Lab 3.1 : The Task Manager Using the Windows NT or Windows 2000 Task Manager, you can examine processes that are running, the number of threads a process has, system performance, and page faults. Windows 9x/Me has a simpler task manager, but it can still show running processes. Learning Exercise: If you are using Windows, follow these steps: Bring up the Task Manager window by pressing ALT+CTRL+DELETE and clicking the Task Manager button. Select the Applications tab. You should see a list of all applications currently running. Now select the Processes Tab. Then, on the View menu, click Select Columns, and check the Page Faults and Thread Count boxes. You can uncheck some of the other boxes if you wish. Then click OK. While keeping the Task Manager window visible (you may want to scroll down to the bottom if there is a long list of active processes), start up a new process, or make active a process that is already running. You should see the number of page faults and the CPU usage figures increase. Now click the Performance tab, and you will see graphs of processor and memory usage. Start some applications and you will see the processor and memory resource demands that they place on the system. You can also use the Task Manager to kill a process. This might be necessary if the process becomes "hung" or stalled, and will not respond when you try to close the application window. Be careful, though: if you kill one of the operating system's processes, your computer may no longer function properly, although rebooting should correct the problem. Lab 3.2 : Device Management This activity provides a user with an overview of how to access some of the Windows device management capabilities.
NOTE #1: Use caution when performing this lab. None of the steps involves actual changing of your computer system's configuration. However, you could inadvertently click on an option in one of the windows that specifies a change. If this occurs, use the Cancel button that should appear for each dialog box, which will discard any changes that you selected. NOTE #2: It may not be possible to perform this lab on some Windows computers. Viewing and/or changing of configuration information may be prohibited by the system administrator of your company or school to avoid problems such as that described in NOTE #1. Learning Exercise: If you are using a Windows OS computer, use the following procedure to view device hardware configuration settings: Examine device properties through the Device Manager. Rightclick the My Computer icon on your desktop, click Properties, and then click Device Manager tab. This window shows a hierarchical view of the system resources starting with "Computer." Each device category can be expanded to show the specific types of devices that Windows recognizes on your system. With "Computer" highlighted, you could click the Print... button to get a complete listing of all of the hardware and system resource settings, along with the version number of the driver being used. This printout may take from three to ten pages depending on your print settings and actual hardware configuration, so you may not want to do this. Select "Computer" and then click the Properties button. The resulting window will allow you to select the proper radio button and see all devices using certain IRQ values and other resource information. Expand some of the device categories by clicking the plus sign ( + ) appearing before the device category name. If a specific device has a problem as far as Windows is concerned, there will be a yellow circle with an exclamation point (! ) (indicating a warning for a possible problem) or a red circle with an "X" (indicating that the device is not functioning).
Determine what, if any, devices may have problems on your system. Clicking a device icon brings up a window with a set of tabs. Depending on the type of device, the window will differ in both the title and the number of tabs. Try this on several devices; modems and network adapters are some of the more interesting ones. Look for a Driver tab and click it if it exists. This window should show the file name and version of the driver currently installed, as well as an Update Driver button for upgrading the driver to a newer version. Look for a Resources tab and click it if it exists. This window shows which IRQs and Input/Output range of addresses are used by this device, and whether a device conflict exists with respect to another device in using these settings. Click Cancel to close Device Manager. On any version of Windows, use the following procedure to view the tools available in Control Panel that can be used to change both system settings and customize their operation for a particular user. On the Start menu, click Settings and then click Control Panel. Note the devices and services that appear in the window. Examine the keyboard attributes using the Keyboard Properties window. Using its various tabs, note how you can indicate to the driver what type of keyboard is being used, what languagekey layout is used, repeat key (continue pressing the same key) characteristics, and the cursor blink rate. You can try changing the repeat key and cursor blink characteristics and see their impact. Click Cancel to close the Keyboard Properties window. Examine the mouse attributes using the Mouse Properties window. Using its various tabs, note how you can indicate to the driver what type of mouse is being used, how the pointer should move on the display, how responsive it should be to a double-click, and if the functions of the buttons should be reversed for a left-handed person. You can try changing the functionality of the left-hand button and the double-click
speed and see their impact. Click Cancel to close the Mouse Properties window. Examine the display attributes using the Display Properties window. Using its various tabs, note how you change the screen saver, wallpaper, text appearance, number of colors, and the resolution. Do not make any changes to these settings. Click Cancel to close the Display Properties window. Use the Sound Properties window to examine which sounds are used by Windows to alert a user to various events. You can add sounds or remove them. You can preview a sound or change to an entirely different sound scheme to customize sounds on a peruser basis. To experiment with sound assignments, first select an event type, such as "Windows: Asterisk". Click the Preview play button to hear the sound currently assigned to that event. Then use the Name drop-down list to select another sound for that event. You can use the Preview play button to listen to your selection. Do not make any permanent changes to these settings. Click Cancel to close the Sound Properties window. Close the Control Panel window. Lab 4.1 : DOS Commands In this section, you will learn about the DOS command-line user interface. Learning Exercise: Perform the "DOS User Interface" lab on the CD that accompanies Parsons/Oja to practice using the DOS command-line interface. Do some additional exploring by trying the following: Note: The help command is not available on all versions of DOS. If it is not available, you can view the help information for any command by including a slash-question mark switch ( /? ) on the command line after the command like so, dir /? and pressing ENTER.
Type the help command on the DOS command line to see a list of all DOS commands. Then type help rmdir to see the Help entry for a particular command. The command color e9 changes the background and foreground text colors of the command window. Its argument is a hexadecimal number. Try it. Then try color 5b. For a list of colors, type help color. How can you set the color back to white-on-black? Some commands, such as dir, have Help entries that do not fit on a single screen. Type help dir more to view the Help entry one screen at a time. The vertical bar ( ) is pronounced "pipe." It is used to direct the output of one command (such as help) to the input of another (more, for example). The more command displays output one screen at a time; you must press the SPACEBAR to proceed to the next screen. However, with DOS systems, once you proceed to the next screen, there is no way to return to a preceding screen. (Modern applications with a GUI interface use a text window with a scroll bar to solve this problem.) If you are in the middle of a listing and you want to stop it, you can type CTRL+C. Example: type help; you will see the first screen of the Help entry. Then hold down the CTRL key and press the C key. Doing so will halt the display of the Help entry and will return you to the DOS command prompt. The assoc command (available in Windows NT/2000 only) displays associations between file extensions and applications. Type assoc.doc and then assoc.txt. Be sure to include the period at the beginning of the extension. The set command is used to set environment variables, which provide additional parameters to programs. Type set to see a list of the current variables and their values. Type exit to close the DOS interface window. Lab 4.2 : Macros If you have used applications such as word processors or spreadsheets, you may have noticed that there are certain operations
that you do quite often when working with documents within these applications. For example, if you are creating reports using a word processor, you may need to create a header with your name and today's date and footer with the page number. This type of operation requires you to select certain functions or make choices within the word processor's menus, as well as typing some information from the keyboard. If you are using an application that supports macros, you can have the application "record" your actions with the keyboard and mouse, and refer to them later for "playback." The recorded sequence is called a macro. The application will use the macro to simulate your inputs and perform the desired actions when you ask it to. The advantages of a macro are: It can reduce the amount of time required to create a document. It can reduce the chance of entering erroneous data. It can simplify a complicated set of interactions, so that other people can perform the operation without understanding all of the details involved with the application interface. You can even place the name of the macro on the application's menu or toolbar, as if you have created a function that was not provided by the application's developers. Macros do not necessarily record your inputs directly into a data file. Instead, a brief computer program is created that interacts with the application to perform the desired actions. (Sometimes this is done in an application-specific macro language, but Microsoft applications use Visual Basic to implement macros.) When you "execute" a macro, you are in fact running this program from within the application. Unlike other programs that you run on your computer, a macro program only has meaning while running the application used to create it. A consequence of macros actually being small programs is that documents that you typically think of as containing only data can actually contain both data and embedded programs. If someone gives you a document containing a macro, and you open the document and execute the macro, the macro could turn out to be a virus designed to harm the data on your computer. The topic of macro viruses is discussed in more detail in Unit 6. The steps typically involved in creating a macro are: Activate the "create macro" function of the application. Give the macro a name so that you can refer to it later.
A small window will appear on the application indicating the macro is recording. Start performing the keyboard and mouse interactions for the operation to be recorded. Click on the macro window and stop the recording when you are done. The only step required to execute a macro is that of invoking it. This is done either by selecting it via a menu using the mouse or via a key sequence known as a "shortcut." Shortcuts, if available, are normally established at the time the macro is created. If you are using the menu selection method, click the name of the macro that you want to execute. What about actions you perform frequently through the operating system's user interface, such as copying all word processing and spreadsheet documents from different folders to a CD disk? Is there a way to automate these actions so that you do not have to repeatedly point and click with your mouse on various menus and dialog boxes? These actions can be simulated on the operating system by using something called a "batch file" or a "script." Unlike with macros, there is typically no way to record a series of actions into a batch file; instead, you must create the batch file with a text editor. Batch files are actually small programs that use the operating system's command-line interface. They will be discussed later in 4.3.2 Batch File Commands. Learning Exercise: Macro facilities are typically found in more sophisticated application software. For example, Microsoft Word supports macros, while the text editor Notepad does not. This learning exercise leads you through the steps involved in creating and executing a macro using Word. If you do not have Word on your computer, try to find some other application that supports macros and perform similar actions. Start Microsoft Word. On the Tools menu, click Macro and then click Record New Macro. The Record Macro dialogue box will appear. In its Macro name box, type "SSD2macro". However, do not type the quotation marks. (Note that the Record Macro dialog box allows you to assign a keystroke shortcut to the macro or to assign the macro to a menu. It also allows you to specify whether the macro is just for the document you are creating or for any
document. If the macro is made to be shared by other documents, it would be placed in a library of macros available for use by other documents. However, we would not be using these features as part of this learning exercise.) Click OK. You will see the small Stop Recording window with buttons for pausing and stopping the recording process appear on the desktop or on the Word toolbar. If necessary, this window can be moved to a different location on the desktop. Suppose we want to create a macro that consists of your name, the class name, and today's date. You might want to include this information at the beginning of each of your exercises. Type your name, press ENTER, type "SSD2 Exercise", and then press ENTER. On the Insert menu, click Date and Time..., and then select an appropriate format from the Available formats box. Click the square button of the Stop Recording window to stop recording the macro. Create a new document by clicking New on the File menu or by using the New icon on the Word toolbar. To execute the macro in this new document, on the Tools menu, click Macro and then click Macros... Select "SSD2macro" from the list of macros; then click Run. You should see the result of the macro appear in the new document. If you want to view the program (that is, the macro) just created during the recording process, on the Tools menu, click Macro, and then click Macros... Select "SSD2macro" from the list and click Edit. The Microsoft Visual Basic window will then appear displaying a sequence of Visual Basic programming language statements, which is the macro you just created. You will have to close the Microsoft Visual Basic window to proceed. To delete the macro you just created, on Tools menu, click Macro, and then click Macros... Select "SSD2macro" from the list of macros, and then click Delete. Click Yes when Word queries you about deleting the macro, and then close the Macros box. Finally, close Word, and do not save any of the documents you have created as part of this exercise. Lab 4.3 : Embedding Application Objects
Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) is a facility provided by more sophisticated applications, and it requires operating system support. The OLE facility allows data (typically graphics or spreadsheets) that has been created by any of a number of different applications to be combined into a single document file. The imported data is treated as a single object that can be moved or deleted from the document or even edited by using the original application that created the data. The act of embedding data within a document is much more powerful than the simple copy-and-paste operations that you are probably already familiar with. The copy-andpaste approach typically inserts the data in a format compatible with the application that the data is pasted into. But, some types of information may be lost in this process (spreadsheet formulas, for example), and the data imported in the manner cannot be updated later by the application that created it. Embedding, however, is not supported by all applications. And, it has one other drawback: the application used to create the data must be installed on your computer if you wish to edit the data. For example, if somebody gives you a Word document with an embedded Excel spreadsheet, your computer must have Excel installed on it in order for you to edit the embedded spreadsheet. Embedding and a similar operation called linking are often found in integrated suites of applications, such as those provided by Microsoft Office or Coral's office applications. Linking differs from embedding in that the linked object is just a pointer to the document containing the data to be imported, rather than the data itself. With an embedded object, any changes to the imported data are saved as part of the host document; they do not affect the original document that was the source of the data. But, with a linked object, a change to the original data will affect all documents that are linked to that data. People who are viewing a file containing a linked object can see the changes made by someone else. Learning Exercise: If you have access to Microsoft's Word and Paint applications, you can create a bitmapped graphic using Paint, embed it as an object in a Word document, and modify the graphic while viewing the document in the Word application.
Start Microsoft Word. Edit an existing document or create a new one by typing a few lines of text. Start Microsoft Paint. (On the taskbar, click the Start button, and then click Programs, then Accessories, and then Paint.) Now, draw something. You might try choosing a color from the color palette at the bottom of the window, then selecting the spray-can tool and using it to write your name. Click the border tool (the icon that is a broken & endash; border rectangle) and click-and-drag to draw a border around your creation. Then, on Paint's Edit menu, click Copy. Now your selection has been copied to the Clipboard. Close Paint. Go back to Word. Within your Word document, click where you want the embedded graphic to appear. On Word's Edit menu, click Paste Special... Notice that the Paste Special dialog box provides you with some alternative formats for the data being inserted. Ignore these formats, and do not select the Display as Icon check box. Just click OK to accept the Bitmap Image Object setting (which is the default). Now, notice the impact these actions have on your document. Double-click the graphic object now embedded in your Word document, and a version of Paint should be started, allowing you to edit the embedded graphic. Make some minor changes in your graphic (say, by clicking on the Paint Can icon and "spraying" part of the graphic). Click outside of the picture on some of the text in the document, which will cause you to quit Paint. Notice that the changes you made to your graphic now appear in your document. Click and select the graphic object again (a border should form around the image). Delete the object by pressing the DELETE key. Now place the cursor (the blinking vertical bar) at the bottom or top of your Word document. On the Edit menu, click Paste Special. This time, select the Display as Icon check box. Notice that an icon representing the object now appears in the document rather than the graphic itself. The icon not only takes up less screen space but also takes up less disk space. An image embedded as an icon may use only half the space a fully-displayed embedded image uses.
Double-click the embedded object and the Paint program will start running once again to allow you to see it and edit it as well. Exit Paint. What happens if you print a document with an embedded icon? The icon is printed, just as you see it on-screen. If you want to print it as a real, full graphic, right-click the graphic. Then click Bitmap Image Object and then click Convert. Unselect the Display as Icon check box. The actual graphic will appear, replacing the graphic's icon. Try this on your own, and when you are finished, delete the object as you did before. Close Paint and Word without saving changes. Lab 4.4 : Creating a Batch File The following are examples of batch files using some of the commands and functions described in the preceding section. Try to follow each example and determine what actions are being performed by the commands in the batch file. Example of a Batch File The following is a simple batch file called COPYWP.BAT that copies all Microsoft Word and PowerPoint files from the C:\data\smith folder to one or more floppy disks. A batch file normally terminates after executing the last command in the file, but this example will not allow terminate, because of the goto command. Hence, we must employ another method for terminating a batch file: press CTRL+C on the keyboard (that is, hold down the CTRL key and press the "C" key). The command processor will then ask if you really want to terminate the batch job, just in case you pressed this key sequence by accident. To run this batch file, a user would type COPYWP at the command prompt. Follow the execution of the DOS commands and batch file commands to determine what actions are being performed. If this was something you were doing frequently using Windows Explorer, imagine how many point and click operations that would involve overtime. Instead of all of those interactions, a user could accomplish the same goal by just typing the batch file name at the command prompt.
REM Batch file created by John Smith @ ECHO OFF ECHO Copying Word and PowerPoint files to a floppy :LOOP ECHO Please insert a floppy into drive A: PAUSE COPY C:\data\smith\*.doc a:\ COPY C:\data\smith\*.ppt a:\ GOTO LOOP Example of a Batch File with Arguments The previous example always copied Word and PowerPoint files from the C:\Data\smith directory. What if Jane Jones wanted to use this batch file, but on her directory that is called C:\data\jones? Either another version of the batch file would have to be created under a different filename, or arguments could be used. In this example, the user must type on the command line not only the name of the batch file, but also the user's directory name. For example, type "COPYWP smith" to backup John Smith's files (which will cause all references to %1 in the batch file to be literally replaced by "smith"), and "COPYWP Jones" to backup Jane Jones' files (which will cause all references to %1 in the batch file to be literally replaced by "Jones"). REM Batch file created by John Smith @ ECHO OFF ECHO Copying Word and PPT files :LOOP ECHO Please insert floppy into drive A: PAUSE COPY C:\data\%1\*.doc a:\* COPY C:\data\%1\*.ppt a:\* GOTO LOOP Batch files may take more than one argument. The first argument is %1, the second %2, the third %3, and so on. In this example, the user must type not only the previous information, the batch filename, and the user's directory, but also the extension of the file to be copied. This batch will be able to copy from any user's directory any group of files to the floppy drive. REM Batch file created by John Smith @ ECHO OFF
ECHO Copying files :LOOP ECHO Please insert floppy into drive A: PAUSE COPY C:\data\%1\*.%2 a:\* GOTO LOOP Learning Exercise: This exercise will give you practice creating and executing batch files using the examples that appear in this page. Use Microsoft Word to create files C:\data\smith\file1.doc and C:\data\smith\file2.doc. You can put whatever you like in these files. Note: if you are unable to create files with this specific path, then choose a path that works and modify the remaining steps appropriately. Start the Windows Notepad text editor (located in the Accessories menu). Type "REM " followed by your name. Be sure to include a space after "REM". On the File menu, click Save As... In the Save as Type drop-down list, choose "All Files". This is necessary to create a text file with an extension that is not ".txt". Save this file in the C: drive's root folder with the name "copywp.bat". Copy the example batch file that appears in the first section of this page, "Example of a Batch File," and then paste it into your newly created copywp.bat. Check your spelling, syntax, and spaces, and then save your work. Start the DOS Command Line program (typically found in the Programs menu). Run the batch file by typing copywp on the command line. Note that you do not actually have to insert a floppy disk in the A: drive. If you do not do this, the copy command will report an error; click on "Ignore" to proceed. Determine if you have any syntax or logic errors in your batch file. Go to the Notepad window. Modify copywp.bat with the modifications shown in the first example in the section "Example of a Batch File with Arguments," and then save your work. Go to the Command Prompt window. Run the batch file by typing "COPYWP smith". Determine if you have any syntax or logic errors. Go to the Notepad window. Modify your copywp.bat with the modifications shown in the second example in the section "Example of a Batch File with Arguments" and save your work.
Go to the Command Prompt window. Run the batch file by typing "COPYWP smith doc". Determine if you have any syntax or logic errors. Try the various menu choices. Close both the Notepad and Command Prompt windows. Lab 4.5 : Searching the Library of Congress Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol is one of his most popular works. Over the years, there have been many adaptations of this classic story. We can research this topic by querying the Library of Congress Online Catalog. Learning Exercise: Go to the Library of Congress Online Catalog (http://catalog.loc.gov/). Click the Guided Search link. On the page that appears, enter "Charles Dickens" (without quotation marks) in the first Search box, and select as a phrase in the drop-down list to the right of the Search box. Now enter "Christmas Carol" (without quotation marks) in the second Search box, and select as a phrase in the drop-down list to the right of that Search box. Click the Begin Search button, and you should be presented with over 150 items that match your criteria, the first 25 of which will be displayed on the first screen. These items will include books, films, and tapes of radio performances. Now, let's narrow our search a bit. Walt Disney has produced adaptations of A Christmas Carol that feature Mickey Mouse. What is the summary of the book? Here's how to find out: In the Resort results by drop-down box, select Full Title Look for title "Walt Disney Productions presents Mickey's Christmas carol" and click on the link Click the Full Record tab