The Send To command is one of Windows' semi-buried treasures. It's a shorthand method of copying a file or group of files to another location on your computer system, and you'll find the command lurking on the context menu which appears when you right-click a file or folder on the Desktop or in Windows Explorer.

On the surface, Send To sounds like a fairly limited function. But when you start fiddling with its capabilities, you'll find it's one of the handiest shortcuts built into Windows.

When you select the Send To command it provides a list of destinations to which you can copy the selected file or folder. The default list is sparse (and differs with the version of Windows you use), with options to send a file to a floppy disk, create a shortcut to the file on your Desktop, e-mail it to someone, or send it to your Briefcase. Even those limited options provide some inkling of how useful Send To can be.

The real revelation comes when you realize that the Send To list is completely customizable. You can add any number of destinations to the Send To list: commonly used folders on your hard disk, other computers on a network, printers, applications. In the latter case, when you send a file to an application, the program launches and the file is opened within that program.