Windows 2000 Administration in a Nutshell

Name

Display

Synopsis

Configures the video display.

To Launch

• Start → Settings → Control Panel → Display

• Right-click on desktop → Properties

• Command interpreter → control desk.cpl

Description

Display opens a property sheet that typically has six tabs, unless the driver for your video card has added additional tabs or removed/renamed existing ones. The key features on the standard tabs are:

Background

Selects a bitmap or other image file as your screen background. If you have Active Desktop enabled, you can also choose an HTML file or define a pattern.

Screen Saver

Enables a screensaver and configures power settings (see Power Options in this chapter).

Appearance

Chooses a scheme for displaying colors and fonts on your desktop. You can also create your own custom schemes.

Web

Enables Active Desktop so you can display web content directly on the desktop. Once enabled, you can add or remove web content from your Active Desktop, make the content available when your Internet connection is offline, download fresh content on a scheduled basis or when you choose Synchronize from the Tools menu of My Computer, specify the number of links deep the content should be downloaded, set a limit to how much disk space will be used for the content, specify which kinds of web content to download, and configure an email address to notify when content changes.

Tip

Active Desktop is a powerful feature but is rarely enabled in an enterprise environment. It also seems to be waning in popularity, as evidenced by the ...