An icon for a file, folder, or program looks pretty much like a shortcut, except that the shortcut has an arrow wedged in its lower reaches. And double-clicking on a shortcut does pretty much the same thing as double-clicking on an icon: starts a program or loads a file or folder.
But a shortcut is only a servant of sorts. After you double-click on the shortcut, it runs over to the program, file, or folder that the shortcut represents and kickstarts that program, file, or folder into action.
You could do the same thing yourself by rummaging through your computer's folders, finding the program, file, or folder you're after, and personally double-clicking on its icon to bring it to life. But creating a shortcut so that you don't have to rummage so much is often more convenient.
If you delete a shortcut -- the icon with the little arrow -- you're not doing any real harm. You're just firing the servant that fetched things for you, probably creating more work for yourself in the process.
If you accidentally delete a shortcut, you can pull it out of the Recycle Bin, just like anything else that's deleted in Windows
I like the "fire the servant"!!! LOL
But thanks for this bit of info Christo !lsmile
Nice. Of course Hardlinks (only available in Win2K and XP upwards) are another kettle of fish altogether... They can
be useful when you want to represent data from several
different disks as residing in the same folder (for the purposes
of creating a large complete share, for example).
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