Installing Programs You need to install a program once you have downloaded it. Zip files need to be decompressed first (see above). Exe files are not compressed and can be installed straight away.
To install the program:
- Find the program in My Computer, Windows Explorer, File manager etc.
- Double click the name of the program.
If the program is an installation program, it will start to install itself. In the process it will probably create a new folder for itself on your hard drive, create an icon for the program, and (in Windows95) add itself to the Start Menu.
If it is not an installation program, the program will simply run itself. In that case you may want to create an icon for it. To do this, create a shortcut to the program (in Windows 95) or drag the program into the Program manager (Windows 3.1).
Double click the icon to run the program. You may need to give the program some extra information before it can run. Read any "Read Me" or "About…" etc files that came with the program to see if this is so. Another place to look is the help menu on the program's menu bar.
A lot of software is available at http://www.tucows.com. For a list of software sites from the authors of the Dummies books, see http://net.gurus.com/software.