path: root/doc/userguide/standard-menu-entries.docbook

<chapter id="menus">
<chapterinfo>
<authorgroup>
<author>
&Philip.Rodrigues;
</author>
</authorgroup>
</chapterinfo>


<title>The Standard Menu Entries</title>

<!-- FIXME: The text is immensely repetitive. Fix that. -->

<para>One of the main ways that you'll control programs in &kde; is
via the program's menus. They provide access to nearly everything
you'll need to do with that program. So that you can more easily
remember where things are in the menus, and to help you learn new
programs more easily, the menus have a standard layout. This means
that once you know how to open a file in one program, you know how to
open a file in any &kde; program. Let's take a look at the standard
menus:</para> <!-- TODO: Note that programs have other menu entries as well-->

<!-- Probably a good place for a screenie, but we'd need one showing
*only* the standard entries -->

<variablelist>
<title>The <guimenu>File</guimenu> Menu</title>
<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>N</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>New</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This entry will start a new, blank document that's
appropriate to the program you're using. For example, in &kate; (the
&kde; Advanced Text Editor) this entry creates a new text file.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>O</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Open...</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>The <guimenuitem>Open...</guimenuitem> menu entry
displays the &kde; <quote>Open File</quote> dialog box, where you can
choose a file to open in the program you're using. The <quote>Open
File</quote> dialog is also standardized, so it's the same for all
&kde; programs. You can find out more about using this dialog
somewhere else in this guide <!-- FIXME: real link -->.</para>
<para>You probably noticed that this menu entry had an ellipsis (...)
after the name of the entry. This means that clicking on the entry
will open a dialog box of some kind. If you make any changes in the
dialog box that appears, they won't take effect until you click on the
<guibutton>OK</guibutton> button in the dialog. You can always ignore
any changes you made, and close the dialog, by clicking on the
<guibutton>Cancel</guibutton> button.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>S</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Save</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This menu entry will save any changes you've made to
the file that you are currently working on. If this is the first time
that you've saved the file, the &kde; <quote>Save File</quote> dialog
will appear, and ask you for a name and location for the file. <!-- TODO: Point to another section for more info --></para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>



<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><guimenuitem>Save As...</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>The <guimenuitem>Save As...</guimenuitem> menu entry
will save the file you're working on with a different name. The
<quote>Save File</quote> dialog appears, and you can choose a name and
location as usual. Note that after you save the file with
<guimenuitem>Save As..</guimenuitem>, you will be working on the
<emphasis>new</emphasis> file. If you save changes, they will be saved
under the new filename. To make this a bit clearer, let's take an
example:

<orderedlist>
<listitem><para>You are working on a file called
<filename>hello.txt</filename> that contains the text <quote>Hello
World!</quote> </para>
</listitem>

<listitem><para>You use the <guimenuitem>Save As...</guimenuitem> menu
entry to save the file with the new name
<filename>newhello.txt</filename>. </para>
</listitem>

<listitem><para>You add the text <quote>Nice to see you!</quote> to
the file, and use the <guimenuitem>Save</guimenuitem> menu entry to
save these changes.</para>
</listitem>
</orderedlist>



Now, the file <filename>newhello.txt</filename> contains the text
<quote>Hello World! Nice to see you!</quote>, while the file
<filename>hello.txt</filename> contains only the text <quote>Hello
World!</quote>. 
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>P</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Print...</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This menu entry displays the &kde;
<quote>Print</quote> dialog, read to print the current
document. Youcan find more information about the options available in
this dialog in <xref linkend="printing-from-apps"/>.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>W</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Close</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This menu entry closes the current document. If you
have made any changes since you last saved the document, you will be
asked whether you want to save those changes. You can choose to
<guibutton>Save</guibutton> or <guibutton>Discard</guibutton> those
changes. If you didn't really want to close the file, just click
<guibutton>Cancel</guibutton>.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>Q</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Quit</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>Use this entry to close the program you're using. If
you have unsaved changes in any files, you will be asked whether you
want to
save them.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>



</variablelist>

<variablelist>
<title>The <guimenu>Edit</guimenu> Menu</title>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>Z</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Undo</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>Use this entry to remove the effect of the last
action you performed in the application. For example, if you deleted a
line of text, the <guimenuitem>Undo</guimenuitem> menu entry will
replace that line.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;&Shift;<keycap>Z</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Redo</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>Use this menu entry to perform the last action that
you removed with the <guimenuitem>Undo</guimenuitem> menu entry. For
example, if, as in the example above, you had replaced a deleted line
of text with <guimenuitem>Undo</guimenuitem>, the
<guimenuitem>Redo</guimenuitem> entry would redo the action of
deleting the line.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>X</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Cut</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This menu entry cuts the contents of the current
selection to the clipboard. See <xref linkend="using-the-clipboard"/>
for more information.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>C</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Copy</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This menu entry copies the contents of the current
selection to the clipboard. See <xref linkend="using-the-clipboard"/>
for more information.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>V</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Paste</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This menu entry inserts the contents of the clipboard
in the current document. The clipboard contents are inserted where the
cursor is currently positioned.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>A</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Select All</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>Use this item to select the whole of the current
document.</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul">&Ctrl;<keycap>F</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Find...</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>This menu entry displays the <guilabel>Find
Text</guilabel> dialog, which you can use to search for a particular
word or phrase in the current document.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><shortcut><keycombo action="simul"><keycap>F3</keycap>
</keycombo>
</shortcut><guimenuitem>Find Next</guimenuitem>
</menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>Use this item to find the next occurrence of the most
recent text you searched for using <guimenuitem>Find...</guimenuitem>.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

</variablelist>

<variablelist>
<title>The <guimenu>Settings</guimenu> Menu</title>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><guimenuitem>Configure Shortcuts...</guimenuitem></menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>In the dialog displayed by this menu entry, you can
change the keyboard shortcuts used by the application. See <xref
linkend="configure-shortcuts"/>.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><guimenuitem>Configure
Toolbars...</guimenuitem></menuchoice></term> 

<listitem><para>In the dialog displayed by this menu entry, you can
change which buttons appear on the application's toolbars. See <xref
linkend="configuring-toolbars"/>.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><guimenuitem>Configure Notifications...</guimenuitem></menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>In the dialog displayed by this menu entry, you can
change the notifications (sounds, error messages, &etc;)  used by the
application. See <xref
linkend="configure-notifications"/>.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

<varlistentry>
<term><menuchoice><guimenuitem>Configure <replaceable>Application</replaceable></guimenuitem></menuchoice></term>
<listitem><para>In the dialog displayed by this menu entry, you can
change settings relating to how the application works in general.
</para>
</listitem>
</varlistentry>

</variablelist>


&help.menu.documentation;

</chapter>

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