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Both Windows 98 and Windows 95 with the Desktop Update portion of Internet Explorer 4.x installed provide a handy way to take a quick peek at the contents of files in common Web formats (HTML, GIF, JPEG, and so on): Just make sure As Web Page is checked on the View menu of any Explorer or folder window. Then select a file to see the preview in the column on the left.

Using this Web-view mode does require you to select one file at a time. Fortunately, you can make all the files in a folder appear as previews to help you quickly find what you need. This feature is especially useful if you work with multiple graphics files or want to visually identify the Web sites in your Favorites folder. If only Microsoft hadn't made this feature so hard to find.

Navigate to one of the folders in your Favorites folder (it's located in the Windows folder by default). Right-click a vacant area of the folder window and choose Properties. Check the "Enable thumbnail view" box at the bottom, and click OK. Right-click an empty area again, and this time choose Refresh. If you don't see thumbnails at once, choose View, Thumbnails. (If you don't see a Thumbnails command on the menu, close and reopen the folder.) Unless you recently visited the sites, your thumbnails may appear as a series of nearly empty boxes. To fix that, connect to the Internet and press Ctrl-A to select all thumbnails within the folder. Right-click one of these thumbnails and choose Refresh Thumbnail. (If you use this technique on a folder of GIF or JPEG files, you don't need to connect to the Net.)

What's up with Thumbs.db. If a folder's options are set to let you view all files, you may see a new file called Thumbs.db in that folder. This is the folder's thumbnails database. If you don't see Thumbs.db, choose View, Folder Options, click the View tab, select "Show all files" in the Advanced settings list, and click OK. Each folder with a thumbnail view will have its own Thumbs.db file; and the more files a folder contains, the larger its Thumbs.db file will be. So if you're getting tight on disk space, it pays to keep track of how much space these files occupy. To see their cumulative size, choose Start, Find, Files or Folders, type Thumbs.db in the Name field, choose Local hard drives for "Look in," and click Find Now. Press Ctrl-A to select all the found files, and press Alt-Enter to display a Properties dialog box that shows the total disk space consumed.

If thumbnails are crowding your hard drive, consider changing the View menu setting to something other than Thumbnails. Then display the Properties for the folder as explained above, and uncheck "Enable thumbnail view." Doing this deletes the Thumbs.db file for that folder. Repeat for as many folders as desired.

Try to remember. Forget which folders you enabled for thumbnail viewing? Search for Thumbs.db as described earlier. The folders listed in the Find window provide a quick reminder. (The Find window won't, however, show folders that have the feature enabled but contain no thumbnails--such as an empty folder or one containing only unsupported file formats.)

Accidents will happen. If you accidentally delete a Thumbs.db file, don't worry. Windows will re-create the file and the thumbnails the next time you view the folder. If they don't appear then, use the Refresh Thumbnail command explained earlier.

Wrapping woes. Often, folders with thumbnails align improperly across the folder window when you resize the window. Align them properly by pressing F5.

Deletion dilemma. In Win 98, if you delete a folder containing thumbnails and then empty the Recycle Bin, you may get an "Access denied" error message saying that the disk may be full or write-protected, or that the file in question is in use. Microsoft confirms this bug in its KnowledgeBase. To avoid this error, close Windows Explorer before emptying the Recycle Bin.

Go pro. Though the thumbnail view greatly simplifies the task of managing image files, anyone who handles lots of images should consider getting a dedicated utility for handling the job. PolyView, my favorite, maintains the familiar Explorer-like interface but lets you choose the size of the thumbnails, gives you more options for sorting and managing files, and includes many basic image-editing features. PolyView is available as $25 shareware. Download it from FileWorld or from PolyBytes Software..