UCL
EDUCATION & INFORMATION SUPPORT DIVISION
INFORMATION SYSTEMS
Effective File
Management
Exercises
Document No. IS-070
Content
Task one: Navigation .................................................................................................................... 3
Task two: File extensions and association .................................................................................... 3
Task three: File names .................................................................................................................. 3
Task four: Views ............................................................................................................................ 3
Task five: Read-only files .............................................................................................................. 3
Task six: Creating files .................................................................................................................. 4
Task seven: Sorting ....................................................................................................................... 4
Task eight: Moving, copying and deleting single files ................................................................. 4
Task nine: Selecting more than one file ........................................................................................ 4
Task ten: Copying multiple files ................................................................................................... 4
Revision task eleven: Copy to floppy ............................................................................................ 5
Task twelve: Folders ...................................................................................................................... 5
Task thirteen: Renaming files and folders .................................................................................... 5
Task fourteen: Deleting folders ..................................................................................................... 5
Task fifteen: Finding files ............................................................................................................. 6
Task sixteen: Murder in the castle ................................................................................................ 6
Task seventeen: Creating a .zip file .............................................................................................. 7
Task eighteen: Extracting files from a .zip file ............................................................................. 7
Hour 1: Navigation, file types and views
Task one: Navigation
1. Click on the small +s and –s next to R:, training.dir and its subfolders in the left pane to display and
hide their contents in the right pane.
2. Double-click on files and folders in the right pane to open them.
3. Close all the files.
Task two: File extensions and association
1. Open R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\mystery.txt.
2. Open R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\mystery.htm.
3. What’s the difference between these two files?
Task three: File names
What's wrong with the following file names?

東京外国語大学.xls

Progress?.pdf

Café.mdb
Task four: Views
1. Go to the View menu in Windows Explorer.
2. Try out the Large Icons, Small Icons, List and Thumbnails views on the View menu.
Which views do you find most useful?
3. Set the default view to Details view.
Task five: Read-only files
1. Make R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\BOOKS\AURIC.DOC read only.
2. Open it and add a word to the file.
3. Save the file.
4. What happens?
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Effective file management. Tasks
Hour 2: Working with files
Task six: Creating files
1. Go to Start | Programs | Accessories.
2. You will find Notepad and WordPad there.
3. Open first Notepad and then WordPad.
4. Type the following as content in both of them:
R:\Docs\Presentations\TeachingCommittee.ppt is the path of a PowerPoint file in the
Presentations subfolder of the Docs folder on the R: drive.
5. Save both of them in the R:\file-management folder with the name efm.
a) Use the Up One Level upward-pointing arrow until you find the R: drive.
b) If you see My Computer, you’ve gone too far.
c) Double-click (to open) My Computer, if necessary, and click (to select) R:.
6. Open Windows Explorer and click the R:\file-management folder in the left pane. Can you see the
files you created?
Task seven: Sorting
1. Navigate to the R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\BOOKS folder.
2. In Details view, sort by the column headings Name, Size, Type and Modified column headings one at a
time.
Note that if you click a column heading again, it sorts in the opposite direction.
Task eight: Moving, copying and deleting single files
1. Copy efm.rtf from R:\file-management to R:\training.dir\EXPLORER.
2. Move efm.txt to R:\training.dir\EXPLORER.
3. Delete R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\efm.rtf and R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\efm.txt.
Task nine: Selecting more than one file
1. Select all files and folders in R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\BOOKS.
2. Practice selecting several files at the same time by holding down Ctrl as you click the files.
3. Select only the files with names starting with the letters A and B in the
R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\BOOKS folder.
Task ten: Copying multiple files
1. Copy files beginning with A and B from R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\BOOKS to R:\file-management.
2. Backup (This just means “copy”!) all the files in R:\file-management to the
R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\ folder.
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Effective file management. Tasks
Hour 3: Creating folders and subfolders
Revision — Task eleven: Copy to floppy disc
1. Copy R:\file-management\efm.rtf to a floppy disc.
2. Give the floppy disc to your neighbour.
3. Create a folder called Floppy under R:\file-management and copy your neighbour’s file to it.
Task twelve: Folders
1. Create a folder on your R: drive called Docs.
2. Create the following subfolders under Docs:
Committees, Email, Letters, Pictures, Policy, Presentations
Note that you need to highlight Docs before going to File | New | Folder.
Task thirteen: Renaming files and folders
1. Rename R:\file-management\efm.rtf to file-management.rtf.
2. Rename R:\Docs to R:\Files.
Task fourteen: Deleting folders
1. Copy the R:\training.dir\EXPLORER folder to R:\file-management.
Note that all the subfolders are also copied.
2. Delete R:\file-management\EXPLORER.
Note how all the subfolders under R:\file-management\EXPLORER are also deleted and that there is no
Recycling Bin on WTS.
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Effective file management. Tasks
Hour 4: Finding files and creating .zip files
Task fifteen: Finding files
1. Select the R:\training.dir folder.
2. Hold down Ctrl and press F (for Find).
3. In the Search for files or folders named box, type a*.doc.
4. Press Enter.
5. What happens?
6. Repeat the experiment, but this time use a*.*.
7. What’s the difference between this and what happened before?
8. Click the Folders icon to restore the left pane.
9. Highlight the R: drive in the left pane.
10. Press Ctrl-F.
11. Clear the Search for files or folders named box, if necessary.
12. Search for files bigger than 20Kb.
Task sixteen: Murder in the castle
Welcome to the castle. A murder has recently taken place and Chief Inspector Clue has been called to
investigate. As you probably know this man is a master of detection — help him to illustrate his
thought processes as he reveals the activities which lead up to Sylvia being found unconscious in the
library and Sir James being shot in the ramparts!
1. Open the folder r:\training.dir\explorer\mystery. All the files and folders for this exercise can be found
here.
2. Draw up a plan of all suspects (files) within the mystery (folder) at the start of events.
How many suspects (files) are there? How many rooms are there (folders) in the castle folder?
3. What sport is the Vicar keen on? (Hint — Open the file vicar.txt to find out.)
4. Who are Louise and Gregory? _____________________________________________
5. To illustrate the inspector’s recount of the sequence of events which led up to the murder, carry out
the following file management operations:
6. Sylvia goes to help Louise with dressing. Move sylvia.txt to the bedroom.
7. Lady Jane dismisses Gregory for ruining her prize roses. Delete gregory.txt.
8. The Vicar joins Lady Jane in the stables. Move vicar.txt to the stables.
9. The Vicar tells Lady Jane that he is not really a Vicar but a Secret Agent. He reports that he has
information to discuss with her about Sir James. He suggests that they meet later. Rename vicar.txt
as agent.txt (he is in the stables).
10. Sylvia goes to meet her lover in the library. Move sylvia.txt (from the bedroom) to the library.
11. Lady Jane and the Agent meet in the attic. Move ladyjane.txt and agent.txt to the attic.
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Effective file management. Tasks
12. Sir James uses the secret passage and emerges in the turret, which adjoins the attic.
Create a new folder in the castle folder called turret. Move sirjames.txt to the turret. Copy
sirjames.txt to the attic.
13. Lady Jane goes to the library to confront her husband. She finds Sylvia in an interesting situation
and hits her over the head with a pot of petunias. Delete sylvia.txt.
14. Lord John with Geeves confronts his lifelong friend Sir James on the ramparts.
Move sirjames.txt from the turret to the ramparts.
Move both lordjohn.txt and geeves.txt to the ramparts.
Delete sirjames.txt from the attic.
15. A shot is heard coming from the ramparts and Sir James falls to the ground.
Open the ramparts folder and delete sirjames.txt.
16. When confronted with the murder Lord John and Geeves claim that they were in the wine cellar at
the time of the shooting.
Copy both lordjohn.txt and geeves.txt (in the ramparts) to the cellar.
17. It is quite clear to Inspector Clue that Lord John was the murderer!
Open the ramparts folder and rename lordjohn.txt to murderer.txt.
Delete geeves.txt from the ramparts.
Delete lordjohn.txt from the cellar.
18. Identify the whereabouts of all the remaining characters (files).
Where is Louise? ______________________
Who is in the stables? ______________________
Another mystery solved by the invincible Chief Inspector Clue!
Task seventeen: Creating a .zip file
1. Create a new folder on the R: drive — R:\file-management\2compress.
2. Copy all files in R:\training.dir\EXPLORER\BOOKS to the new folder.
3. Compress all files in R:\file-management\2compress.
4. Rename the .zip file created so that it is called booksfolder.zip.
Task eighteen: Extracting files from a .zip file
1. Create a new folder on the R: drive — R:\file-management\2decompress.
2. Move booksfolder.zip to R:\file-management\2decompress.
3. Decompress booksfolder.zip.
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Effective file management. Tasks