
CHAPTER 3
EXPLAINING MICROSOFT WINDOWS
Chapter Summary
This chapter is primarily concerned with defining and 
explaining terms and concepts used in Windows. 
Sections 3.1 and 3.2 explain how the mouse moves the 
pointer around on the screen, and how icons and 
symbols represent programs, files, and functions. 
Section 3.3 has 3 sub-sections_windows, menus, and 
dialogs_and describes the different features found in 
each. Section 3.3.1 explains how to use the Minimize, 
Maximize, and Control menu symbols; describes the 
menu bar; explains how to scroll a window by clicking 
on the scroll bars; and explains the concept of 
parent windows which can contain multiple child 
windows. Section 3.3.2 describes how a menu is pulled 
down from the menu bar by clicking on its title, and 
how commands can then be chosen from it with a single 
click. Section 3.3.3 explains dialog boxes and their 
most common functions and features, such as clicking 
on different types of buttons; how to open and make 
selections from combo boxes; how to type text into an 
edit box; the organizational function of group boxes; 
and the concept of clicking, or double-clicking, on 
an item to select it from a scrolling list box. 
3.1	The Mouse and the Pointer
The pointer is one of the most important elements of 
Microsoft Windows. It is a small, usually arrow-shaped 
cursor which is used to "point" at objects displayed on 
the screen. It is moved from place to place on the 
screen by means of a mouse or other device attached to 
the computer. 
The mouse is about the size of a deck of playing cards, 
and is normally attached to the computer with a wire. 
As the mouse is moved around on a flat surface, the 
pointer on the screen moves in a corresponding 
direction. By moving the mouse, the pointer on the 
screen can be brought in contact with the images on the 
screen. 
On the mouse, there is at least one button. This button 
is used to select objects that the pointer is currently 
touching. This is called "clicking" on, or "selecting," 
an item. This is a vital piece of terminology for using 
Windows. For example, icons and symbols are selected by 
placing the pointer on them and clicking (Section 3.2); 
windows are activated by clicking inside them (Section 
3.3.1); menus are revealed by clicking on their titles 
(Section 3.3.2); and buttons within dialog boxes are 
chosen by placing the pointer on them and clicking 
(Section 3.3.3.1).
Selecting an item, such as a block of text or a window, 
usually causes it to become highlighted. This is how 
Microsoft Windows indicates that the item is ready to 
be used. Depending on the situation, highlighting can 
be accomplished in several different ways, but the most 
common is a single click on the item of interest.
A single click is also used to position the text 
insertion cursor, or "caret," when editing text. It is 
extremely important to understand the difference 
between the caret and the pointer. The caret is a 
different cursor from the pointer. It marks the 
location where text will be inserted when the user 
types on the keyboard. The pointer can be moved 
anywhere on the screen, but the caret is restricted to 
editable text. When the mouse is moved, the pointer 
moves in a corresponding direction, but the caret 
remains fixed. To relocate the caret within editable 
text, the user places the pointer at the desired 
location and clicks. The caret then jumps from its old 
location to the spot where the pointer was clicked. 
Double-clicking is another term that you will encounter 
in this and other manuals. It simply means to place 
your pointer on top of an object (such as an icon) and 
click the button twice in rapid succession. This action 
is often available as a shortcut when opening files or 
directories. The pointer is placed on the picture or 
text representing the file or directory, and the mouse 
button is quickly clicked twice.
Dragging is also a frequently used term. When an item 
is dragged, the pointer is placed on top of it, and the 
mouse button is pressed and held down. Without 
releasing the button, the pointer is moved to a new 
location, and the button is then released. This causes 
the object under the pointer to be dragged along in the 
direction that the pointer is being moved. Dragging is 
used to move items from one place to another, or when 
adjusting certain types of controls. For example, many 
word processors display tab settings as small symbols 
along a graphical ruler. To reset tab stops or margins, 
these symbols can be dragged from one location to 
another on the ruler. Dragging is also used in word 
processors, to highlight a block of text.
The mouse is not the only way to move the pointer, but 
it is the most common. There are track balls, joy 
sticks, and touch pads, all of which perform basically 
the same function as the mouse: that of moving the 
pointer around the screen. Instead of the mouse, 
outSPOKEN uses a set of keyboard commands to manipulate 
the pointer (Section 4.1).
As a final note, the pointer is not always shaped like 
an arrow. It often changes its shape to give the user 
information about what is currently being pointed to or 
about the state of the entire system. For example, the 
pointer changes from an arrow to an hourglass when the 
system is busy computing or accessing the disk. At 
other times, the pointer changes its shape to indicate 
something about the object or area being pointed to. 
When the pointer is placed over editable text, it 
changes to resemble a vertical insertion bar to 
indicate to the user that the area being pointed to can 
be edited. There are many different pointer shapes in 
Windows, and many applications have pointers of their 
own. outSPOKEN announces the name of each new pointer 
as it appears (Section 5.2). 
3.2	Icons and Graphical Symbols
Icons are small pictures, usually with text labels 
below them, representing files and applications. 
Generally, they look like the object, or have the logo 
of the thing they represent. For example, the "Write" 
icon, representing a simple word processor shipped with 
Microsoft Windows, looks like a fountain pen. The 
"Clock" icon, representing a program which displays the 
time and date, looks just like an analog clock. 
Within an application, functions such as tab and margin 
settings are often represented by graphics which 
outSPOKEN calls symbols. The distinction between a 
symbol and an icon is one of size. An icon is defined 
by outSPOKEN to be a graphic thirty-two pixels square 
or larger, while a symbol is any graphic smaller than 
that. Symbols do not normally include text labels. 
Symbols frequently represent controls or settings. For 
example, many word processors have "Tool Bars," which 
are rows of symbols shown above the document. When 
clicked on, these symbols perform operations such as 
double-spacing the document, bringing up a spell 
checker, sorting lists, or changing fonts.
outSPOKEN keeps track of all the graphics on the screen 
and has a name for each one. The Write icon is named 
"Write," the Clock icon is named "Clock," etc. Whenever 
outSPOKEN encounters a graphic that it has no name for, 
it assigns a unique number to it. This enables the 
outSPOKEN user to distinguish one icon from another, 
even before they have been named. When the user names 
an icon (Section 5.2), outSPOKEN remembers that name 
until the name is changed. All other icons that are 
identical in appearance will automatically acquire that 
name as well. 
3.3	Windows, Menus, and Dialogs
As the name "Windows" implies, all information 
displayed by Microsoft Windows appears inside 
rectangular bordered regions called windows. In this 
section, we describe many of the different types of 
windows used to display information.
A few concepts are common to all windows, and are 
important to understand before others can be 
introduced. The desktop is the workspace on the screen 
on top of which windows are opened, closed, moved, and 
resized. If no windows were shown on the screen, only 
the desktop would be visible. It can be clean or 
cluttered with many open windows. It is entirely a 
matter of personal taste.
A window can be large or small, wide or narrow, tall or 
short. Because of the many sizes and shapes of windows, 
it is not unusual for some of them to overlap or even 
cover other windows entirely. It may help to think of 
windows as papers on a desk. You can have many papers 
on your desk at once, and they can be stacked, 
shuffled, arranged side-by-side, or filed away safely 
in your file cabinet. It all depends on how you like to 
work. 
3.3.1	Windows in General
Although there are different types of windows, many 
features are common between them. This section 
describes the features of the "generic window." The 
terms and concepts developed here are used in 
explanations of more complicated concepts, such as 
dialog boxes (Section 3.3.3) and customizing outSPOKEN 
(Chapter 5).
3.3.1.1	The Title Bar
Most windows have a title bar associated with them. It 
tells the user what is displayed in the window, and in 
many ways is like the title of a book or a paper 
document. The title bar gives you a name for that 
window and a clue about its contents. Figure 2 shows a 
generic window. It is a rectangular border containing, 
among other things, a title bar. This window's title 
bar reads "Title Bar," and it can be found in the 
center of the top edge of the window.
In the title bar, and on either side of the actual 
title, are several small symbols used for changing the 
window's size and location on the screen. To the right 
are two small boxes. The right-most box has an upward-
pointing arrow. This symbol is called the Maximize 
button. Clicking on it will enlarge the window to fill 
the entire screen. If the window is maximized, the 
Maximize button will be replaced with a double-headed 
arrow called the Restore button. Clicking on this 
symbol will return your window to its previous smaller 
state. The symbol shown in Figure 2 at the right end of 
the title bar is the single-headed Maximize button. An 
example of the Restore button can be found in the 
upper-right corner of Figure 4. 
The box immediately to the left of the Maximize button 
has a downward-pointing arrow, and is called the 
Minimize button. Clicking on this symbol causes the 
window to shrink to the size of a large icon showing 
only the title of the window. Double-clicking on this 
iconized window will restore the window to its larger 
size.
To the left of the title, you will find another small 
box with a single horizontal line in it. This symbol is 
called the Control menu. A single click on the Control 
menu causes a menu to open, offering a number of 
options for changing the window's size and shape 
(Section 3.3.2).
3.3.1.2	The Menu Bar
Many windows include a Menu Bar. This is a row of menu 
titles immediately below the title bar. In Figure 2, 
the words in the menu bar read "File, Options, Windows, 
Help." Each of these words represents a menu of 
commands available to the user in this particular 
window. Clicking on one of the menu titles causes a 
menu to be displayed, as in Figure 3. For details about 
using menus, see the section in this chapter called 
"Menus" (Section 3.3.2). At this point we simply want 
to introduce the concept of the menu bar and explain 
that some windows have this feature. For more 
explanations about which windows have menu bars and 
which ones do not, see the last heading in this 
section, called "Parent and Child Windows" (Section 
3.3.1.4).
3.3.1.3	The Scroll Bar
A window frequently has room to display only a small 
part of its total contents. This may happen, for 
example, when viewing a large document in a word 
processor. In this case, probably the first several 
paragraphs can fit in a single window, but in order to 
reveal the remainder of the document, the window must 
be "scrolled down."
The scroll bar is a long, narrow object usually found 
along the right edge of the window. In Figure 2, there 
are two scroll bars: one on the right, and one along 
the bottom. A scroll bar has arrows at either end 
pointing in opposite directions. The vertical scroll 
bar in Figure 2 has an upward-pointing arrow at its top 
and a downward-pointing arrow at its bottom. To scroll 
down, as in the above example, the user would click on 
the downward-pointing arrow, and the next line of the 
document would be revealed. To scroll up, the user 
would click on the arrow at the top of the vertical 
scroll bar. Pressing the PAGE UP and PAGE DOWN keys on 
the keyboard also perform the functions of scrolling up 
and down. The scroll bar is simply a graphical way of 
doing the same thing.
Similar to the vertical scroll bar, the horizontal 
scroll bar at the bottom of the window is used to 
scroll the view to the left or right. If either the 
vertical or the horizontal scroll bar is missing, that 
means that there is nothing further to display in that 
direction.
3.3.1.4	Parent and Child Windows
Microsoft Windows uses the concept of parent and child 
windows to organize windows into logical groups. The 
concept itself is quite simple: child windows are 
contained within parent windows.
A parent window (or application window) can contain one 
or more child windows (or document windows), and 
usually has a menu bar, as well as a title bar. Any 
commands available from the menu bar of the parent 
window are available for use within its children. The 
parent has Minimize, Maximize, and Control menu symbols 
in its title bar (Section 3.3.1.1), and using them 
affects the child windows. For example, if a parent 
window is minimized, its child windows disappear, and 
only the parent's minimized icon remains on the 
desktop. The child windows re-appear along with the 
parent when it is restored to its normal size.
Child windows do not have their own menu bars, but they 
do have their own title bars. Each title bar has 
Minimize, Maximize, and Control menu symbols. These 
symbols control only the child window, and not the 
parent. A child window can never go beyond its parent's 
borders. A minimized child window stays inside the 
parent window, and a maximized child window entirely 
fills the parent window. If the parent is not maximized 
to fill the entire screen, then the child window will 
not fill the entire screen either, since a child window 
cannot be larger than its parent.
Any application that you run_such as a word processor 
or a spreadsheet_displays as a parent window, and will 
therefore have its own menu and title bars. For this 
reason, parent windows are frequently called 
application windows. A document opened inside the word 
processor or spreadsheet is displayed in a child window 
inside the parent application's window. There can be 
more than one child window within a parent window. They 
can overlap, or cover one another entirely, within the 
borders of their parent. Parent windows may also 
overlap or cover each other. 
3.3.2	Menus
We have discussed the menu bar already (Section 
3.3.1.2), and will now explain more fully how menus are 
used. Figure 3 shows a menu with six items. It has been 
"pulled down" from the menu bar by clicking on one of 
the menu titles. A menu title gives the user a clue as 
to what type of commands the menu contains. For 
example, the File menu usually contains commands 
dealing with files, such as New File, Open File, and 
Close File. 
Once a menu is revealed, an option can be selected by 
moving the pointer to the desired item and clicking. 
The menu shown in Figure 3 is divided into three 
sections. This is simply a graphical way of grouping 
similar commands together. 
Another feature frequently found in menus is the sub-
menu. A sub-menu is usually represented by a special 
symbol to the right of the menu item. When selected, a 
sub-menu pops up a new menu with further choices 
related to the original entry. Occasionally, there are 
also graphical check marks to the left of certain menu 
items. A check mark indicates that a menu option is 
currently chosen or selected. Selecting that item again 
removes the check mark and turns the option off.
Each item in Figure 3 has a corresponding command on 
the right. This illustrates that menu items often have 
keyboard equivalents, or "shortcut keys," which can be 
used to execute that command without using the menu. 
Often, menus can also be opened using keyboard 
shortcuts, as well as by clicking on the menu title. 
These commands will vary from application to 
application. For more information on shortcut keys, see 
the section in Chapter 4 called "Using Built-in 
Microsoft Windows Commands with outSPOKEN."
Please note that you can close a menu without 
making a selection by pressing the ALT or ESC 
keys. The menu then closes and the pointer 
returns to the active window.
3.3.3	Dialog Boxes
A dialog box is a special kind of window that prompts 
the user for information. Dialog boxes vary widely 
depending on what kind of information they are 
requesting. They can be extremely simple, with only one 
or two controls, or they can be quite complex. Figure 6 
shows an "Open" dialog box of the Windows text editor 
Write. This dialog is used to select a document to be 
opened by the editor. In the following sub-sections we 
will refer to Figure 6, as well as to other common 
features of dialog boxes.
3.3.3.1	Buttons
A button is a small rectangular object depicting a 
push-button. It often contains a label describing the 
action it performs when clicked on or "pressed." Many 
dialog boxes have buttons labeled "OK" and "Cancel". 
Clicking on the "OK" button tells the application that 
you have finished supplying whatever information was 
being requested, and that you wish to proceed with the 
operation. Clicking on the "Cancel" button tells the 
application that you do not wish to proceed; the dialog 
is then closed, no other actions are performed, and any 
changes made in the dialog are lost.
In Figure 6, there are two buttons, one above the 
other, on the right-hand side of the dialog. The bottom 
button is labeled "Cancel" and the one above it is 
labeled "Open." Clicking on the "Open" button would 
tell the application that you have finished specifying 
the name of the file to be opened. 
The buttons shown in the figure are "push buttons." 
This means that when you click one of them, an action 
is performed immediately. In this case, one button 
performs the action of making the dialog go away 
without opening a file (Cancel). The other accepts the 
settings made in the other parts of the dialog and 
performs the action of displaying the selected file in 
a document window (Open).
Windows sometimes offers one of the buttons in a dialog 
as the default button. This button is marked by a dark 
border and is referred to by outSPOKEN as the "def 
button." Pressing the oENTER key automatically selects 
this button.
Another type of button (not shown in Figure 6) is the 
radio button. Radio buttons come in groups, and only 
one of them can be selected, or "on," at a time. They 
are used in situations where the user has several, 
mutually exclusive, options for a particular setting. 
When a radio button is selected, the previously 
selected one is automatically unselected. A radio 
button which is "on" is indicated with a small solid 
circle inside the button. These buttons allow the user 
to view all the available options, as well as which one 
is currently selected. The name "radio button" was 
adopted from older analog car radios, and their style 
of buttons for selecting pre-set stations.
Another type of button is called a check box. The check 
box is simply a small square which can be checked or 
unchecked by clicking in it. These are used in 
situations where a feature is either on or off. When 
the check box is checked, a graphical X mark appears in 
the check box.
3.3.3.2	Combo Boxes
A combo box is similar in many ways to a menu (Section 
3.3.2). It is a small rectangular box containing some 
text on the left and a small symbol on the right, 
called a combo button. Clicking on the symbol pops open 
a menu. This menu, called a combo list box, may also 
have a scroll bar on the right, allowing the user to 
scroll the menu up or down to reveal more choices 
(Section 3.3.1.3). Moving the pointer to one of the 
menu options and clicking causes the menu to disappear 
and displays the new selection in the text area of the 
combo box. 
Figure 6 shows two combo boxes in the bottom of the 
dialog box. The one on the left has the heading "List 
files of type" above it, and shows the setting of 
"*.TXT". A single click in a combo box opens it to 
reveal a list of choices. When this particular combo 
box is opened, the resulting combo list box might 
contain choices such as "*.*", "*.DOC", or "*.TXT". 
These choices are all different types of files which 
can be listed in the dialog box. When a selection is 
made by clicking on a file type, the combo list box 
closes back to a combo box and the new setting appears 
in the combo box. The files shown in the list above 
then change to reflect the file type selected. For 
example, the setting shown in the File Type combo box 
in this figure is "*.TXT". This means that only files 
with the file extension .TXT will be displayed in the 
file list.
The combo box on the right has the label "Drive" and 
shows the setting "C:\". The setting of this control 
determines which disk drive will have its directories 
and files displayed in the lists above. This combo 
box's combo list box could contain such choices as A:\, 
B:\, and C:\. In Figure 6, the current setting is C:\, 
as is shown in the combo box. This means that the files 
and directories listed above would be found on the C 
drive.
3.3.3.3	Edit Boxes
An edit box is a field in a dialog into which the user 
can type text. In Figure 6, the edit box is labeled 
"File Name" and is located in the upper left corner of 
the dialog box. As the label implies, the user can type 
a file name into this field. Simple editing commands 
such as clicking, backspacing, and highlighting 
(Section 3.1) are available in edit boxes. Edit boxes 
are used in many situations where the user is prompted 
to enter a name, number, or other item.
3.3.3.4	Group Boxes
A group box is not really a control, like a button or 
an edit box. A group box is a way of grouping sets of 
controls together within a dialog box. If several 
controls all operate on a single parameter, it makes 
sense to enclose them in a group box with a 
corresponding label. For example, a group of radio 
buttons (Section 3.3.3.1) labeled "Too Hot," "Too 
Cold," and "Just Right" might be contained in a group 
box titled "Porridge Temperature."
3.3.3.5	List Boxes
A list box is a common way of displaying a set of 
choices in a dialog. It is scrollable (Section 3.3.1.3) 
to accommodate long lists. In Figure 6, there are two 
list boxes: one on the left, listing files, and another 
to the right, listing directories. 
Clicking on an item in a list box highlights it 
(Section 3.1), indicating that it is the currently 
selected item in the list. In Figure 6, there are three 
file names shown in the left-hand list box. Clicking on 
any of these file names would highlight it. Pressing 
the Open button would then open that file in a document 
window. Similarly, a click on an item in the list box 
that displays directories would highlight the directory 
that was clicked on. After having highlighted a 
directory, clicking on the Open button would cause the 
file names in that directory to be displayed in the 
other list box. 
Double-clicking on an item in a list box is the same as 
selecting it and clicking on the "Open" button (Section 
3.1). For example, a double-click on File#1 would have 
the same effect as highlighting it with a single click 
and then pressing the Open button. Double-clicking on 
an entry in the Directories list box would open that 
directory, causing the names of its files to be 
displayed in the list box on the left. 

