You can view the files and folders in a desktop window in any of four ways: as icons; as a single, tidy list; in a series of neat columns; or as giant document icons that you flip through like they’re CDs in a record-store bin (called Cover Flow view). Some of these are sort of like the corresponding views in Windows; others, not so much. Figure 2-3 shows the four different views.

Every window remembers its view settings independently. You might prefer to look over your Applications folder in list view (because it’s crammed with files and folders), but you may prefer to view the Pictures folder in icon or Cover Flow view, where the larger icons serve as previews of the photos.

To switch a window from one view to another, just click one of the four corresponding icons in the window’s toolbar, as shown in Figure 2-3.

Figure 2-3. From the top: the same window in icon view, list view, column view, and Cover Flow view. Very full folders are best navigated in list or column views, but you may prefer to view emptier folders in icon or Cover Flow views, because larger icons are easier to preview and click. Remember that in any view (icon, list, column, or Cover Flow), you can highlight an icon by typing the first few letters of its name. In icon, list, or Cover Flow views, you can also press Tab to highlight the next icon (in alphabetical order), or Shift-Tab to highlight the previous one.

You can also switch views by choosing View→as Icons (or View→as Columns, or View→as List, or View→as Cover Flow), which can be handy if you’ve hidden the toolbar. Or, for less mousing and more hardbodied efficiency, press -1, -2, -3, or -4 for icon, list, column, or Cover Flow views, respectively.

The following pages cover each of these views in greater detail.