Common Software Features
Introduction
The variety of software programs used by the Department of Defense and the
U. S. Navy make it impractical to discuss each program and undesirable to
select only one program for inclusion in this chapter.
There are, however,
several features and options common to a majority of software programs.
There is no attempt to identify individual programs in this section. Your
software may or may not have any of these features.
Cursers and
pointers
Cursers and pointers indicate a current position on the screen. Common
cursers are blinking horizontal or vertical bars and are usually moved by the
keyboard or mouse. Pointers are usually associated with the mouse and
appear as arrowheads, trailing arrowheads, crosshairs, hourglasses, I-beams,
prohibiting circles, hands, and sometimes bars and cross hairs with
directional arrows.
Figure 8-2 shows a variety of common cursers and pointers.
Figure 8-2.—Common cursers and pointers.
BLINKING BAR:
A blinking, heavy-weighted bar usually precedes text.
Its place is to the left of the next character. A mouse (rapid action input
device) pointer may also appear on the screen, but as a non-blinking I-beam.
The I-beam moves as the mouse moves.
The blinking bar moves by
operating the keyboard, curser control keys, or by repositioning the bar with
the mouse and clicking to anchor it in place.
ARROWHEADS and TRAILING ARROWHEADS:
Arrowheads appear
when you use a mouse to move around the screen in graphics software
programs.
The tip of the arrowhead must touch the section or item you
intend to alter. If the image of the arrowhead tail lingers, it is said to be
trailing.
CROSSHAIRS: Crosshairs representing the curser or pointer appear when
using the draw feature of graphics programs or desktop publishing programs.
Crosshairs allow more precise positioning by focusing on a picture element
(pixel).
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