A file is a piece of furniture that allows you to store and organize files.
File is a term with several uses. The first meaning mentioned by the Royal Spanish Academy ( RAE ) in its dictionary refers to the furniture or container that allows the orderly storage of chips .
File , meanwhile, also has different meanings. In this case, we are interested in highlighting that a file can be a piece of cardboard or paper where certain data or information is recorded and that, due to its format and structure, it can be filed together with other documents of the same type.
The file as furniture
A file, in this way, can be a piece of furniture . The files have drawers that, when opened or moved, provide access to the files.
It is possible to say that a file is a filing cabinet : a piece of furniture whose configuration makes it useful for filing something (in this case, files). In different places, possessing such an object is a necessity .
State offices, medical offices y newspaper archives, por mencionar algunas posibilidades, son dependencias que suelen tener ficheros. Esto les permite guardar y organizar las fichas que atesoran information de importancia.
The files are useful in doctors' offices, newspaper archives and other places.
Example of use
Take the case of a dentist who works in his own office. This professional has a file for each of his patients, where their personal data and information related to their oral health appear ( extractions , interventions performed, etc.).
The dentist saves these files in a file, arranged alphabetically according to the last name . Thus, in one drawer of the file you place the cards that go from A to D , in another the cards from E to H , etc.
Thus, when a patient named María Gómez arrives at the office, the dentist approaches the file, opens the drawer that contains the cards that begin with E , F , G and H and looks for the one that corresponds to this woman .
File as a data set
The notion of file can also refer to a set of data that is interrelated . The file, in this context, is a collection of information that is arranged in a specific way and that is stored in a particular way to enable access to it.
A research file , for example , gathers the collected data and organizes it so that its consultation is simple. It also helps to understand the topic being investigated easily.
a computer file
By extension to what was expressed above, in some regions a computer file is usually called a file. These files store information that is recorded in an electronic system.
There are numerous types of files, with very different characteristics depending on the format . There are text files (such as .doc or .txt files), audio files ( .wav , .mp3 ), image files ( .png , .jpg ), etc.
To view and edit the data in these files, you need the appropriate resources, both physical (a computer, a telephone) and logical ( software ).
It can be said, in short, that a file of this kind is a set of bytes (a unit of information formed by an ordered group of 8 bits). An operating system is able to treat the file as a logical unit, interpreting and presenting the corresponding information.