Practical 1: Familiarization of the computer system and on hand practice on power on and
power off.
Hardware, equipment involved in the function of a computer. Computer hardware consists of
the components that can be physically handled. The function of these components is typically
divided into three main categories: input, output, and storage. Components in these categories
connect to microprocessors, specifically, the computer’s central processing unit (CPU), the
electronic circuitry that provides the computational ability and control of the computer, via
wires or circuitry called a bus.
Software, on the other hand, is the set of instructions a computer uses to manipulate data, such
as a word-processing program or a video game. These programs are usually stored and
transferred via the computer's hardware to and from the CPU. Software also governs how the
hardware is utilized; for example, how information is retrieved from a storage device. The
interaction between the input and output hardware is controlled by software called the Basic
Input Output System software (BIOS).
Although microprocessors are still technically considered to be hardware, portions of their
function are also associated with computer software. Since microprocessors have both
hardware and software aspects they are therefore often referred to as firmware
The main parts of a computer that we'll be focusing on are the Power Supply, Access Slots,
Motherboard, Hard Drive, CPU, RAM, CD-Rom, and Floppy Drive.
First, let's look at two simple diagrams of the inside of a computer.
Quickly, you may recognize some parts of you computer just from these simple diagrams. The
First diagram is of a tower computer, which currently is popular for the home PC. The second
Diagram is a desktop computer, which normally is used for space as you can easily place the
Monitor on top of it and have the whole computer compact in one easy spot.
POWER SUPPLY
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The power supply is vital to the computer as it is the source of power. The power supply is
usually a small metal box in the top corner of a case (tower).
ACCESS SLOTS
Access slots or expansion slots are openings in a computer where a circuit board can be
inserted to add new capabilities to the computer. Examples of drives that may go here would
be modems; USB drives, networking cards, video adapters, and sound cards. These expansions
are easy to install along with being very useful to your computer to allow you to do new things,
such as network computers together.
MOTHERBOARD
The motherboard has been an integral part of most personal computers for more than 20
years. The motherboard contains various circuit cards performing various functions all plug into
many similar sockets on a common circuit board. Each circuit card performs a unique function
in the computer and gets its power from the socket.
The motherboards contain many circuits and slots, but let’s focus on some of the important
ones.
The motherboard is home to the processor (CPU) along with the access slots and RAM.
If we look at the diagram above I've labeled the parts of the motherboard that I wanted to
discuss. The objects labeled 1 are the access slots. 2 is the processor slot and 3 are slots to hold
memory (RAM).
CPU
The CPU, or processor, is the heart of your computer no matter what type (PC, Server, and
Laptop). There are many brands for processors such as Intel and Athlon all with different
processors for your computer. The CPU processes everything that your computer does,
therefore the better the processor, the faster the computer.
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RAM
Random Access Memory (RAM) is the form of memory contained in most computers. RAM is
considered "random access" because you can access any memory cell directly if you know the
row and column that intersect at that cell. When an application is running it stores its
information in the RAM. When you close the application the information is deleted from the
RAM. This is why you need certain amounts of RAM to run applications. The more RAM you
have the faster your computer will be, and the more applications you'll be able to run without
loosing speed.
HARD DRIVE
Nearly every desktop computer and server in use today contains one or more hard-disk drives.
These hard disks do one thing well - they store changing digital information in a relatively
permanent form. They give computers the ability to remember things when the power goes
out.
A hard drive stores all your files and information in a permanent form unlike storing it in RAM
(which is temporary). The larger your hard disk (drive) the more information and files you're
able to store. Today's average hard drive is 40 GB although slowly 80 GB hard drives are
becoming used more often.
CD-ROM
The CD-Rom is quite simple, it reads CD's. CD-Rom completely stands for Compact Disk Read
Only Memory. The revolution of CD's is that they hold much more data than a floppy disk,
although are not as flexible when it comes to rewriting and storing personal data.
Using CD-RW you can make your own CD's and use them more like a floppy disk. These are
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becoming more and more popular although you still need a CD-Rom to read them.
FLOPPY DRIVE
A floppy drive reads the popular floppy disk. Floppy disk are easy to use, rewritable, compact,
and great for storing information. The floppy drive is simple and allows you to read,write over
information stored on a floppy disk.
Now you have a basic knowledge of the parts of your own PC. In the future you'll be able to
read more advanced articles and have an understanding of the parts of a PC.
STEPS TO SWITCH ON THE COMPUTER:
1)Switch on the ups .
2)Switch on the monitor
3) Press the power key of the CPU to start the machine.
STEPS TO SWITCH OFF THE COMPUTER:
1) Click on START.
2) Select TURN OFF YOUR COMPUTER OPTION option.
3) Click on SHUT DOWN to turn off.
4) Switch off the monitor.
5) Switch off the UPS.
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Practical 2: Loading window, closing, maximizing, icon shifting & ordering.
To start Windows installation: Put Windows XP CD and restart your computer. You will see
“Press any key to boot from CD …” so you must push any button on your keyboard to proceed.
Now Windows XP installation will start by itself. Please pay attention to the lower part of the
Screen. Important commands will be displayed that you need to use in installation process.
If drivers for hard disk controller (SATA, SCSI) is needed, you must press “F6” and do three
following steps:
1. Insert diskette and press “Enter”
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2. Choose adequate driver and press “Enter”
3. Press “Enter” to continue installation process.
In this windows press “Enter” to continue the installation or press “F3” to cancel the
installation.
Then follows Windows Xp license, and if you agree with these rules and want to continue
installation press “F8”, but if you don’t agree and want to cancel installation press “F3”
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If you install Windows XP in computer that already have installed Windows XP, then you will
see window and I recommend press “Esc” (don’t repair) in it. If you choose to press “R” than
only the windows files will be rewrited and viruses will stay in your computer. So press “Esc”
In this step we can divide disk in many pieces (partitions) if you need it.
1. If there is any partitions you can delete the with “D”
2. With “C” you can create new partitions
Choose partition where you want to install Windows XP and press “Enter”
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Choose file system what you want format your disk. I usually advise to choose NTFS. If you
don’t want to wait long time you can choose NTFS (Quick) and press “Enter
Your hard disk will be formatted and after that files will be copied to your hard disk. When all
files will be copied, computer will restart.
After restart don’t press any key when you see “Press any key to boot from CD …” Just wait and
Windows installation will continue.
After some time a windows will appear “Regional and Language Options”. Click customize if
needed, but if you don’t need to customize click “Next” to continue Windows XP installation.
You can customize it later after installation if you want.
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Fill the fields Name and Organization, when it is done click “Next”
Write in your Windows XP license number (serial) and click “Next”
Fill the computer’s name and administrator’s password if needed. Then click “Next”
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Choose your time zone and make sure that clock is correct. Then click “Next” Windows XP
installation will continue after that.
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If you want to configure network’s configurations you can do it here, but you can do it after
installation as well. So you can choose ‘Typical settings’ and click “Next”. In next window click
“Next”
Windows XP installation will continue and after that computer will restart again. After booting
in follow short wizard that offer you to activate windows and create user accounts.
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Then choose “skip” and about windows registering in their site you can answer “No”
So you finally have installed Windows XP in your hard drive by now.
Important things to do after installation:
1. Please install firewall and antivirus before you plug in your internet cable.
2. After the installation process of Windows XP you can continue installing drivers and any
software you need.
MINIMIZING & MAXIMIZING WINDOW
A window can be maximized and minimized by clicking the minimize and maximize button. are
displayed on the right-top corner of the window on the title bar. A minimized button has
hyphen (-) symbol when u click it, windows will be iconized and icon will be moved to the task
bar of the Desktop. A maximize button is a small rectangular area (). When you click it, then
your windows will occupy whole monitor screen i.e. it will cover up the whole desktop.
CLOSING WINDOW
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If you do not want to work more with your opened window, then you can close it by clicking the
close button, close button is next to the maximize button on the right top corner of the title bar.
It has X (cross0 sign in the small rectangular box. It is also called cross icon.
ICON SHIFTING & ORDERING
Drag and Drop is an action which helps the user to copy and to move an icon or an object from
one window to another, one folder to another etc. To drag & Drop an object on to another
object is to move the mouse pointer onto the source icon or source object which you want to
drag, the by pressing down the mouse left button, holding it down, move towards the
destination object. When your dragged object moves onto destination object, then drop the
source object onto the target object by removing your hands from the mouse button. So,
dropping is to release of the mouse button from the target position when you completely drag
an object.
Ordering of icons on the Desktop is done by right clicking the mouse on the blank area of
Desktop. Then from the pop-up menu so displayed, select the ‘Arrange icons by’ option. From
the further displayed menu you can choose any one option according to which you want to
arrange the icons and the various options for ordering are: Arrange icon by-name, size, and
type, modified.
Practical 3: Practice with MS-Word, operating and closing document, Preparation of
document, setting of document, familiarization with various tools, mail-merge practice.
Introduction to MS-Word:
History-Evolution of Word: Many concepts and ideas of word were brought from bravo, the
original GUI word processor developed at Xerox PARC. Bravo’s creator Charles Simonyi left
Xerox PARC to work for Microsoft in 1981. Simonyi hired Richard Brodie, who had worked with
him on Bravo, away from PARC that summer. On February 1, 1983, development on what was
originally named Multi-Tool Word began.
Having renamed it Microsoft Word, Microsoft released the program October 25, 1983,
for the IBM PC. Free demonstration copies of the application were bundled with the November
1983 issue of PC World, making it the first program to be distributed on-disk with a magazine.
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However, it was not well received, and sales lagged behind those of rival products such as
WordPerfect.
Word featured a concept of “What You See Is What You Get”, or WYSIWYG, and was
the first application with such features as the ability to display bold and italics text on an IBM
PC. Although MS-DOS was a character based system, Microsoft Word was the first word
processor for the IBM PC that showed actual line breaks and typeface markups such as bold and
Italics directly on the screen while editing, although this was not a true WYSIWYG system
because available displays did not have the resolution to show actual typefaces. Other DOS
word processors, such as WordStar and WordPerfect, used simple text-only display with
markup codes on the screen or sometimes, at the most, alternative colors.
Word 2007 is the most recent version of Word. This release includes numerous
changes, including a new XML-based file format, a redesigned interface, an integrated equation
editor, bibliographic management, and support for structured documents. It also has contextual
tabs, which are functionally specific only to the object with focus, and many other features like
Live Preview (which enables you to view the document without making any permanent
change(s), Mini Toolbar, Super-tooltips, Quick Access toolbar, SmartArt, etc.
File Formats:
Word document formats (.DOC) as of early 2000s were a de facto standard of
document file formats due to their popularity. Though usually just referred to as “Word
document format”, this term refers primarily to the range of formats used by default in Word
version 2-2003. In addition to the default Word binary formats, there are actually a no of
optional alternate file formats that Microsoft has used over the years. Rich Text Formats (RTF)
was an early effort to create a format for interchanging formatted text between applications.
RTF remains an optional format for word that retains most formatting and all content of the
original document.
Later, after HTML appeared, Word supported an HTML derivative as an additional full-
fidelity roundtrip format similar to RTF, with the additional capability that the file could be
viewed in a web browser. Word 2007 uses the new Microsoft Office Open XML format as its
default format, but retains the older Word 97-2003 format as an option. It also supports (for
output only) PDF and XPS format.
COMPONENTS OF WORD WINDOW
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When user opens a Microsoft Word window on the screen, it has number of different parts.
These
parts are given as under:
(a) Title Bar
(b) Menu Bar
(c) Tool Bar
(d) The Ruler
(e) Status Area or Status Bar
(f) Scroll Bar
(g) Frame
(h) Working Area or Document Window Area
(i) View Button Bar
The main ones are explained as below:
(a)Title Bar: The title bar of the MS-Word window displays the name of the program as
“Microsoft Word”. It also displays the name of the document, which is currently opened. If we
are creating a new document, then it will be “document1” in the title bar with the “Microsoft
Word”. When after typing the textual information you save the document by pressing theCtrl+S
key combination from the keyboard, it will ask you for the name of the document. When you
assign the name of the document, it will replace “Document1” with your entered name. You
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can move the window anywhere on the screen by moving the mouse to title bar. Here click the
left mouse button once and by holding the mouse, you drag it anywhere.
(b)Menu Bar: The next line or bar of the Word window contains the menu bar. Word’s menus
are pulled down from the Menu Bar, located across the top of the screen. The menu bar
contains several menu items on the menu pads. Various menus are File, Edit, View, Insert,
Format, Tools, Table, and Windowand Help having menu pads. Menus are accessed by
picking a menu name from the menu pad with the mouse pointer or by pressing Alt+X key
combination from the keyboard, where X is the underlined letter in the menu name. On
selecting a particular menu pad, Word displays the corresponding pull-down menu. Once a
menu is pulled down, you can pick one of the selections with the mouse pointer or again by
typing the underlined letter of the desired selection. These various types of menu selections on
the pull down menu are also called Menu commands. When a menu command is highlighted,
you can getHelp information about that selected command by pressing the Function key F1.
Now we will study various Pull-down menus as:
1. File: The File menu displays several menu commands. The File menu is used to perform a
variety of file and printing operations. The main menu selections or commands in the File
pull down menu are New, Open, Close, Save, Save As…, Save All, Properties…,
Templates…, Page setup…, Print Preview, Print, Send, Exitand some currently used
and saved document files.
We can create a new document by selectingNew command or pressing theCtrl+N key
combination from the keyboard. You can open an existing document by clicking the open menu
command and close it by selecting and clicking the close menu command or menu option. You
can save your text or document by clicking the Save Command. If you want to save your
document in another drive or directory, then click the Save As command. If you want to save all
opened documents then select the Save All command. The properties selection displays
information about the current document. You can set the templates by clicking the Templates
command. You can set the size, margins and orientation of a page by selecting Page setup
command. You can print the document and also take print preview before printing by selecting
Print and Print Preview Commands respectively. You can send your document to E-mail by
selecting Send to command or option. Ellipses (…) following a menu items or commands
indicate that dialogue boxes appear after the menu selection that performs an operation. Exit
selection will quit the user from MS-Word. Word also displays recently saved files at the bottom
of the file menu. You can open a recently used file by picking it with mouse pointer or by typing
the corresponding number.
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2.Edit :Th e Edit menu displays several menu selections as Undo, Clear, Repeat, Cut, Copy,
Paste, Paste Special, Select all, Find, replace, Go to, Auto text, and Book mark. The Edit
Menu is used to delete, Copy and move blocks of the text. It also includes Undo (to cancel last
executed command) and Repeat the selection (i.e. redo operation). It will also find and replace
the text. The paste special selections used to link pasted objects from other applications. You
can move to any page with the help of Go to command. The Bookmark selection inserts
reference points within a document. Auto text does the alignment of the text.
3.View:Th e View menu displays the menu commands such as Normal, Outline, Page
Layout, Footer, Footnotes, Annotations, and Zoom. The view menu lets you to display
your document in no. of ways including Normal, Outline, Page layout, Master Document(which
gives you the document’s underlying structure) and Full screen. You can select any one of these
views and take the decision which is better for the viewing the information or textual data.
View can also turn off and on the display of the tool bars, the ruler, footnotes and annotations.
It can also zoom the page size to different percentages. View is used to create, edit header and
footers and also set.
4.Insert: The Insert menu displays the several menu commands of Break, Page Number,
Annotations, Date and Time, Field, Symbol, Form Field, Footnote, Caption, Cross-
Reference, Index and Tables, File, Frame, Picture, Object and Database. Insert selection
gives you the ability to insert a variety of things into your document. This menu is used to
insert page and section breaks, page numbers, the current date and time, footnotes
annotations, special symbols, forms, files, pictures, frames, objects, including equations,
databases and captions for figures, tables or equations. You can also identify text for an index
or table of contents.
5.Format: The Format menu displays menu commands like Font, Paragraph, Tabs, Bullets
and Numbering, Heading Numbering, Auto format, Style gallery, Style, Frame, Picture
and Drawing objects. The format menu lists options for setting and modifying various fonts,
one or all paragraphs formats, to set the borders and apply shading on Borders, to insert or
delete columns, to set Bullets and set the Numbers, to set heading numbering, to do auto
formation, to apply various style settings, set picture in text and apply drawing objects.
6.Tools: The Tool menu has the main selections as Spelling, Grammar, Thesaurus,
Hyphenation, Language, Word count, Auto correct, Mail Merge, Envelopes and Labels,
Protect Document, Revisions, Macro, Customize, and Options. In this the user can use the built
in spelling checker, grammatical error remover and Thesaurus. User can count the words in the
document, set the special characters corresponding to different languages, turns hyphenation
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on or off, prepares the envelopes and labels, mail merge the documents, create and run
macros, customize the various toolbars menus and shortcut keys. It can also protect and
unprotect document and set the many Word options.
7.Table: The Table menu displays the selections of Insert row, Delete row, Merge cells, Split
cells, Select row, Select column, Select table, Table Autoformat, Cell height and width,
Headings, Convert table or text, Sort, Formula, Split Table,and Gridlines.
8.Window: The window menu displays several menu commands like New Window, Arrange
All, Split, and some document filenames. The window menu is used to create, arrange and
select document windows when more than one document is open.
9.Help: The Help menu comprises of Microsoft Word Help topics, Answer Wizard, The Microsoft
Network, Word perfect Help, and about Microsoft Word. By using the help menu option, one
can review the information about Word operations. You can press F1 at any selection and get
the required help. We can use the Help index and search features to locate specific information.
The Answer Wizard can be useful for direct Help.
Tool bars: Each Office application comes with a set of tool bars. Word 6.0 and its advanced
versions come with several predefined toolbars. Each tool bar has a set of tools that are
appropriate for a particular type of task. By default, the standard and Formatting toolbars are
displayed but you can display other toolbars at any time by selecting these from the View
menu. You can also hide all the toolbars if you want to see more of your document on the
screen. The main toolbars in Word 6 for Windows 3.x (3.0/3.1/3.11) are standard, formatting,
Border, Database, Drawing, Forms, Microsoft, Word for Windows 2.0 and Tip Wizard .
PAGE SETUP (MARGINS AND GUTTERS):
Clicking the file menu displays the page setup command. The page setup command will set the
margins (top, bottom, left, right, set gutter), define the paper size and its orientations (portrait
or landscape), and find the paper source (tray and others) and set the page layout. To work
with page setup, first of all click the file menu and select page setup command. When you click
this command, a page setup dialog box will be displayed
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CHANGING STYLE, FONTS AND FONT STYLE:
Styles: Ms-Word comes with a number of built in styles (several paragraph styles and flow
character styles) that can be applied to both the document heading and normal text. A style is a
named set of formatting characteristics which can quickly and easily paragraph and character
formatting to text. You define the style by giving it a name and various paragraphs or character
formatting properties. The paragraph or selected text automatically takes on the formatting
characteristics assigned to the style. The primary purpose of style is to simplify and standardize
formatting. You can create any number of styles according to your requirement. Ms-Word has
mainly two types of styles as: Paragraph style and character styles. A paragraph style applies to
an entire paragraph and improves the paragraph’s appearance. Some common paragraph
formatting characters are line spacing, Indent icon, Tab stops, Border and Font properties.
Every paragraph has a style. The default paragraph style is called normal. Character style
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applies only to selection of text rather than the entire paragraph but you can apply it to whole
paragraph. Some common character Paragraph styles are Type face, Face size, Bold, Italics and
Underline.
Applying style to a text: You can apply a style to a paragraph before or after you type the text in
the paragraph. To apply style to a paragraph or character move the mouse pointer to the
desired location and highlight the text to which you want to apply style if text is already written
otherwise when you type the text, it will automatically take the selected style. Now select the
style from the style drop-down list in the Formatting toolbar. This list provides you a preview of
each style within the list including the type face and font characteristics. You can also apply
style by pressing the Ctrl+Shift+N key combination and to activate the Font drop-down list press
the Ctrl+Shift+F key combinations. Also we can apply style by selecting the style command from
the Format menu.
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PAGE BREAKS: MS-Word automatically warps text to the following page based on page margins,
paragraphs indents and other criteria. You can insert a manual page break any time you want
to force Word to start a new page. To insert a page break, move the cursor where you want to
set the page break. Now there are two ways to set page breaks between the continuous texts.
First you can select Break Command from the Insert menu and click the break command. If it is
not selected then you can click the Page Break radio button and click theok button form the
break dialog box.
HEADERS AND FOOTERS:
Header and Footer appear at the top and bottom respectively of a document. Header is a
special text, which is often used for repeating the title of document from a page to page and
entering page numbers at the top of the document. Also graphics symbol can be displayed at
Header. Title of the book is shown on every page of the book work as Header. Footers are often
used for the same purpose but at the bottom of a document. You have to enter the text for a
header or footer only once. Headers and Footers are also useful for placing backgrounds and
watermarks on a page.
Auto text:
Cut and Copy both store information on the Clipboard. Each time you store new information on
the Clipboard, the old information is lost. If you wish to store text permanently so you can use it
repeatedly, use Auto text. For this purpose following are the steps:
a. Type the following:
Auto text information is stored permanently.
b. Highlight “Auto text information is stored permanently.”
c. Choose Insert> Auto text> New from the menu.
d.Microsoft Word suggests a name. The suggestion displays in the dialogue box. Change the
name by typingAT in the Please Name Your Auto text Entry Field.
e. Click OK.
f.Click anywhere in the text area to remove the highlighting.
g. Place the cursor between the period in the sentence you just typed and the paragraph
marker.
h. Press the spacebar twice to leave two blank spaces.
i.Type AT.
j. Press F3.
k. Your text should now read:
“Auto text information is stored permanently. Auto text is stored permanently.”
The Tab Key:
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The default tab setting for Microsoft Word is .5 inches. When you press the Tab Key, the cursor
moves ½ inches across the page and an arrow appears on the screen. The arrow is a non
printing character, when you print your document the arrow does not print. Press the Tab key a
few times. Note how the cursor moves across the page.
Printing the document file:
We can print a document, table, chart or any text or graphics materials from the document file.
Note that before using the Print command, document should be opened. Also note that before
using the Print command, you should take the view of your printed document using the print.
.
PREVIEWING Documents:
Previewing is the procedure to view the document before printing i.e. in other words
Previewing a document means viewing a screen representation of one or more pages before
you print them. To print preview a document, the procedure can be taken as:
a. Select the Print Preview option from the file menu. Alternatively, click on the Print Preview
button on the standard toolbar.
b. Use the magnifier button or select the Zoom options from the view menu to enlarge the
document. When you use Print Preview, several preview buttons are displayed on the Print
Preview toobar
Background printing:
Some printing jobs take hours to complete. In such situations, you can use the background
printing utility offered by Word. Background printing enables you to do other things while the
printer prints in the background. You can also check and control the status of multiple print
jobs. In background printing, the system sends the print jobs to a file on the hard disk rather
than directly to the printer. It then sends it to the printer in the background.
MAIL MERGE
The term mail merge is typically used to describe the process of merging some form of address
data base with a form of letter to create a group of individual letters. It is a good feature of the
Microsoft Word. Mail merge is used to print letters, envelopes, mailing labels etc.
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Mail merging uses two files. Actually Mail merging means to combine two different files
in one at the time of printing. Mail merge uses the main file or main document and picks the
first Name, address from the data files or label files and combine these file into one. Similarly it
picks the second address and combines it with general letter and creates the second letter.
Again similarly it will continue this process until last address in the data file.
How to create a mail merge file:
Mail merge list summarizes the steps involved in performing a mail merge operation:
a)Create the Main letter: It has the general body of letter.
b) Create the Data source: It has the label address of the letter.
c) Define merge files in the main document: User defines merge fields in the main document.
These fields tell the Ms-Word where to insert specific data items from the data source.
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d) Merge the data with the Main document: when the main document and the data source are
ready, you can merge two. The result is a single document containing all the personalized
documents with page break separating one document from another.
e) Print the document: as all personalized documents are placed in a single document file, you
can print all documents in one operation.
Types of document that you can create.
The main document in a mail merge operation is the one that contains the boilerplate text and
graphics, which are the same in all resulting documents. There are few types of main
documents used in Mail merge:-
i. Form letter: when you want to create a form letter, Ms-Word merges the main document and
the data source to create a single document that contains all he personalized letters, with each
letter in its own section.
ii. Envelopes: Ms-Word automates the process of creating envelopes, enabling you to specify
the
envelope type, print options and other variables.
iii. Labels: Word allows you to specify the type of label having size, number per page etc. and
then creates a main document consisting of page label. Each label cell contains the fields to
insert the address information. The resulting merged document contains multiple pages of
labels all in one section.
iv.Catalog: a catalog is much like a form letter which has resulting merged document contains
all the data in one section instead of individual sections.
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