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About the Author
Alan Simpson is a freelance computer/Internet consultant and veteran author of digilit (digital literature. He's the author of more than 80 computer books, published in many languages throughout the world. Alan is best known for his light, conversational writing style and clear jargon-free approach to dealing with technical topics. Prior to writing books full time, Alan taught introductory and advanced computer programming courses at San Diego State University and University of California, San Diego Extension. He also worked as a freelance programmer and computer consultant. He maintains the www.coolnerds.com Web site (when time permits, and can be reached at alan@coolnerds.com. Brian Underdahl is the best-selling author of more than 50 computer books, including several current titles from IDG Books Worldwide: Pocket PCs For Dummies, Opera Web Browser For Dummies, Windows 98 One Step at a Time, Internet Bible, 2nd Edition, Teach Yourself Office 2000, Teach Yourself Windows 2000 Professional, and Teach Yourself Windows Me. Brian spends most of his time at the keyboard, writing about personal computing. When he finds the time, he enjoys taking in the view from the home he and his wife, Darlene, built in the mountains 2,000 feet above Reno, Nevada. He tries to find the time to attend Mensa meetings whenever possible, and he has become a fairly decent gourmet cook in the recent years, too.
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Preface
Welcome to Alan Simpson's Windows XP Bible.
Professional Edition versus Home Edition
Microsoft Windows XP is the latest version of the widely used Windows operating system. This book covers both the Professional edition and Home edition of Windows XP. On the surface, the two editions
are virtually identical. Skills you learn on one edition will carry right over to the other edition. The Professional edition offers some extra tools that are of interest to professional corporate system administrators and network administrators. The Professional edition is the only one to support the use of multiple monitors, however, which might be of interest to home and small business users as well. If you're wondering which version to buy, you might want to review Chapter 34, which covers the features of the Professional edition that aren't available in the Home edition.
Who Should Read This Book
This book is written for people who are not professional computer programmers or corporate administrators. It's written for that enormous class of people commonly referred to as users in the computer biz. These are people whose job requires them to use a computer as an adjunct to their "real job," which isn't necessarily computer science. I think it's safe to say that about 99 percent of the jobs in this world fall into that non-computer science category.
Of course, plenty of people just enjoy using their PCs at home. Or, at least, would like to start enjoying that PC at home. This book is certainly not "all work and no play." You can do tons of fun and creative things with Windows XP. And this book covers them all in considerable depth. So if you're just looking to get the most from your home PC, you've definitely come to the right place.
No Experience Required
This book is not an "upgrade" book for people who already know some earlier version of Windows by heart. Even if you're new computers