In the latter case, don't be surprised if you find the entire Microsoft Office suite displayed within a screen no bigger than a matchbook. Is this a phase? That's highly doubtful. The market for these devices extends from the highly technical and professional all the way to the pre-teen socialite. The product crosses all demographics and thanks to decreasing costs - it sees no economic boundaries as well. So if Microsoft Edit was in a directory or folder named "Process," you could start the program by typing, "C:>process\edit.com" Then, and only then would the program load up for use. This is a small command, but just imagine if you had a program that was deeply nested within a series of folder. So even though your co-worker may have emailed a funny video, it's no more safe to open than a video downloaded from a complete stranger. Be safe and scan each and every file you download from the Internet or receive through email regardless of where it came from. 4. Create a barrier between your computer and prying eyes. But even still, operating systems have extended onto to non-computer devices such as game consoles, portable music players, and PDAs. Regardless of the device, the operating system installed onto it serves the same purpose across the board: to enable user-to-hardware communication. When you think about upgrading your computer to a new operating system, be careful to make sure that you have the necessary hardware components. Using Computers It's Not Rocket Science These days it's strange to hear people say, "I'm just not computer literate," as computers have evolved from archaic scientific calculators to simple point-and-click type machines. We suspect that today's "computer illiterates" are people who haven't taken the time to experiment with such a machine. "1 In the past, we would be comfortable in telling new computer users not to worry about viruses and that catching a computer virus is rare. Today, that would be some of the worst advice we could give anyone. As reported in countless news reports, computer viruses are rampant and they're extremely worrisome.