How To Show A File Extension.

On Sunday I posted a section about Downloading Files from the Internet and the extension.nfo. An extension is the bit which goes at the end of a file name, eg word.doc The extension .doc tells the computer it is a file which is opened by Microsoft Word. In the file word.exe the .exe means it is an executable file, ie when you open it it does something, in this case it opens up Microsoft Word. Picture files can have all sorts of extensions but the main file extension for a picture is .jpeg

In that post I said to open the .nfo file using Wordpad. I am not sure what computer program .nfo is meant to be opened with, but we can tell the computer whenever it sees a .nfo file we want it to be opened with Wordpad.

Many of you may not be able to "see" the extension in the file name eg .nfo, as XP doesn't show it automatically. It is an XP feature which must turned "on".

To do this go into the Control Panel Start > Control Panel.

Double Click on "Folder Options" and click on the tab "View".

Turn off the tick beside "Hide extensions for known file types"

On my computer I also have a dot next to "Show hidden files and folders" and I have removed the tick from beside "Hide protected operating files (Recommended)". However if you have a few people who use your computer you might want to leave this last option ticked.

When you close the View tab, make sure you have clicked "Apply" first.

Now you should be able to see the extension in the name of a file.