My desk at work looks as if someone dumped the entire stock of a secondhand bookstore on it. At home, entering my office requires physical agility and great courage. You have to hop, slither and jump to get from the doorway to my desk.

So today's topic --- organization --- requires more than the usual amount of hypocrisy to write.

Luckily, we'll talk about organizing the data on your hard disk, not the stuff on your desk. I'm a slob in the real world but easily qualify for the Good Housekeeping Seal when it comes to keeping things straight inside my computer.

I can find almost any file within seconds, even if it's one I haven't used in a while. When it comes to locating a picture, I'm better than the average librarian. So I have a completely straight face as I tell you I can help you better organize your data.

Files and folders

All computer filing is built around the notion of filing cabinets and folders. Years ago, when I started messing with computers, we called them directories and subdirectories. The only things that really changed over the years are the names.

We'll start with a bad example. It is furnished by my real estate agent wife. Almost everything she saves in her computer --- whether it's a photo of a house, a real estate contract or a birthday card she designed on the computer --- is stored in a single folder. So she has to plow through thousands of files to find something.

Worse yet, the names she assigns to files and photos often fail to give a clue as to what's in the file.

On my own computer, I create separate folders for almost any topic. My file names tell me what's in the file and also include the date the file was created. Let's talk about how to do that.

We'll start with photographs. I have a single folder for all pictures. Think of that folder as the filing cabinet. Within that cabinet, there are folders organized by subject matter and date.

Here's an example: If I want to see the pictures from our beach trip to California in 2004, I simply click open the one labeled CALIF04. So the name of the folder tells me about the subject matter as well as when the pictures were taken. If I wanted to be even more exact, I could have included the month and day.

I have a lot of word-processing documents in my computer. Again, there is a master folder (the one I think of as a filing cabinet) and then a series of folders arranged by topic and date (the ones I think of as file folders). And there are folders within folders.

For instance, in the one labeled "work" there are folders inside with labels like "computercrime," "spam," "column" and "ideas." Once inside the folders, the word-processing documents themselves all use the date as part of the name of the document. That way, if I want to find the latest draft of some work project, I can go right to it.

It's the same with my e-mail program. I have created folders so that when I get an e-mail I can file it away. Labels there include "neighbors," "work," "photography," "personal," etc.

I seldom delete an e-mail. There have been plenty of times when I've used these folders to find the e-mail address of an old friend, or to dig out a tip sent to me by a reader.

Web navigation aids

Like most 13-year-olds, I have a lot of interests. And I often use the Web to research those interests. So I have an elaborate system of folders for the bookmarks (some people call them favorites) created using the Web browser.

For instance, when I decided to buy an HDTV, I did a huge amount of research on the Web. So I created a folder for my HDTV bookmarks. Then, inside that folder I created subfolders with topic names such as "HDTVchannels," "reviews," "accessories" and so on.

That's just one example. There are folders that include restaurant reviews, ham radio information, computer stuff, etc.

Having my Web searches organized means that I seldom have to repeat a long search the next time I'm researching HDTV or looking for a good Italian restaurant. I can just click open the right folder and find what I need in seconds.

Doing things my way requires you to spend a bit more time creating folders and file names. But it'll pay off in the time you save searching.

I'm glad my wife wasn't peeking over my shoulder while I wrote this column. I am pretty sure that, right about now, she would say: "If you spent a little more time hanging your coat in the closet and filing the bills and letters on top of your desk, things would be better for you in the real world, too."

tecbud@ajc.com