ArcView Tutorial I: A Basic Tour

Examine ArcView Screen & Tools

Your initial ArcView screen will look something like this (This image is from ArcView 3.1 ...  3.0 is almost identical):

ArcView shares most of the common characteristics of GUI (graphical user interface, like Windows instead of DOS) applications, including:

• title bar -- shows title of the program
• menu bar -- File, Edit, View, Window, Help items are standard in Windows; ArcView adds its own items
• document windows, which are smaller windows within the main application window (e.g., the "Untitled"  and "View1" window above)

ArcView has extensive material available under its Help documentation. If you have a question, use it first and ask others later.

Examine the use of Help briefly by clicking with the mouse on Help in the menu, then on Contents in the Help sub-menu. Help includes the Tutorial, which you can use later to familiarize yourself more with ArcView. For now, choose File-Exit from the Help window to return to the ArcView screen.

Three other screen components are similar to those in other windowed programs, especially graphics and mapping packages:

• button bar (upper bar, just below menu) -- buttons or tools that take effect immediately, and mostly operate on entire windows or groups of objects, e.g., all countries in a window
• tool bar (beneath button bar) -- tools that you use to operate on objects on screen, e.g., one or several roads; also gives scale and x/y location
• status bar (at bottom of ArcView screen) -- describes tools or actions;

Demonstrate for yourself the use of the status bar by moving the cursor over one of the buttons or tools. You should see a short description of the effect of using the button/tool.

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