Organizing Your Files on Windows PC's
If you've noticed your files piling up to the point where they're hard to find, here are a few tips to help view them more easily as you work on deleting or relocating.
These days while people are spending more time at home than usual can be a good time for getting those files under control and better organized.
Most Windows computers have a handy built-in utility program you can use to find any of your files and their location in the folder structure on your drive(s)
On Windows 10 computers this program is called File Explorer. On previous Windows computers, the program was called Windows Explorer. Other than added features and modifications over time, the program is basically the same among Windows systems.
When you open the program, you'll generally see folders like Documents, Downloads, Pictures among others listed in the left-hand column, and often listed under Frequent Folders at tge top of the larger center-right area.
These listings are shortcuts to folders actually located in your User folder on the hard drive.
If you go to one of these folders, you'll find listings of sub-folders and files in that folder. Sometimes you'll see the listings in the form of "thumbnails" - notably in the Pictures folder. These give you a miniature pictorial display of each picture file, which otherwise would be unrecognizable based on date-based file names.
If you go to Documents or Downloads, you'll usually find the folder and file listings presented alphabetically or reverse-chronologically, identifying the file name, a date, the file size, and the type of file. This is called the "Detail" view.
You can choose how you want to view the list of files in a folder by clicking on the View tab at the top of the File Explorer program screen. This display will show a list of View options including Extra-large, Large, Medium or Small icons; List, Details, Tile or Icon.
Generally the View options I use are either Large or Extra-large icons for sorting pictures, and Detail for sorting Document or Download files.
Sorting files requires learning how to use a few key features of File Explorer, including cut & paste or drag & drop, on-the-fly folder creation, file selection (including Ctrl/Shift-click options) and file-ordering. These don't take long to learn but do take a bit of practice. It's far easier to use these features together using a mouse and keyboard than relying on the touch-pad built into laptops or notebooks.
You'll notice that when you open up File Explorer the screen may look similar to screens you see when sending an attachment in your email program, or when using File:Open in other programs. This is because those other programs are borrowing certain File Explorer functions to give you access to your files. None of these programs "contain" your files. They simply work together to give you convenient access to them.
If you're not sure where a file is located, you can use the Search icon or box, usually in the lower left below your desktop, to search by name or indexed content. When you find your file or folder listed, you can use Open Folder Location and then open it if you choose.
File Explorer a.k.a. Windows Explorer is one of the most fundamental and useful programs available as part of Windows. Spending a bit of tutorial and practice time with this program can make a great difference in getting more useful service from your machine.
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