This guide shows us how to save information on the PC. It starts with basic concepts and ends with more advanced ones, so don't worry if you don't understand everything now. It will surely help you as a reference in the future.

SAVING

To store the information you work with, you need to save it somewhere on your computer. Once saved, you can recover it in order to read it, print it, correct it, copy it, etc.

It is best to save while you work, in case of a power failure, a mistake in a program (bug), or a mistake you might make. If the work we are doing is not saved, it will be lost.

A backup copy of our documents is a copy we store on ANOTHER disk (or other medium) in case the content of the hard disk you usually work with is lost.

SAVING FOR THE FIRST TIME

You must always supply two things to the machine the first time you save something

WHERE? In which place in your PC are you saving?

WHAT? What name are you saving under?

Therefore, the first time that you save, the machine automatically goes to Save as… which is the dialog box in which you can supply this information.

Save as can be seen in this way…

First: You decide where in the machine you are saving.

1. In what DRIVE of the computer.

• Eg: The Hard Drive (C:) or Floppy Disk Drive 3 1/2 (A:) (These are the most commonly used).

• You can also save on the Desktop (which is a special folder in C:) or any other drive like a Zip Drive etc....

2. In which FOLDER inside the selected drive.

• Eg: My Documents fooder (in Drive C:) or any other folder you created.

SAVE AS DIALOG BOX

You might not save it in a folder. (If you save it directly in a Drive, or the Desktop.)
You might also save it inside a folder which in turn is inside another folder..

These graphics whow how the hierarchy inside the machine is organised:

 

Structure of: -Desktop -Drives -Special Folders -Folders -SubFolders -Files
Structure seen from the Windows Explorer

Second: You name the file.

The name could be practically anything you want but you can't use the following symbols: (these are reserved for system purposes)
/ \ > < * . ? " | : ;

You should save your work somewhere on the hard drive for a number of reasons:

• It's faster to work there than on a floppy.

• It's generally safer since they hardly fail..

• When you finish a work session you can make a backup copy of your files to a disk or other backup device..

• You probably won't run out of disk space like when you work on floppys.

EXAMPLE OF SAVE AS...

Working on a file in Word 97 and 5 minutes into the job you decide to save the work done so far.
(It's a good habit to start a job and save right away.)

 

Click the Save button.
or,
Choose File - Save

The computer will open the Save as dialog box (this happens even if you ask for Save only, because it still doesn't know where and under what name it should save the file. It will 'ask' you via this dialog box.)

First: You must tell it where it must save. The machine will suggest saving in the folder you've been working with so far or maybe in My documents.

Decide if you accept that folder or change it. In this example we will change it:

 

'Display' the hierarchy in the machine by clicking the arrow next to the selected drive / folder Select the drive with a click on it's name Search for the folder you wish in the content box of the selected drive. Double click on its icon to open it and see its contents in the box. (If necessary, open another folder inside that one.)

Second: Once you have the exact location you must name the file. The machine always suggests a name, it could be a random name like Document 1, Drawing 1 or the first words in the text.

You must decide if you use that name or if you change it. In this example we will change it so you must write over the the suggested name. For this you must insert the cursor in the name field. There are two ways of doing this:

 

Select the suggested name and simply write over it.

or,

Move the pointer over the suggested name and when the I-shaped pointer appears, click (this will insert the cursor). Then erase the name with Backspace and/or Delete and write the name you want.

You already have the informatin you need, so click Save. The machine saves the file. A sand clock will appear on screen and stay for a short time indicating that the machine is working. If you are saving on the hard disk this can be very fast, almost instantaneous. If you save on a floppy, it is much slower.

You can check that the machine has saved, since the title bar should show the title you chose.

SAVING AFTER THE FIRST TIME

Once the machine knows where and under what name you have saved a file, it will continue to save it in the same place and with the same name if you make any changes to it and Save. This is called updating. The machine will replace the the previous version with the new one on screen. Even after saving you can undo some changes before closing if the software has undo capabilities.

Note: You can no longer return to the previous version if you close the file!

It is very easy to save after the first time. You only need to click on the Save button in the tool bar or choose Save from the File menu.

Saving takes very little time. Especially if you compare it with the time it takes to write the document (which potentially could be lost at any time).

Therefore it is advisable to save often since problems can occur (in fact they do!)

SAVING - FATAL ERROR!

It's important to pay attention when saving. If not, something like this could happen:

• (un-willingly) select all. (It sometimes happens. In Word it coul be a triple clic on the margin or [Ctrl] + A.)

• Without noticing that all is selected (lack of attention) insert any data. This will replace everything wich is selected, yes, EVERYTHING (We're still in time to undo this last action.)

• Save. You're still in time to undo this last action. (in most software packages)

• Close. OH NO!!!! We just erased all our previous work replacing it with the last item we entered and saved that permanently.

This actually happened to a student recently. She had prepared a front page in another file and pasted it in the main file (without noticing that all was selected). Since the screen was covered by her front page she never noticed that all her work was missing. She saved her job and then copied it onto the floppy disk she was using as backup. Ouch!

MAKING A COPY OF THE DOCUMENT

From an application you can make a copy of a document you are working on if it's already saved, using the Save as... command.

Once the Save as dialog box opens you should change the name and/or destination folder. (At least one of these two variables.)
This can be useful for:

• Creating a 'versión' of the document that you can change while another one remains unchanged on the disk. This is used a lot when you want to make sone changes to a document but you aren't sure they will work and want to keep a copy of of it just as it is at present just in case.

• Creating more than one verion of the document so you can have different proposals and then choose the final one.

• Making a backup copy of the document. This is used at the end of a work session and before you turn off the machine. You make a backup copy of your work onto a diskette or another drive in case the Hard drive information gets lost.

It is important to keep in mind that using Save as... to make a backup copy of the file, the machine will close the original document without saving and move on to the new document. It is on the new document that you carry on working.
That is why it is important to Save just before you Save as… unless you purposely want to undo the last changes made to the original version (the ones since you last saved).

It insn't advisable to have two different files on the hard drive with the same names since this could lead to confusion. Make use of the Windows 95/98 capability to use long names and when saving with Save as… change the name to one that clearly indicates that it is a "coy of…" or "version… of…" etc.

It's also good to make sure that your files are safely backed up on a Zip disk or diskette. (In fact diskettes aren't very trustworthy, but it's better than nothing.) Every time that you change a file considerably on the hard drive you should update the backup copy as well.

When you copy the document to a disk which had a previous version, the machine will tell us that a file with that name already exists and will ask if you want to replace it. In some cases it will show the dates when they were last modified, their sizes etc. You must make sure you know which file you are saving and agree to replacing it.