File Extentions Review

What Are File Extentions

learn about files extensions here

Learning and Understanding Files Extensions Names

The computer science world is a very complicated and extremely detailed world that not very many people understand it.  It takes a special mind to be able to maneuver in it.  There are far more people that don't understand it, but use computers on a daily basis.  To someone who studies computer science, something like files extension names are a very simple and easy thing.  They might argue that a kindergartner can understand it.  To the average Joe, that term means absolutely nothing to them, it might as well have been said in Greek.  Now, you can finally learn what exactly it is, where you will most likely see it, and also some examples so you can easily spot one.

The basic idea behind a files extensions name is that it is really just a suffix at the end of a file name.  It might seem like just letters to you, but to someone in the computer science field, it will tell them what format the file is saved in.  By knowing that information, they will know what programs they need to be able to run or open the file.  Depending on what operating system your computer runs on, the rules for the extension name will be different.  The most common operating systems are DOS and OS/2.  In these systems, the file name can only be three characters long.

As mentioned before, you will most likely see these files extensions names in computers that operation on DOS, OS/2.  The most common place you will also see these is in Microsoft's Window programs.  Most people will experience computer issues and need to call someone at a help desk to help them clean up their problem.  When the tech person has you on the phone, they often ask you to go to an icon labeled "My Computer" and have you open up different files and such.  They ar most likely looking for certain files with these extensions.  People often are able to find what they are told to find and run those programs and they don't even ask what they are or what they do.

Many of the very common files extensions names you will see in your own computer are EXE or COM, or even CMD.  If you see any of those three codes, you will learn that these are files that are called executable files, or meaning that they will some type of program.  These files can actually do something on your computer.  The other two common codes are TXT and HTML.  These two codes tell you that the file contains some type of text that you can open up in a word processing program or in a web browser.  Even knowing those five basic codes will help you have a very basic and small understanding of computer science.

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