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Go backMac Guided TourWhat else is in the menus?

You’ve used the File menu several times already. The commands in the File menu are very useful in opening documents, getting information about them, or filing them away.

The File menu also has a Print command. You can use this command when you have an Apple ImageWriter printer attached to your Macintosh, and when you want to get a printed copy of some document.

And there’s the Eject command to eject the disk from the disk drive. You’ll use this command on your system disk. You’ll eject your Guided Tour by clicking “I am ready to stop” on the Guided Tour screen.

In the View menu there are commands which help you view the objects on your disk in a number of different ways. You can view them by icon as they are now, or by name as they will be next.

Or you can view them by date...

...or by size. With the few objects we have here this may not seem very important right now, but you’ll appreciate it later when it helps you sort out and remember your numerous and scattered documents.

The Finder and all other applications on your Macintosh also come equipped with the menu, which has an apple as its title. This menu contains objects called desk accessories. You can choose these accessories to appear on your desktop on top of whatever you might have there.

These include a clock. Choose Clock and you have the date and the time displayed in a very elegant little clock.

The Apple menu also has a calculator which works like any other calculator.

You can have several desk accessories on top of any windows you may have opened, but only one accessory is active at any time. You know which one is active by looking at the title bar. The title of the active one is highlighted. You activate the one you want just like the windows, by clicking anywhere in it. You can also move these accessories around by pointing at the title bar of the active one and dragging – again, just the windows.

And, you can close them by clicking on the close box.

Another desk accessory is the Control Panel, which helps you set you Macintosh to work just the way you would like it to.

If you would like to change the volume of the warning beep, adjust it here.

To change the pattern on your desktop, click on the dots here, and then click on the desktop icon next to it. If you change your mind click on the dots again and change it back.

You can also change the time by clicking on it and adjusting it up or down. And, you can change the date the same way.

The desk accessories on your Macintosh are both useful and fun. Experiment with them and discover on your own what very useful tasks your Macintosh is capable of. We’ll quit this part of the tour now, and go back to the Guided Tour screen so that you can do just that.

Page added on 6th October 2005.

Copyright © 2002-2006 Marcin Wichary, unless stated otherwise.