When you work in, say, your word processor, you use the Edit menu quite a bit—its Cut, Copy, and Paste commands are very useful for moving bits of text. At the desktop, these commands operate on icons, providing an easy way for you to move files and folders from one window or disk to another.
The menu's commands vary, depending on whether an icon in the window is selected.
Reverses the last action you performed. The name of the command changes to describe what you did; if you delete a file, for example, the command name becomes Undo Delete.
You can cut or copy any selected icon except a drive. As you'd expect, Cut removes the original icon from its current folder location; Copy leaves the original icon in place. (See Section 5.3 for details on cutting and copying icons.)
Learning the keyboard shortcuts for these actions will pay off handsomely in efficiency over the years. For Copy, it's Ctrl+C; for Cut, it's Ctrl+X.
If grayed out: Select an icon to cut or copy.
Once you've cut or copied an icon, you can click in a new folder or disk window and select Paste. The icon reappears in that location. (Paste Shortcut creates a shortcut to the original icon.) The keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+V.
If grayed out: The Clipboard is empty. Cut or copy an icon.
These commands offer another way to move a folder or file to another folder. When you choose either command, a dialog box opens so you can select the target folder (see Figure B-2).
Highlights all of the icons in the open window (or, if no window is open, on the desktop). Windows applies any subsequent command (Copy, Delete, Print, or whatever) to all of them at once. If you're editing an icon's name, and your cursor is blinking in the renaming rectangle, this command highlights the entire file name instead. Keyboard equivalent: Ctrl+A.