Absolute Beginner's Guide to Microsoft Windows® XP Media Center®

Organizing Your Pictures

My Pictures provides several ways for simply and effectively organizing your image

collections at a touch of the button. These include tabs that do the following:

■ Sort by name

■ Sort by date

■ Change subdirectories

Let’s look at how these work, and how they can

make even a very large collection of images

easily accessible.

Sort by Name

Sort by Name is the My Pictures default method

of sorting your images: alphabetical order (see

Figure 18.2). My Pictures applies this sorting

method to either folder or thumbnail views. If

you have named your photos and folders indi-

vidually using descriptive titles (and this is

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FIGURE 18.1

The folder view

allows you to see

multiple folders,

or collections of

images, as well

as single images

stored on your

hard drive.

tip

My Pictures will remember

where you last looked for

image files when you exit to

the Media Center main

menu. It will automatically go

back to the same subdirec-

tory, or to Other Media,

the next time you use My Pictures.

Sort by Date

Selecting the Sort by Date tab changes the pecking order of

your images, instantly rearranging them into chronological

order. Note that the date now appears in the

beginning of the title under each photo,

allowing only four or five characters of the

image file’s name to be displayed (see

Figure 18.3).

This sorting method is preferable if you are

viewing the results of a typical outing with your

digital camera. Similar to scrolling through a

set of prints (or perusing a “contact sheet,” if

you happen to be photographically inclined),

the pictures are arranged in the same order in

which you snapped them.

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ABSOLUTE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO WINDOWS XP MEDIA CENTER

FIGURE 18.2

This shows a typ-

ical folder full of

photos, placed in

alphabetical

order by using

the default Sort

by Name feature.

recommended if you want to be able to find images easily as your collection grows),

and if you tend to categorize your images by subject matter, you’ll find the Sort by

Name feature very useful.

If no picture files are

stored in the subdirectory

you have chosen, or if

no removable media is

available when you select

the Other Media tab, Media Center

will display the error message

shown in Figure 18.4.

caution

Changing Subdirectories

As mentioned in Chapter 17 (see the section “Storing your Photos”), My Pictures is

set up to look in only three places for image files: the My Pictures subdirectory, the

Shared Pictures subdirectory, and on Other Media, meaning removable storage

devices, such as memory cards. Select the appropriate tab to locate your pictures.

Linking to Other Image Locations

What if you have images stored elsewhere on your hard disk, in a place where My

Pictures stubbornly refuses to look? Here’s a workaround that allows you to create a

link to your alternative image location.

For the sake of this example, let’s assume that you have image files stored in your

My Documents directory, and you want to access them from within the My Pictures

interface, but you don’t want to actually change the physical location of the image

files. Just do the following:

1. Minimize Media Center and click on the Start menu in Windows XP.

2. Click on the My Pictures folder icon to view the content of the My Pictures

directory (see Figure 18.5).

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FIGURE 18.3

This thumbnail

view of photos

in My Pictures

shows how the

same images (as

in Figure 18.2)

appear when

you’re using the

Sort by Date tab.

3. Right-click inside the contents window. Click on New, then Shortcut (see

Figure 18.6).

4. The Create Shortcut Wizard will open and prompt you to type the location of

the item you want to link to.

5. Click on Browse, select My Documents, and click OK (see Figure 18.7).

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ABSOLUTE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO WINDOWS XP MEDIA CENTER

FIGURE 18.4

If you select a

location to

search for image

files, and no

pictures are

stored there,

you’ll see this

error message.

FIGURE 18.5

This view is use-

ful for exploring

and organizing

the contents of

your My Pictures

subdirectory.

6. Select Next in the wizard, and then click Finish. Close the My Pictures

contents window.

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FIGURE 18.6

This view shows

the location of

the Create

Shortcut Wizard.

FIGURE 18.7

Using the Browse

feature in the

Create Shortcut

Wizard, you can

navigate and

link to any loca-

tion on your

Media Center.