The reason for the change has to do with the improved support for multiple users that XP provides.
Each user has her own My Documents folder, which prevents multiple users from overcrowding a single
My Documents folders. Each user also has his own desktop, and Start menu settings, Favorites, and so
forth, and these too are stored within the user’s folder.
These changes are pretty transparent when you’re working in Windows. Normally there’s really no need
for you to ever dig around in any subfolders within Documents and Settings. You can get to your own
My Documents folder from many places on the desktop and within Explorer. There’s really no need to
“drill down” to the folder via the Documents and Settings folder.
Note If you attempt to view the contents of such a drive while it’s empty, you’ll
just see a little message asking you to put a disk into the drive. When you
insert the disk, the message disappears and Explorer displays the
contents of the disk.
You rarely need to use My Computer to use a CD-ROM or DVD disk. Most of these have an autostart
capability. Just insert the disk into its drive and wait a few seconds for something to appear on-screen. If
nothing happens, you can open the icon for the drive in My Computer. Be aware, however, that doing so
might automatically start some program on the CD, in which case you won’t be taken to the traditional
view of the drive’s contents.
If you do get to a traditional view of the drive’s contents, and you’re looking to install a program that’s on
that CD, you can probably just click (or double-click) the icon for the file named SETUP.EXE on that
disk. Refer to Chapter 16 for detailed information in installing new programs.
Introducing My Documents
Even though most of the folders on your hard disk contain still more folders and files that you probably
don’t want to mess with, there is one folder on your hard disk that’s especially reserved for you and your
personal files. Its name is My Documents, and you can quickly get to it using any of the following
methods,
Click the Start button and choose My Documents.
Or, if you’re already in an Explorer window, choose My Documents from Other Places in the
Explorer bar at the left side of that window.