Working with Icon View
Icon view (Figure 1) displays a window's contents as icons. Unlike some other views, a window in icon view displays the contents of only one disk or folder at a time.
As discussed in Chapter 2, icons can be moved around in a window to reposition them. An invisible grid makes it easy to keep icons neat within the window. You can also use commands under the View menu (Figure 5) to neatly arrange icons.
I tell you more about working with icon view on the following pages.
To neatly arrange icons
- Activate the window that you want to clean up (Figure 7).
Figure 7 Start with a Messy window like this one...
Choose View > Clean Up (Figure 5). The icons are arranged in the window's invisible grid (Figure 8).
Figure 8 ...and use the Clean Up command to put the icons in place.
or
Choose one of the commands from the Arrange By submenu under the View menu (Figure 9) or press its corresponding shortcut key:
- Name () arranges the icons alphabetically by name (Figure 10).
- Date Modified () arranges the icons chronologically by the date they were last modified, with the most recently modified item last.
- Date Created () arranges the icons by the date they were created, with the most recently created item last.
- Size () arranges the icons in size order, with the largest item last. (Folders have a size of 0 for this option.)
- Kind () arranges the icons alphabetically by the kind of file.
- Label () arranges the icons by color-coded label (if applied).
Figure 9 The Arrange By submenu offers several options for neatly arranging icons.
The icons are arranged in the window's invisible grid in the order you specified (Figure 10).