جامعة بابل | University of Babylon



Control Panel

Principles of Control Panel

The Control Panel is a part of the Microsoft Windows graphical user interface which allows users to view and manipulate basic system settings and controls via applets, such as adding hardware, adding and removing software, controlling user accounts, and changing accessibility options. You can use Control Panel to change settings for Windows. These settings control nearly everything about how Windows looks and works.

The Control Panel has been an inherent part of the Microsoft Windows operating system since Windows 2.0, with many of the current applets being added in later versions. These applets are stored as .cpl files. For example, the Add or Remove Programs applet is stored under the name appwiz.cpl.

To reach control panel, click start menu, in the right pane of it, and choose the control panel. If you don't find the control panel in the right pane, you can add it by the following steps:

[pic] [pic] [pic]

You can use two different methods to find the Control Panel's item you are looking for:

• Use Search. To find a setting you are interested in or a task you want to perform, enter a word or phrase in the search box in the start menu. For example, type "sound" to find specific tasks related to settings for your sound card, system sounds, and the volume icon on the taskbar.

[pic] [pic]

• Browse. You can explore Control Panel by clicking different categories (for example, System and Security, Programs, or Ease of Access), and viewing common tasks listed under each category. Or, under View by, click either Large icons or Small icons to view a list of all Control Panel items.

Many of the individual Control Panel applets can be accessed in other ways. For instance, Display Properties can be accessed by right-clicking on an empty area of the desktop and choosing Properties.

In recent versions of Windows, the Control Panel has two views, Classic View and Category View, and it is possible to switch between these through an option that appears on either the left side or top of the window.

The classic view consists of shortcuts to the various control panel applets, usually without any description (other than the name), it browse by icons with names only. The categories are seen if the user use "Details" view.

The category view consists of categories, which when clicked on, display the control panel applets related to the category.

[pic]

If you browse Control Panel by icons, you can quickly jump ahead to an item in the list by typing the first letter of the item's name. For example, to jump ahead to Display, type D, and the first Control Panel item beginning with the letter D is selected in the window.

Some of important contains of the control panel are:

• Accessibility options: Select (Ease of access center) option. [pic], this options make the computer easier to use by allowing modification to the computer equipment, specially for the disabled persons, such as, you can make the computer able to display visual warnings instead of these acoustic.

• Add new hardware: Select (Hardware and Sound) or (Devices and Printers),You can install most hardware or mobile devices just by plugging them into your computer. Windows will automatically install the appropriate driver if it's available, this feature called plug and play. If it's not, Windows will prompt you to insert a software disc that may have come with your hardware device. View and manage devices.

• Add/Remove programs: Select (Programs and Features) or (Programs), make install or set up a program or deleting it finally from the computer, because the manual deletion doesn't delete all the files of a program.

• Administrative Tools: Select (System and Security-Administrative Tools) [pic]

Configure administrative settings for the computer, it contains tools for system administrators and advanced users.

• Display: Select (Appearance and Personalization)[pic]or (Display), to add new colors to the desktop, change the background or screen saver, or change the windows forms and appearance and effects.

• Date and Time: Select (Region and language-Date and Time), to adjust the date and time according to the certain location.

• Region and language: Adjust the location, currency and numbers formats, and the input languages.

• Fonts: Select (Appearance and Personalization) or (Fonts), to add, change, and manage fonts on your computer.

• Keyboard: Select (Keyboard), to customize the keyboard settings such as cursor blink rate, and the speed of character repeated.

• Mouse: Select (Mouse), to customize the mouse settings such as button configuration (which click is primary), double-click speed, mouse pointer, and motion speed.

• Internet Options: Select (Network and Internet) or (Internet Options), to customize internet settings such as: select the home page, browsing history, saving temporary internet files, etc.

• Color Management: [pic] To change advanced color management settings for displays, scanners, and printers. Color management systems ensure that color content is rendered everywhere as accurately as possible including on devices, such as your monitor display and your printer. Color management systems help to ensure that colors appear the same on different devices because different types of devices have different color characteristics and capabilities.

• Device Manager: View and update the hardware's settings and driver software. You can use Device Manager to install and update the drivers for hardware devices, change the hardware settings for those devices, and troubleshoot problems. A device driver is software that allows Windows to communicate with a specific hardware device. Before Windows can use any new hardware, a device driver must be installed.

• Folder Options: Customize the display of files and folders, such as show hidden files, how to open the file (single click or double-click), open a folder in new window, etc.

• Sounds: Configure the audio devices or change the sound schemes for the computer, determining a sound for each event such as when maximize or minimize windows, startup, start menu, closing the program, resume a windows up and down, etc.

• Recovery: Restore the system to an earlier time without affecting the your files, or replace everything on the computer and reinstall windows. System restore to an earlier point in time, it can resolve many system problems, and is the best recovery method to try first, it is like undo recent system changes, but leave files such as documents, pictures, and music unchanged, this might remove recently-installed programs and drivers.

• User accounts: Change user account settings (name, type, etc.) and passwords for people who share the computer.

• Network and Sharing Center: Select (Network and Internet) or (Network and Sharing Center), check network status, change network settings and set preferences for sharing files and printers.

• Autoplay: Select (Hardware and Sound) or (Autoplay), change default settings for CDs, DVDs, and devices.

• Notification area Icons: Select which icons and notifications appear in the notification area. It contains program icons that provide status and notifications about things like incoming e-mail, updates, and network connectivity.

Another way to select the appeared icons (not from control panel):

[pic]

You can expand the notification area to view hidden icons [pic]

• System: Select (System and Security-System) [pic] ,view information about your computer, and change settings for hardware, performance.

• Taskbar and Start Menu: Select (Appearance and Personalization- Taskbar and Start Menu), Customize the start menu and the taskbar, such as how the items should appear, the location of taskbar, items of start menu, etc.

[pic]

-----------------------

LEC. 11

College of Information Technology / Software Department

…………………………………………………..

Computer Skills I / First Class / First Semester 2014-2015

Right click on the Taskbar

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download