Explanation of terminology used in these pages
This page is under construction
Preamble:
- Click always means left-click with your mouse,
unless otherwise specified
- A+B+C means you perform the operation A (like holding down
the "A" key) then, at the same time, you hold down the "B" key (but still
keep the "A" key depressed) and then you also hold down the "C" key (usually
you need both hands to do all this) and then release all three keys...
- A->B->C-> ...(think of "->" as an arrow indicating succession) means:
First you highlight "A", then "B", then "C" etc. For example, start->programs->microsoft applications...
on your desktop
Jargon
Cold boot
This means you turn your computer off (yup, push the switch) and on again after
30 secs.
Warm boot
Essentially the old control+alt+delete command executed twice. There are many
ways of doing this in Win95...
You can:
1. Hold down all three keys "control", "alt", and "del" at once and let go
and then do this again, or
2. start->shut down->restart the computer->Yes...but this takes longer than (3) below
3. start->shut down->restart the computer->shift+Yes, i.e., hold down the shift key while
you're clicking "Yes"
SCSI
An acronym for Small Computer Systems Interface. SCSI devices are
best, in my view, for use with Win95. These kinds of devices are usually associated with
names such as "Adaptec", "Future Domains", "DEC", etc. and this company name usually
appears in the first screen during a cold boot. If you don't know whether you have
such devices on your machine, look for the following during a cold boot:
Do you see a line with writing such as "SCSI ID 0 ..." or "SCSI ID 5..." during the
boot process?
If yes, then you do have SCSI devices installed on your machine...
If no, then you don't have SCSI devices.
With a SCSI interface, (i.e., a physical "card" in your machine) you can connect
up to 7 (with SCSI or SCSI-2) or even up to 15 (with SCSI-3) devices on your machine, using the
one card only! Imagine connecting a CD-burner, a CD-ROM, a ZIP-drive, a back-up drive, etc., all
external devices connected to one port on your SCSI card...amazing isn't it? Of
course, this card and corresponding hardware can be quite expensive but is highly recommended if
you are doing serious computing!
Where does one find such devices? Well, the Apple-Macintosh power PC's are
all SCSI-powered, among others. Windows 95 does a marvelous job with SCSI devices,
especially with "Adaptec" stuff...
Non-SCSI, IDE or EIDE
This is the kind of card you have in your machine if you don't pass the test above, on SCSI
devices. These cards are capable of supporting up to 4 physical devices (hard drive, CD-ROM, ...).
Multitasking
From "multi" + "task" -> many tasks...the property of an operating system to allow for many tasks to be performed simultaneously; for example, you could be downloading a file off the Internet and, at the same time, in another window, you may be editing a document, or even watching a movie. Windows 95 has this ability ...
Multithreading
From "multi"+"thread" -> many threads...the property of an operating system to associate many different "threads" to any given single application; for example, You may be editing a graphic in Corel 6.0, and, at the same time, you maybe printing another graphic from within the same application or editing other material within the application. Windows 95 has this ability also ...
Hardware
In this business, any piece of machinery containing at least one transistor or integrated circuit (IC), aside from floppies.
Software
In this business, any program written for use by a CPU ...usually stored on floppies or disk drives etc.
Conflict
Trouble...For example, two applications are trying to access the same area in memory at the same time, or two cards/controllers are using the same IRQ (Interrupt), etc.