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DADDY BOB'S COMPUTER Q & A
December
11, 2005 |
Q. It annoys me when icons on the desktop
periodically rearrange themselves. Is there a way to
make them stay where I put them?
A.
Right click on a blank spot on the desktop, and select
"Arrange Icons by", then uncheck "auto arrange".
Possibly uncheck "align to grid" also. If the auto
arrange is checked, then anytime a change is made to
your desktop, or you press F5,(refresh) the icons will
auto arrange.
Q. I want to give someone a list of the names of files
that I have created and stored in a folder. Is there a
way to print that list from Windows Explorer
A.
Unfortunately no. Microsoft still hasn't provided a way
to print a directory in any version of Windows. It
was/is possible to do it from DOS/command line.
However, I have written a small batch file that will
print a folder’s contents. It is called PrintFolder.bat,
and you can download it by clicking
HERE. Copy this
file into the folder you want to print, and then double
click on it. This will open Notepad with the contents of
the folder displayed.
You can then
print it, or save it to open in a word processor like MS
Word to further edit it. This file actually contains
only three lines. Here is the complete file:
dir %1/-p/-c/o:g/n/s> "%temp%\Folder
notepad "%temp%\Folder
del "%temp%\Folder
Here's how it works.
The first line.
dir is the command to
display the folder contents
%1 tells it to use the current folder.
/-p tells it to not pause for pages.
/-c tells it to not separate the file size with commas
/o:g tells it to sort with the folders first
/n tells it to list the long file names in the right
column
/s tells it to list all the files in all the sub-folders
"%temp%\Folder - creates a file named folder in the
temporary folder
The second line.
notepad
"%temp%\folder - opens Notepad, & displays the file
named folder
Third line
del "%temp%\folder -
tidies up things by deleting the file named folder after
you close Notepad
Additionally, I have
written a little batch file that will let you print out
the folder hierarchy, commonly called its "tree". It is
called FolderTree.bat, and it can be downloaded
HERE. Copy this
file into the folder you want to print the folder
"tree", and double click on it. This will open Notepad
with the folder tree displayed. You can then print it,
or save it to open in a word processor to further edit
it. This file too contains only three lines. Here it is:
tree %1 /f /a> "%temp%\Folder
notepad "%temp%\Folder
del "%temp%\Folder
Without going into a
lot of detail, this works similar to the one above. To
see what the switches do here, click Start, enter
command and click OK, then enter tree /? and hit enter.
