Table of Contents

1. What is the "Unified Desktop (UDT)?
2. Starting and Quitting the UDT
3. Getting Help on the UDT
4. Opening, Closing, and Switching Between Programs on the UDT
5. Viewing the Contents of your computer
6. How You Can Use Your Mouse to Work Efficiently on the UDT
7. Organizing Files and Folders on the UDT
8. Contents of Common Programs

What is the "Unified Desktop" (UDT)?

The Unified DeskTop (also called the UDT or the NPS Desktop) is a customized computing system that includes the Windows NT 4.0 operating system plus several popular software items, such as Microsoft Office 97, Outlook 98, Publisher 98, and Netscape Navigator 4. If you've been using Microsoft Windows 95 or Windows 98, then you'll find the look and feel of the UDT very familiar. Windows NT offers more security than was available in previous versions of Windows. This means that staff will have the luxury of customizing appropriate learning and working environments on their computers without the worry of unauthorized persons (especially students) altering those environments or accessing the documents within them.

We are entering what will undoubtedly be a technological millennium and the Unified Desktop offers us exciting new possibilities. We now have roaming profiles that allow us to access our own documents, lesson plans, and email and from any UDT computer in the district. Teachers are using shared folders to publish or exchange information among students within a class as well as with teachers and students in similar classes on different campuses. Administrators and their staff are able to access shared documents and calendars from anywhere in the district. Each week we discover new ways to take advantage of the opportunities available to us with the Unified Desktop.

Starting and Quitting the UDT

"Logging on" is the process of identifying yourself to the computer by entering the username and password you have been assigned. This is a security feature that will distinguish you from all other users in the NPS district. Having a unique user name also allows you customize your computing environment (your "desktop"). Those settings are saved when you log off and then reloaded when you log on to any networked Unified Desktop computer -- anywhere in the district!

To "Log On" to a Unified Desktop Computer:

1. When you start the UDT computer and see the NPS logo, press  Ctrl + Alt + Delete  (simultaneously press all 3 keys on the keyboard) to log on. You should then see the Logon Information dialog box appear in the center of your screen.
2. Type your user name and password (these are the same as your email name and email password) in the Logon Information dialog box.

Your password is a security precaution that prohibits unauthorized users from accessing your personal documents and email. A password should be 4 to 8 characters in length and may include numbers as well as uppercase and lowercase letters. We suggest using a password that contains an unusual combination of uppercase letters, lowercase letters, and numbers. Words that can be found in a dictionary and names -- especially names (or nicknames) of family members or pets -- are not good choices for computer passwords. These are too easy for others to guess or "crack". Replacing a letter with a digit is a good way to make a password more secure. For example, "Steve" and "steve" are not very secure passwords. Using "StEvE", "St3v3", or "st295eve" would be safer. Choose something that you can remember or write it down -- preferably not on a post-it note stuck to your computer.   ;-)

To Start Using a Unified Desktop Computer: Use the computer mouse to click on the Start Button (usually located in the lower left corner of the screen) to display the Start Menu, which contains: Common Programs - software that comes with the UDT Programs - software installed after the UDT (e.g., AS400) Documents - your most recently edited documents Find - locate your files and/or folders Help - access online documentation for Windows NT Shut Down - shut down, restart, or log off the computer You can navigate the Start Menu by clicking on the appropriate choices.

To Quit the Unified Desktop and Shut Down Your Computer: Click the Start button and then click Shut Down. When the "Shut Down Window" dialog box appears... Click Shut down the computer. If you've forgetten to save any changes you've made in your documents, the UDT asks you if you want to save those changes. Then your computer will either turn itself off or display a message on the screen indicating that it is OK for you to turn off the power or restart the computer. CAUTION: Please use this procedure to shut down your computer. It allows Windows NT to safely close system files and ensures that your documents and your user profile (your personal settings) are properly saved.

Getting Help on the UDT

Much of the information that you need to use for Windows NT 4.0 is now online. You should refer to online Help as your primary source of information to help you use your computer.

The UDT provides you with two kinds of Help.

1. Help about specific procedures.
2. Help about what you see on your screen.

When you open Help by using the Start menu or the Help menu in This Computer or the other icons, you will get help for Windows NT in general. If you use the Help menu in a program such as Notepad, Internet Explorer, or Microsoft Word, the Help you see is specifically geared for that program.

To Get Help about Specific Procedures Click the Start button, then click Help. The list of help topics appears. You can use the Contents tab in Help to find topics grouped by subject, or use the Index tab or Find tab to search information by typing in a subject, title, or specific word or phrase. Some Help topics contain green underlined text. You can click the green text to see a definition of the term. To return to the list of topics after reading about a specific topic, click Help Topics. To Find Help Using the Contents Tab Click the Contents tab to find topics grouped by subject. To Find Help Using the Index Tab Click the Index tab to find specific topics listed alphabetically. To scroll through the Help index, type the first few letters of the word you want to search for. If you don't find the entry you want, type a synonym for the word you want. To Find Help Using the Find Tab Click the Find tab to find all the topics that contain a specific word or phrase.

Opening, Closing, and Switching Between Programs

The easiest to open a program on the UDT is to select the program from your Common Programs or Programs menus. The standard software included with the UDT package is available on the Common Programs menu. This is where you will find BookShelf, Access, Excel, Explorer, Navigator, Outlook, Powerpoint, Publisher, Word, Works, as well as your Accessories submenu. Software that is not a part of the standard UDT package, such as the AS400 software, should be available on the Programs menu.

To Open and Close a Program from the Common Programs menu

1. To start a program, click the Start button, and then point to Common Programs.
2. Point to the program name you would like to open (or to the folder containing the program that you would like to open, and then click the program name).
3. To quit the program, click the Close button (the square button containing an "x") in the upper-right corner of the window.

   You can run many programs at the same time, and switch easily between them by using the taskbar. The taskbar is the gray bar -- usually located at the bottom of your screen -- that contains the Start button, the clock, and "buttons" for each file, folder, or program that you currently have open on your computer. You must already have the programs open in order to view them on the taskbar.

To Switch Between Programs

Click the taskbar button representing the open program or folder that you want to switch to.

Viewing the Contents of Your Computer

There are two ways you can view programs, documents, and data files that you have on your computer. You can use the This Computer icon that is displayued on your desktop, or you can use Windows NT Explorer by Right Clicking on the Start button and selecting Explore.

To View Your Computer's Contents using "This Computer"

From your desktop, double-click This Computer. A window (see right) should appear. The following table explains some of the icons you might see in that window.

Icon	Description
	This icon represents the 3.5 inch floppy disk drive, or A: drive, in your computer. This drive is useful when you want to make an extra copy of your documents that you can take with you on a floppy disk. You should always have an extra, back-up copy of your important documents -- just in case something happens to the original copy.
	This is your CD-ROM drive. Most new software titles come on CD-ROM disks. Note that when a CD-ROM disk has been loaded into the CD-ROM drive, the name and appearance of this CD-ROM drive icon may be changed to match the software on that CD-ROM.
	This icon represents a network disk drive that is located on another computer but is available for use on your computer. One example of this is the district "shared" drive space which appears as the S: drive on UDT computers.
	This icon represents disk drives available to you while you're logged onto that computer. In particular, the U: drive is your personal storage space on a district file server that is backup up on a nightly basis. You should always see this this disk drive on any UDT computer. There is a shortcut to your U: drive called "My Stuff" on the computer's "desktop" screen. (You will also see a P: drive that uses this same type of icon. The P: drive is where the computer maintains your UDT roaming profile. Never modify items on the P: drive.)
	This folder contains several control panel utility programs that change the system configuration settings for your computer. Be very cautious when modifying those settings.
	This folder allows you to view information about the printers available to your computer and any documents waiting to print on those printers.

When you double-click a disk-drive or folder icon in This Computer, (e.g., the U: drive) a window containing the contents of that disk drive or folder should appear (see right). You can start programs, see the contents of a folder, or view the information in a file by double-clicking on one of the icons in this window. You'll find an explanation of a few types of icons in the table below. (More icons are described later in this document in a section entitled Contents of Common Programs.)

Icon	Description
	Folders: Like folders in your filing cabinet, folders on your computer may contain files as well as other folders and are used to help organize the information stored in your computer. Unlike the folders in your filing cabinet, a computer folder can contain many, many other files and folders, limited only by the capacity of your computer. Creating folders inside of folders creates a hierarchical (or tiered) directory structure. Thus, depending on which level in that hierarchical structure a computer folder occupies, it may act much like a traditional folder in a filing cabinet, or as a drawer in a filing cabinet that contains many folders, or even as one of several filing cabinets that contain a great deal of information.
	Shared Folders: On occasion, you may see a little hand beneath a folder (or beneath a printer or other device) which indicates that the folder (or device) is shared with other users on the network. Shared folders may contain information (programs, documents, etc.) that that you want to share with other people who are on the network. It is possible to restrict the type of access those people have to the information - or even which people have access to that information - by setting the "Permissions" for the shared folder.
	Files: A file is the basic unit of storage in Windows NT. The programs you run and the documents you create and use are all files. Files of various types are represented by different icons (or graphical images) that are associated with those file types. There are many different types of files (and many different icons) in Windows NT. If a file type does not have a specific icon associated with it, then the generic file icon (displayed on the left) will be used. Several more icons that you may encounter are described below in Section 7: Contents of Common Programs.

To view your computer's contents using Windows NT Explorer

Right-click the Start button, click Explore. A double-paned window appears. The left side of the window lists all the names and icons of the disk drives on your computer, as well as files and folders. The right side of the window displays the contents of any item you click on the left, along with its icon. Double-click the icon of a document, program, or folder (e.g., the U: drive) that you wish to open. The contents appear in the right-hand pane of the window...

Using Your Mouse to Work Efficiently

This section shows you how you can use your mouse to quickly accomplish common actions and speed up your work. Notice that your mouse has two buttons, a left button and a right button. You select an item by "clicking" on that item. "Clicking" (also called "left-clicking") on an item is accomplished by pressing, then releasing the left mouse button while your mouse pointer is pointing at (positioned over) that item. "Right-clicking" is the same procedure using the right mouse button instead of the left mouse button. "Double-clicking" is merely two left-clicks in fairly rapid succession and will open a document, folder, disk drive, computer or printer.

Move Items

You can move an item by pointing at it, pressing and holding down the left or right mouse button, and then dragging the item to the new location.

Create Shorcuts

You can open a file or folder directly from your desktop or from the Start menu by creating a "shortcut" icon that represents a link to a document, folder, disk drive, computer or printer.

Get Help

You can get help on any item on your screen by clicking the What's This? button and then clicking the item you would like more information on.

Complete Common Tasks

You can right-click any item on your screen and a task menu will appear, listing common tasks (such as Open, Delete, and Rename) that can be performed on that item. Click a task to activate it.

Organizing Files and Folders

This section shows you some basic procedures for organizing files and folders on your computer so that they are easier to work with. The following procedures use This Computer, but you can also use Windows NT Explorer to do these tasks.

To create a new folder

1. Double-click This Computer, and then double-click the drive or folder in which you want to place the new folder.
2. On the File menu, point to New, and then click Folder.
3. Type the name of the new folder and then press ENTER.

To move or copy a file or folder

1. Double-click This Computer. Find the file or folder you want to move or copy, and then click it.
2. Click Edit. To move the file, click Cut. To make a copy of the file, click Copy.
3. Open the folder where you want to place the file, click Edit, and then click Paste.

To delete a file or folder

1. Double-click This Computer. Find the file or folder you want to delete, and then click it.
2. On the File menu, click Delete.

To copy a file to a floppy disk

1. Double-click This Computer. Find the file or folder you want to copy, and then click it.
2. On the File menu, point to Send to, and then click the drive where you want to copy the file or folder.

Using Drag and Drop to Move Information

Sometimes the quickest way to move and copy information is to drag it from one place to another by using your mouse. You can move or copy files and folders to another folder or disk drive.

To move or copy information

1. In Explorer, open the folder that contains the file or folder you want to move or copy.
2. Press down on the right mouse button and keep the button pressed down as you drag the icon to the folder where you want to move or copy it. Then release the mouse button.
3. Click Move Here or Copy Here.

Installing Software Programs

It's easy to install software onto your computer using Windows NT (UDT). You can add and remove programs with the Add/Remove Programs utility in Control Panel

To install programs

1. Click the Start button, point to Settings and then click Control Panel.
2. Double-click Add/Remove Programs.
3. The Add/Remove programs Properties dialog box appears. Follow the instructions on your screen.

Contents of Common Programs

Below you will a table that includes the icons for some of the software provided on every UDT computer as well as brief descriptions of what that software can do for you. You can run this software from the Common Programs section of the Start menu or by double-clicking on a document that you've already created using this software.

Icon	Description
	Accessories: Utilize numerous helpful programs such as: Calculator, Paint, Telnet, Webpad (aka Frontpage Express which lets you design web pages), and WordPad (a simple word processor).
	Bookshelf: Includes a dictionary, a book of quotations, and a thesaurus for looking up synonyms.
	Access: Develop customized databases. It's kind of like a stack of index cards - but much more flexible and powerful.
	Excel: Develop spreadsheets to keep track of grades, statistics, financial forecasts, etc. and then graphically chart the results.
	Internet Explorer: View web pages on the Internet. You will find that this "web browser" has a user interface that is similar to Windows itself.
	Netscape Navigator: View web pages on the Internet - it's similar to Internet Explorer. Because some people prefer Navigator over Explorer, the UDT offers both.
	Outlook: Send and receive email, organize contact lists, share calendars, and produce "To do" lists. There are many helpful tools!
	PowerPoint: Develop custom "slide-show" presentations on your computer screen with that professional look. It's great for the classroom as well as for the conference room!
	Publisher: Develop newsletters, flyers, websites, business cards, calendars, announcements, labels, brochures and much more.
	Word: Produce flexible "word processor" documents: type papers, write books, generate personalized form letters, etc.
	Works: Create "word processor" documents, databases, and spreadsheets in this integrated package of office software.

A Final Note

Hopefully the information provided to you in this brief tour of the Unified Desktop will prove useful and make your computing experience more pleasant and productive. Please take the time to experiment with the different features of the UDT. Many features may go unnoticed, but a little time invested in learning and using those features now may save many late-night hours later when deadlines loom. A little understanding of the Unified Desktop and the many software applications it contains may also have hidden benefits for our educators. We all realize that you don't have to use technology to be a good teacher. But our students should learn to use computers effectively and responsibly if they are to become productive members of an increasingly technological society. And I can't think of better role models for them than our teachers.

Credits: This web document contains a few of the introductory highlights from the Microsoft support booklet that is shipped with Windows NT workstations. Some of the examples have been modified to accomodate our particular implementation of Windows NT 4.0 that we call the Unified DeskTop (UDT). The Microsoft booklet is entitled: Start Here: Basics and Installation: Microsoft WindowsNT Workstation.