What is “Windows?”
Microsoft Windows is an
operating system, which means that it is a
set of programs which control other
programs. Several versions are in
use. Windows 95 is covered in the
previous chapter. Versions earlier than
3.1 are effectively extinct.
Windows 3.1 has largely
been replaced by Windows 95. Many users
have converted, and most new IBM-compatible
personal computers are pre-loaded with
95. The different interface was heavily
advertised. My personal assessment is
that the new interface may be easier to
learn, but not any advantage to people
already familiar with Windows 3.1. I
did convert, due to good advice from a
seminar leader teaching the use of
QuickBooks. He found that 95 was much
better at task switching. In writing
this book, I have wanted to use five heavy
programs at once. With QuickBooks
running, I also needed a screen capture
program. Ten screen shots were captured
for each one printed in the book, so I needed
a spreadsheet to catalog them. An image
editing program was needed, and lastly a word
processor. Windows 3.1 could not handle
all that. Windows 95 does it fairly
well.
One feature of Windows
tends to grow on you: its
flexibility. Rather than a single, rigid
way to do something, you often have a
choice. You expect a computer to have
hard and fast rules. In Windows, the
rule often is that you must pick one of
several means to do your job. Do not
expect to learn procedures. Expect to
learn the environment. That begins with starting an application program. This is even more true in Windows 95.
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