(Updated: 2005/09/14 02:44 )

Getting Started

Created by: Shelly Zhao 

Updated by: Tanya Ellchuk         

Updated by: Holger Hoos         

Comments to: Holger Hoos

 


Sources: Some of the lab materials were taken from the CPSC 100-101 lab manual.



Contents

 



Objectives

The purpose of this lab session is to acquaint you with basic things you should know to do when using a computer to create documents or explore the web. In this lab, you will learn how to interact with different elements of the Graphical User Interface (GUI). These include icons, windows, menus, files, folders, documents, and applications. The main activity of the lab will be to create a simple document about you and your interests. The following topics are covered in this lab:



Before the Lab

Read through all of the lab instructions prior to your lab session. Fully understand the Lab Etiquette. Chapters 2 and 3 of the textbook provide useful background.


Lab Etiquette

Things you should do:

You will not hurt or damage the equipment through normal use.

 

Things you shouldn't do:

 
Getting Comfortable

You needn't be involved in heavy lifting to develop back, neck, shoulder or leg problems. Try working at a computer day after day. Sitting too long in incorrect positions is one of the chief causes of aches and pains in your muscles and joints from computer work. And small strains that are hardly noticeable  accumulate and can become unbearable.

Take note of the illustration and the following suggestions for maintaining proper posture when using a computer. Some of these may not feel as comfortable as your current posture. But after a while your muscles will be trained to the new position, and you'll feel comfortable again. Also, check with a computer or office store for specific ergonomic devices that may help you.
1 Sit directly in front of the keyboard and computer screen.
2 Situate the monitor so it will be 18" to 24" from your eyes and you have to look slightly down to see it.
3 Make sure your legs fit beneath the desk with your feet flat on the floor. Use a foot rest if necessary.
4 Adjust the chair seat height so your thighs are parallel to the floor with your knees at about 90° and slightly lower than your hips. Make sure your chair seat isn't too deep.
5 Use a work surface that allows your elbows to maintain about a 90° angle.
6 Sit upright, maintaining the natural curves of your back.
7 Make sure you have adequate lower back support.
8 Keep your shoulders relaxed. Don't slump forward.
9 Relax your wrists and keep them in a neutral position. Don't flex them up or down.
10 Keep your knees shoulder width apart or closer.

Web pages on this topic are at the end of the lab. 



During the Lab

Remember, get comfortable!

Start the Computer

Before you can begin to use the computer, you may need to turn it on. In addition, because you are working in a multi-user environment, you must also login. 

You must provide your username and password in  the Login dialog box. Your username will be your user-id for your computer science account.  If it is your first time logging on, you will need to create an account.

Create an Account

Because you don't yet have a login id, at the log in prompt, type getacct.  Follow the instructions on screen.  You will be prompted to enter your student number and last name and will then be asked to create a password. The password should be no more than 8 characters long.   Once this process is complete, you can log out, and use the login id and password you have just created to log into the Windows environment. 

Logout of your account

Click on the left-bottom of the window, and choose ShutDown... , and choose Log off  from the pop window,  then click OK. 

Note: Do not click any other option except log off.

 

Use Notepad to Create a Text File

A file is a collection of bytes stored as an individual entity. All data on disk is stored as a file with an assigned file name that is unique within the folder (directory) it resides in. A text file is a file that contains only text characters. Now we will create a simple text file using Notepad. 

Open the Notepad: click ,

Type the following information into the document; a space is needed between each word. 

After finishing all the input, click File from the menu bar,  choose Save or Save as

choose disk/drive Z in the Save in window, and click on the Create New Folder Icon , type lab0 and press enter.

There should be a folder called "lab0" now. Double click on this folder to open it and type lab0.txt as your File name. Then click Save.

Close the file by choosing File -> Exit, if it asks "Do you want to save the change?" Click Yes.

Find the "My Computer" icon on the desktop.  Double click on My Computer, find Disk Z,  make sure there is a folder "lab0" and has a file lab0.txt in it.  If not, you need to create the file again. 

 

Create Directories (Folders)

In a graphical user interface (GUI), a folder holds data, applications and other folders. Folders were introduced on the Xerox Star, then popularized on the Macintosh and later adapted to Windows and UNIX. In Unix, DOS and Windows 3.1 (an old Windows), a folder is known as a directory, and a subfolder (folder within a folder) is a subdirectory. 

Windows Folders:
Folders on the hard disk are pictured as manila file folders, but they are not fixed in size and can hold as much data as there is room on the entire disk.

You can use My Computer in future labs when you will need to create folders (directories).  As described above, double click the My Computer icon, double click Disk Z.  All file and folders that belong to your home directory will be displayed.  To select a directory to see it's contents, double click on it.  To create a new directory, click on the File menu, select New, then select Folder and give your new folder a name.  To rename an existing folder, select it (by clicking on it once).  Once selected, you can do one of the following:

and enter the new name for your folder.  You can also use Windows Explorer to view, rename, or delete your files, as well as create new ones.  To open Windows Explorer click  Start  --  Programs  --  Accessories  --  Windows Explorer

 

Open a new file/an existing file:

Open a new file: 

Open an existing file:

Launch the application you want to use. 

Tip:  To open a document you've used recently, click History on the Places Bar in the Open dialog box. In Word, you can click the file name at the bottom of the File menu. If the list of recently used documents isn't displayed, click the General tab (Tools menu, Options command). Select the Recently used file list check box.

Now, open the file lab0.txt you just created, and add more content by answering each of the questions listed below.  Each question will need to be started with a separate paragraph. Press the "Enter" key at the end of each paragraph. Don't worry about the format of the file; we will take care of it in later labs.  Remember to save the file after finishing each paragraph. See the next section for how to save a document as you work. 

Answer the following to add content to your lab0.txt file:

 

Save files

Locate a folder

When you open, save, or insert a file, you can locate a folder in the following ways.

To Do this
Go to any location available from your computer Click a drive, folder, or Internet location in the Look in box (Open or Insert dialog box) or Save in drop-down list box (Save As dialog box).
Create a new folder Click Create New Folder .
Open a folder in the folder list Double-click the folder.
 

Close Files / Applications

To close a file, choose File on your application's menu bar, and choose close in the pop-up menu. Ctrl-F4 has the same function in most of the applications. 

To close an application, choose File on your application's menu bar, and choose Exit in the pop-up menu. 

In some applications, there may not be a close, you can always choose Exit after you save to close it. 

You can also click the icon on the top right of your window to close an application or a window. 

 

File Types:

Here is a sample of some of the different file types you may encounter or need to use.

 
File Type suffix Application examples
Text files .txt Notepad, Wordpad myfile.txt
Word Document .doc MS Word myfile.doc
Spread Sheet .xls MS excel myfile.xls
Presentation .ppt MS PowerPoint myfile.ppt
webpage .html, .htm Internet Explorer, Netscape myfile.html
images .jpg, .gif, .bmp MS Paint, Imaging, Ultimate Paint myfile.jpg, myfile.gif, myfile.bmp
audio .wav   myfile.wav
video .avi,    myfile.avi
 executable .exe   myfile.exe

 

Internet Basics


 

Unix Introduction

We won't learn Unix in this course, however, we may need to use some of its features through our labs. If you are out of time to do this in the first lab, don't worry - you know where to find the information when you need it. Here is what you need to do. 

Launching SecureCRT (found by clicking on Start) will enable you to work in the Unix environment while still in Windows. Your lab TA will help you set up the connection for the first time.

When you first open SecureCRT you will most likely see the following:

If you see

instead, pressing the right mouse button on the word Sessions and selecting Quick Connect from the shortcut menu that pops up should give you the following

Changing the protocol to ssh2 will change the window to reflect the first Quick Connect window shown.

Alternatively, you can select Quick Connect from the File menu to get the windows described above.

Once you have a Quick Connect window open, change the Protocol to ssh2;  the content of the window should change.  Complete the fields to reflect this sample below:

Press OK when you are finished.  Make sure that you save this session; otherwise you will have to go through this process each time you open SecureCRT.

You will need to provide your userId and password again to login to the server.  They are the same ones you use to login to the PC. 

Unix Commands:

Viewing Files and Directories

Type the following at the xterm window:

 ls -l

then the following information might be displayed:

    -rw-r--r--  4 a1a1 guest    9512   May  10   15:21   banner.gif
     drwx------  1 a1a1 guest     512   May  13   09:59   document
     -rwx------  1 a1a1 guest 5275326   May  27   15:53   emacs
     -rw-------  5 a1a1 guest   11512   May  28   15:28   hello.cpp
     -rw-r--r--  4 a1a1 guest     512   May  19   15:27   homepage.html
     drwx------  1 a1a1 guest   25194   Jun  16   09:59   temp

The meaning of the information contained in each column is (column 1 is the leftmost column):

Column 1: The type of the named entry: the first character in this series of dashes and letters is either "d" indicating a directory or "-" indicating a file, followed by the access permissions "-rw-r--r--". These access permissions specify which users have permission to read, write, or execute the file, which are designated as "r", "w", and "x" respectively.

 

Making and Removing Directories

The Command "mkdir"

As you start a new project, you might need to create a new directory for storing files. To make a new directory, use the make directory command, mkdir. The directory will be created as a subdirectory of the current working directory.  If you want to create the directory "cs100" inside your home directory, then while you are in your home directory, you should type:

        mkdir cs100

Unix makes a new directory named "cs100", located in your home directory.

The Command "rmdir"

To remove a directory, you use the remove directory command, rmdir. The command name is followed by the name of the target directory. For example,

       rmdir ~/cs100

will remove the "cs100" directory located in the home directory. If the target directory contains files or subdirectories, rmdir will display the error message:

     Directory not empty

Sometimes rmdir will report a more cryptic error, such as:

    rmdir: cs100: File exists

You must delete all the files and subdirectories in the target directory before removing the directory. 

 

Copying, Moving and Removing Files

Unix allows you to copy, move, rename, and remove files. You can make a copy of a document before experimenting with format changes. You can move files into or out of a directory, and rename files to better organize them. When a file is no longer needed, you can remove it.

Copying Files

To duplicate a file, use the copy command, cp. The format of the command is:

       cp source_filename destination_filename

where source_filename is the name of the original file and destination_filename is the name of the resulting copy. 

Moving (or Renaming) Files

To move a file to a different location, use the move command, mv. The format of the command is:

        mv source_filename destination_filename

where source_filename is the name of the original file and destination_filename is the name of the file to move to. 

Removing Files

To remove a file, use the remove command rm.  This command has the following form:

        rm filename [filename]

where each filename is the name of a file you want to remove.

Note: rm is very powerful and permanent; use it with extreme caution. There is no way to recover a removed file in a Unix system.

 

Commands Summary

The following table summarizes the commands for managing files that have been discussed:
 

Command Function
ls To list the contents of the current directory.
ls -F To list the contents of the current directory in terms of files, directories and executable programs.
ls -a To list the contents of the current directory, including hidden files.
ls -l To list the contents of the current directory in details.
pwd To list the pathname of the current directory.
cd To navigate to another directory.
mkdir To make a directory.
rmdir To remove an empty directory.
cp To copy files.
mv To move(rename) files.
rm To remove files.
rm -i To remove files with confirmation.
rm -r To remove a directory.  The contents of the directory is also removed.
rm -f To remove files, overidding any confirmation.

 


Deliverables

  1. Send an e-mail to your TA. 
  2. Keep your lab0.txt file under your lab0 folder/directory.
  3. Your TA may ask you to demonstrate some of the things you've learned in this lab. Be prepared to do so.

 

Resources and Reference Links

  1. CPSC 101 / WMST 201 Course Web Page
  2. Computer Science Undergraduate Student Web Page: has information about the CS undergraduate program and facilities For problems with your undergraduate account, e-mail help@ugrad.cs.ubc.ca or ask your TA.
  3. You will be provided 30 units of printing quota for the first lab. You can purchase more printing coupons from the bookstore or Copyright.
  4. For more information on undergraduate accounts, printing, and lab availability, check www.ugrad.cs.ubc.ca or ask your TA for details. 
  5. Computer Ergonomics:

Ergonomics is the study of the relationship between people and their work with the goal of designing job tasks, work stations, tools and equipment to fit the physical capabilities of people. Creating a good ergonomic working arrangement is important to protecting your health.  Following is a useful link for information on computer ergonomics:

Cornell University Ergonomics Web: http://ergo.human.cornell.edu/ergoguide.html