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Managing Your Files

The basic units of data management on your Amiga are files, directories, and drawers. Files are organized collections of data that are given a name and are stored on the system or on removable media. Files are contained in directories or drawers. Directories and drawers are the same thing - a subdivision in your Amiga's filing system that is used to organize files and other directories/drawers (subdirectories).

Organizing Information on Disks

Information should be stored on disk in a logical manner to allow easy access to your files. The Amiga Workbench organizes information into a hierarchical system of drawers.

A drawer - a directory in AmigaDOS - is a container for items that are related. These items can be files and even other drawers.

On any disk you can create multiple drawers containing multiple files, as available disk space allows. Workbench also allows the creation of drawers within drawers, subdrawers or subdirectories, for further file management. Create as many drawers and subdrawers on your disk as needed.

A drawer icon is displayed in the disk window for each drawer created on a particular disk. Each drawer window contains the icons of the files and subdrawers that exist in it.

Paths

A path is a complete description of the location of a particular file on a disk. When a program requests the name of a file for retrieval, specify the file's path, including the volume or device name and all the drawers that lead to that file.

The method for specifying paths varies from program to program. Most programs use a file requester with a scrolling list, in which the disk name, any drawer names, and the file name are displayed. Click on the appropriate names to specify the path. However, for some programs you may have to type in the complete path name.

To enter a complete path:

Diskname:

Diskname:filename

Diskname:drawername/filename

Diskname:drawername/subdrawername/filename

Note:

File and drawer names containing spaces can cause recognition problems. We recommend that you avoid using spaces in file or drawer names. If you have trouble referencing a name that contains a space, enclose the entire path in double quotation marks.

File and Drawer Names

The following rules apply for naming files and drawers:

Trashcan

The Trashcan is a special drawer that can be placed on a disk for storing files that you no longer needed and may wish to delete. Discard icons or pseudo-icons for the files to be deleted by dragging them into the Trashcan. If the icon to be discarded is a drawer, is associated files are also moved to the Trashcan.

Choosing Empty Trash from the Icons menu deletes the icons and all of their associated files from the Trashcan. Before choosing Empty Trash, you can still recover any of the Trashcan's contents by opening its window and dragging the icons back out.

For more information about putting a Trashcan on a disk, see the Format Disk description in Chapter 3.

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