The Desktop

Your first view of GNOME will look something like Figure 1-1.

Double-click on any of the following items on your desktop to start or open the associated link:

• Launchers -- Icons which lead to websites (such as the Red Hat, Inc. website at http://www.redhat.com/), support documentation on your installed system and more.

• Folders -- Containing contents of directories, launchers to documentation or applications. The folder Home directory, for example, leads to your specific directory in /home on the system (for example, if your login directory was bob, the Home directory folder on the desktop would lead to your login directory, /home/bob).

You may also see a warning dialog urging caution, if you logged in as root, because you hadn't created your user account during your installation of Red Hat Linux. Click on the OK button to dismiss this warning dialog (take the warning to heart, however…).

Double-click on a launcher to start the associated file (see Figure 1-2). If it's an application, it will start; if it's a directory, it will open and if it's data, that data will be displayed in its associated program (a spreadsheet, for example, will open in Gnumeric).