Starting Explorer - To open Windows Explorer, On the Taskbar (the gray strip along the bottom of the screen), you’ll see the Start button. Left-click it to access the Start menu. Move your pointer arrow up until you highlight Programs and open the Programs menu. Now move your pointer to the right—keeping it within the boundaries of the Programs icon bar—until it enters the new window. Move the pointer until the Windows Explorer icon bar, which is located near the end of the listing of available programs, is highlighted. Left-click it.

The Exploring window is divided by a vertical line into two sections. The left side, which is labeled All Folders, contains the main directory structure for your computer. The right side, which is labeled Contents Of, displays your files and subdirectories for the selected directory. If you want to resize the two sections, move your pointer arrow until it rests over the dividing line between the two sections and changes into a double-headed arrow. Now click and hold down your left mouse button. Move the double-headed arrow until the dividing line is in the desired position. Release the mouse button.

Your computer’s directory structure begins with the Desktop icon. From there, the structure branches out similar to a family tree. Under the Desktop icon, you’ll have an icon called My Computer. Under My Computer is your listing of drives, including any diskette drives, hard drives, or CD-ROM drives you have installed. Under each drive is its directory structure and file listings. 

The connections among icons and within the directory structure are fairly easy to understand because Windows Explorer has drawn lines between the icons of the connecting folders and drives. When a drive or folder icon is preceded by a box containing a plus or minus sign, it means the drive or folder has additional listings underneath it in the structure. If you left-click the plus sign, the folder or drive structure is expanded to display all folders and drives contained within it. After the structure is expanded, the plus sign is changed to a minus sign. To cancel the expanded structure, left-click the minus sign. When an icon isn’t preceded by a plus or minus sign, no folders or drives are contained within it.

The icons used with Windows Explorer are designed to give you an idea about the type of file, drive, or folder you’re using. For instance, the My Computer icon looks like an entire computer, which helps you determine that the icon represents your computer. The diskette icon looks like a diskette drive. Icons representing directories on your hard drive are represented by icons resembling manila folders. For files, you’ll see a wide range of icons representing the program used to create the particular file. Any time you double left-click a file icon in Windows Explorer, Windows will opens both the program used to create the file and the file itself. If Windows can’t determine the program used to create the file, it lets you select the program.

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TEMP (temporary) files are bits and pieces that have been left behind from software or hardware installations that are no longer useful. Deleting TEMP files is a maintenance function that you can perform yourself in either operating system or one that you can set up to have Win98 do for you through the Maintenance Wizard. In Win9x, you can find TEMP files by clicking the Start button and selecting Find, Files Or Folders. In the Named field, type *.tmp; next, move down to the Look In field and type C:\WINDOWS\TEMP, and then click the Find Now button. In the bottom part of the window you’ll see a listing of all the TEMP files in this directory. You can delete these as you would delete any file.

Win98 comes with a utility called the Maintenance Wizard, which makes adjustment to your computer so you get the best performance from it. The Maintenance Wizard sets three basic tasks, which help keep your hard drive working efficiently and well, to run on a regular schedule: ScanDisk, Disk Defragmenter, and the more general task of deleting old and useless files including the TEMP files that we are interested in here. To access the Maintenance Wizard, click Start; select Programs, Accessories, System Tools; and then click Maintenance Wizard. The Maintenance Wizard will open and walk you through the steps of setting it up. If this is your first time using the Maintenance Wizard, you may want to select Express in the first window. This option configures Maintenance Wizard to perform the most common maintenance settings.

From here, you’ll have to schedule a time for Maintenance Wizard to run; your best bet is to run it late at night or at another time when you won’t need to use the computer. You will have to leave the computer running for Maintenance Wizard to work. The next window shows you which tasks Maintenance Wizard will perform, including the deletion of unnecessary TEMP files. Once you click Finish, your computer is on schedule for maintenance.