Parent and Child Directories

The image shown here is a common way of representing directories.

We can say that the Images and Util directories are in the Dell directory. Or we could say that Dell is the parent directory of both Images and Util. Whichever terminology we use it means the same thing. It means we would have to "open up" the Dell directory to see either Images or Util. Or you could think of it as travelling through Dell to get to Images or Util, which helps when we study the idea of a directory's path.

Using the "parent and child" approach, we also gain the ability to stretch a bit farther by talking about "grandchild" and "grandparent" directories.

The grandparent of "_borders" is "FrontPage Webs".

(FYI: the quotes are used to stress that although a space and the _ are used everything in the quotes belongs to the directory's name. Generally speaking, it is better not to use such characters when you name your directories or files. This is covered in connection with syntax and the nature of identifiers.)