Windows XP Pro The Missing Manual [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

17.6 Setting Up the Logon Process

On a Windows XP computer in a workgroup, the dialog box that greets you when you turn on the PC (or when you relinquish your turn at the PC by choosing StartLog Off) looks something like Figure 17-14. But a few extra controls let you, an administrator, set up the logon screen for either more or less securityor, put another way, less or more convenience.

Open the User Accounts program in the Control Panel, and then click "Change the way users log on or off." As shown in Figure 17-14. The second lets one person duck into his own account without forcing you to log off completely, as described in Section 17.6.2. Note that these options are relatedyou can't turn off the first without first turning off the second.

17.6.1 Use the Welcome Screen

Under normal circumstances, the logon screen presents a list of account holders when the PC is first turned on, as shown in Figure 17-14.

If you're worried about security, however, you might not even want that list to appear. If you turn off "Use the Welcome screen," each person who signs in must type both his name and password into blank boxesa very inconvenient, but secure, arrangement (Use the Welcome screen if Fast User Switching is turned on, as described in the next section.)

Figure 17-13. If you turn off the new Welcome screen, you sign into Windows XP just as Windows 2000 fans have for years. You're expected to type in your name and password and then click OK. (By the way, you also see this display if you joined a domain when installing Windows XP Pro.)

Figure 17-14), you can switch to the older, Classic logon screen: just press Ctrl+Alt+Delete. (If you're having trouble making it work, try pressing down the Alt key before the other ones.)

You may be used to using the Ctrl+Alt+Delete keystroke for summoning the Task Manager, as described in Section 6.4, but at the Welcome to Windows box, it means something else entirely.

17.6.2 Use Fast User Switching

If you've used any version of Windows before, the business about separate user accounts for everybody who uses a certain PC is old hat. One aspect of this feature, however, is dramatically new in Windows XPand extremely welcome: Fast User Switching.

17.6.2.1 How Fast User Switching works

Suppose you're signed in, and you've got things just the way you like them: You have eleven programs open in carefully arranged windows, your Web browser is downloading some gigantic file, and you're composing an important speech in Microsoft Word. Now Chris, a co-worker/family member/fellow student, wants to duck in to do a quick email check.

In the old days, you might have rewarded Chris with eye-rolling and heavy sighs, or worse. If you chose to accommodate the request, you would have had to shut down your whole ecosystem, interrupting the download, closing your windows, saving your work and exiting your programs. You would have had to log off completely.

If Fast User Switching is turned on, however, none of that is necessary. All you have to do is press the magic keystroke, Windows logo key+L. (Or, if you've misplaced your keyboard, you can choose StartLog Off, and then click Switch User in the Log Off dialog box.)

Now the Welcome screen appears, ready for the next person to sign in. Looking at the screen now, you may think you've just logged off in the usual way.

But look at it closely (): Figure 17-14 You haven't actually logged off at all. Instead, Windows has memorized the state of affairs in your accountcomplete with all open windows, documents, and programsand shoved it into the background. Chris (or whoever) can now sign in normally, do a little work, or look something up. When Chris logs out again, the Welcome screen comes back once again, at which point you can log on again. Without having to wait more than a couple of seconds, you find yourself exactly where you began, with all programs and documents still open and running.

This feature requires a good deal of memory, of course (don't even think about it on a machine with less than 96 MB of RAM). Otherwise, however, it's an enormous timesaver.