4. [4 marks] Give an example of a situation in which you would prefer to use the KDE main menu (lower-left of the screen) to start an application program, and give an example of a situation in which you would prefer to start the program by typing its name in a terminal window.

Sample solution:

You would prefer to use the KDE main menu if you did not know the exact name of the program you wished to run. This could be because you didn't remember the exact name but would be able to recognize it in a list; or it could be because you want the guidance of the structure of the menus, e.g. if you want to run a word processor and you don't know which ones are available at CDF so you want to see a list. (Of course you only had to give one example for the purposes of this exam question, not a general discussion.)

You would certainly prefer typing a program name in the terminal window if the program is not listed in the KDE main menu so you can't select it from there; we saw this with the "idle" program, and, if I recall correctly, with the "pine" program. But even if it is listed in the KDE main menu, it's probably faster to type its name in a terminal window, at least if you already have a terminal window open, so long as you remember its exact name. Furthermore, the command-line is more flexible, as you can type commands such as "cat file", whereas if the "cat" command were in the KDE main menu, you would not be able to add a file name.


(press 'back' in your web browser to get back to where you were in the exam)