On 18 Mar 99, at 12:14, Bryce, Katherine wrote:

> We work in a state government office, using Gateway E-3200's.
> Nothing fancy, but they get the job done.  Another secretary uses My
> Briefcase to stash all her work.  Recently she tried to delete a file
> from a folder within My Briefcase, but for some reason the file
> apparently converted to something called "Scrap Object."  Now she can
> neither delete the file or the folder it's in.
>
> She has renamed it, tried to change it from an archive file to a
> read-only file, tried right-clicking to Cut it as opposed to simply
> dragging it to the Recycle Bin.  Nothing removes it, though she can
> move it outside My Briefcase and then back in.

  ...

> What is a Scrap Object and how do we get rid of it?
> Is this a characteristic of My Briefcase?

  Scrap Objects, like shortcuts, are special objects that the "Desktop
Shell" deals with.  One of the neat(?) features of Windows 9x is that you
can grab a text selection out of some application, drag it out, and drop
it on the desktop.  Behind the scenes, it's probably going into a small
temporary file, but on the screen it appears as a "scrap object".  The
assumption is that this object isn't going to be around long enough to
bother giving it a unique file name (as far as the user is concerned).

  That suggests that it MAY automatically go away if dropped on another
text window, perhaps a running instance of NotePad.  It's worth a try.

  I've never seen anyone use this feature outside of Microsoft demos
from four years ago....

> Should she simply use a folder (maybe called briefcase to distinguish it?)
> to hold her work rather than My Briefcase?

  "My Briefcase" is a special shell object, too, rather than an
ordinary folder.  It's supposed to make it easier to synchronize files
between machines -- for instance, she could drag the briefcase onto a
floppy, take it home, work on her files there, bring it back the next
day, and have WIndows automatically update her files at work to reflect
what she had done at home.
  This doesn't sound like something taxpayers really feel comfortable
about state employees doing, so I suspect she's not actually using that
aspect of it.  As such, an ordinary folder -- MS Office likes to use
"My Documents" -- may be a better choice.

  I know of no special interactions between the briefcase and scrap
objects.

David G

                PCSOFT mailing list is brought to you by:
                            The NOSPIN Group
                            http://nospin.com