA, WINDOWS 7, WINDOWS 10)• FAT16 (FILE ALLOCATION TABLE 16 BIT)• FAT32 (FILE ALLOCATION TABLE 32 BIT)• ISO 9660 (INTERNATIONAL STANDARDS ORGANIZATION) AKA

CDFS

FILE SYSTEMS RESIDE ON:

Common mass storage devices on personal computers:Disk drives (hard disk, fixed disk consisting of one or more rotating platters, rotating at up to 7200 rpm) the primary disk drive in a personal computer, usually named the C: drive, contains the operating system, most programs and data. Disk drives in laptops are usually 2.5 inches in diameter, in desktops 3.5 inches in diameter. Disk drives in new computers typically contain 250 – 1000 GB (gigabyte - 1 billion bytes, 1000GB is also known as 1TB terabytes) These devices are non-volatile (retain contents when power is removed).

Flash drives memory made of transistors on an integrated circuit device. Flash drives are also non-volatile

CD ROMs - compact disk used for data and music

DVD – digital versatile disk

Cameras - digital cameras with flash drive storage

Network drives – disk drives on other computers which have granted permission to access to all or part of a drive.

(ROOT DIRECTORY)DRIVE C:

FOLDER A FOLDER C

FOLDER B FILE A

FILE B

FILE A1

FILE A2

FILE A3

FILE A4

FILE A1

FILE A2

FILE A3

FILE A4

FILE A1

FILE A2

FILE A3

FILE A4

FOLDER B1

FILE A1

FILE A2

FILE A3

WHAT IS A FOLDER?A folder is a container in a file system that contains files and folders. Folders are used to organize the information that is stored on the storage device. Folders are also called directories.

WHAT IS A FILE?A file is a collection of sequential bytes of data. A file may contain:

• PROGRAM(S)• DATA • MUSIC• PICTURES• MOVIES, etc.

Application programs are executable code that perform useful work for the user. Examples are – Windows Explorer, Internet Explorer, Wordpad, Turbo Tax, etc. An application program resides on a disk drive as one or more files in a folder on the disk drive.

Data files contain information that is useful and of value to the user of the personal computer e.g. text documents, pictures, financial data, (stock, income tax data, bank account, etc.)

WHERE PROGRAMS AND DATA ARE STOREDPrograms and data files are stored on mass storage devices . Examples of these devices are:

C: Drive – a hard disk drive that is the primary mass storage device on a personal computer. The C: drive holds the operating system, application programs and user data.

CD/DVD Drive typically the D: drive. This drive accepts removable media (CD or DVD). Data is written to the media by a special burn process.

External Disk Drive – these drives are identical to the internal drive C: and plug in to a USB port. The drive letter assignment will vary depending on the configuration of the computer.

Flash drive (thumbnail) – Semiconductor memory that plugs into a USB port. The memory is non-volatile, I.e. it retains the contents when power is removed.

TYPES OF FILE SYSTEMS

Windows can manage storage devices with the following File System Types:

NTFS – New Technology File System, the standard file system on the C: drive

FAT16 and FAT32 – File Allocation Table (16 bit or 32 bit) FAT 32 is standard on flash drives

CDFS – Compact Disk File System or ISO9660 standard file system for audio cd's

UDF – Universal Disk Format (also ISO9660) standard file system for DVD's

FIXED DISK STRUCTURE

Assume a 1 Terabyte Drive (1000 Gigabytes):

MasterBootRecord

Partition 1 Partition 2 Partition 3 Partition 4

WindowsNTFS orFAT

LINUX Hidden(Windowsbackup)

?

PARTITION 1

Filenames,FoldersPointers todata

Operating system

User data,programs

Emptyspace

Operating system

Fragmented Disk Memory space

Now open File Explorer:

The Navigation pane is used to find the location on the device that contains the end objective of your search. The Contents pane shows the contents of the highlighted item in the Navigation column. The Preview pane shows a preview of the item selected in the Contents pane.

In the Navigation Pane the right pointing arrows to the left of the items indicate that something is contained in that named item. You can expand the item by left clicking on the arrow.

NAVIGATIONPANE

CONTENTS PANE

PREVIEWPANE

Under This PC there are six folders and the C: drive. The right pointing arrows indicate each contains additional items. If you expand each one you will find that the Music, Pictures, Documents, Downloads and Videos are Libraries just as in Windows 7.

Under Users there is a Folder for each User Account in the system. Each folder is protected for the account that it belongs to. For example, from the Intermediate account, you cannot access information in the Beginners account or one of the Administrator accounts. To share data with other users, use a folder that is in the root directory of the C: Drive.

With File Explorer we can copy, delete and move files. Simply right click on the file name and select the Cut, Copy, Delete, or Rename options.

These operations work regardless of the device that the file is copied from or to, unless the destination device is write protected.

FILE EXPLORER

File Explorer has many features which add ease of use and additional function. The top bar on the pane is the Title bar and contains the name of the element selected in the Navigation pane. Below the Title Bar is the Menu Bar which contains menu items that were on the Windows Explorer screen.

The Home tab contains a number of file and folder manipulations available to the user such as Move, Copy, Paste, Rename, Delete, etc.

The Share tab functions provides means to output files to other devices, print, zip, email files and folders. The View tab provides the means to change the format of the File Explorer display. Features such as additional columns containing the Date Created, file name extensions, etc.