The Adult View
For the longest time, you had to jump through all sorts of hoops to see the full file names on Mac computers. My mother was a Mac user long before I was and figured if she couldn't see the file extension, it couldn't be all that important. My sister pretty much felt the same way. I hated seeing two otherwise intelligent women so dependent on a computer knowing more than they did.
A file extension is the last part of a file name, the part after the dot (like book.txt), and the reason it is so important is because it is what tells your computer what kind of file it is, and what software will need to open in order to view or edit the file. Even when you can't see this part of the file name, your computer can. This is why you see different little icons next to the file names. These are showing you visually that your computer knows what kind of file it is, and it has something that will open it.
What do file extensions have to do with your Kindle? A lot! If you can't see the file extensions, you won't know if it is a .mobi, .txt, .prc, or .azw file - all file extensions for files that can be used directly on your Kindle without any conversion. I have no idea why the brains who invented the operating systems for Macs and PCs decided to not show file extensions as the default settings for both systems - like we're too stupid to have that information? I call it the Adult View. It is a great tool to have in your arsenal... knowledge.
View file extensions on Mac:
I'm not sure how this was done on older Macs, but the newer ones (Tiger operating system and newer) seem to understand how valuable knowing what the file extension of a file is and made it quite easy to set up so you will see them from then on.
While Mac OS X hides file extensions by default (just like Windows), you can choose to show all file extensions (for all files) by clicking on the desktop to activate the Finder if is not already active and select "Preferences..." from the Finder menu.
Then click the Advanced tab and make sure to put a check next to the words Show all file extensions
To show the extension of a single file, select it and choose Show Info from the File menu. choose Name & Extension from the pop-up menu and uncheck the Hide Extension checkbox.
Voila!
Note: It is very important to not change file extensions unless you have a very good reason. Changing the extension can (and usually does) make the file unusable. This means if you need to rename a file for any reason, be sure to leave the file extension part alone. Unless you have a very good reason, and you know exactly what you are doing, everything to the right of the dot is off limits. Changing a file extension could confuse your computer and cause the file to not open at all. Changing a file extension does not convert a file to whatever you want it to be. It just changes the way your computer looks at it.
Note: It is very important to not change file extensions unless you have a very good reason. Changing the extension can (and usually does) make the file unusable. This means if you need to rename a file for any reason, be sure to leave the file extension part alone. Unless you have a very good reason, and you know exactly what you are doing, everything to the right of the dot is off limits. Changing a file extension could confuse your computer and cause the file to not open at all. Changing a file extension does not convert a file to whatever you want it to be. It just changes the way your computer looks at it.
Common File Extensions:
.txt - text files
.doc - Word Document
.rtf - Rich Text format (a little fancier than plain text)
.jpg - image file (could be a photo)
File types (extensions) your Kindle likes:
.azw (native Kindle file)
.txt
.mobi
.prc
.pdb
.pdf (not as pretty as it would be on your computer screen, but viewable)
Ask Mrs. Wizard: Please send me a personal email (mrswizard@mrswizard.com) if you have any questions. I answer all my emails and am more than happy to help any time I can. Your questions mean a lot to me, and may even inspire an article that will help others and make this a more valuable resource to anyone who reads it.
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