What is Finder and it's function ?

Uh... Windows Explorer (not Internet Explorer) IS always open too. Like Finder, (except for the "lit up" dock icon) you just don't see it unless you have a folder open, but the process explorer.exe is always running.

The Finder is the default file manager used on Mac OS and OS X operating systems. It is responsible for the overall user-management of files, disks, network volumes and the launching of other applications. Finder acts like the shell on other operating systems, but using a graphical user interface, and is described in its 'About' window as The Macintosh Desktop Experience. It was introduced with the very first Macintosh computer, and also existed as part of GS/OS on theApple IIGS. It underwent a complete rewrite with Apple's switch to a UNIX-based OS in OS X.

The Finder is the first application a user interacts with after logging into a Mac. One could compare it to Windows Explorer in Microsoft Windows, the Tracker in BeOS, Nautilus inGNOME, and Dolphin or the file management aspect of Konqueror in KDE.

The Finder maintains a view of the file system that is rendered using a desktop metaphor – that is, the files and folders are represented as appropriate icons, volumes are displayed on the desktop, and there is a trash can (on the Dock in OS X, on the desktop in previous versions) to which files can be dragged to mark them for deletion.

The biggest difference between Finder & Windows Explorer is that Finder is always open, except for developers who wish to troubleshoot situations with it. The other big difference is that Finder has never been a web browser in its own right where you could type a web address.

An interesting facet of Mac OS X's Finder starting with Mac OS X 10.3 was that Find File command became separate from the Sherlock application. And with Mac OS X 10.4, Apple chose to replace Find File with an index based file search engine adding content search in the process, known as Spotlight. Finder's Find File since Mac OS X 10.4 has been integrated with Spotlight's built-in search. The downside is that individual file searching by name became slower, unless you used a third party utility such as FindAnyFile. Windows 7 I've found has become more index based than Windows XP, as I can no longer use it to search for Content from a folder window directly when it comes to Acrobat PDF files.

A bit of history, back in System 6 days in the 1980s, Apple added Multifinder for multitasking, but then in System 7 integrated it in early 1990s with the Finder.

If you google/Bing/etc "mac OS Finder" you'll get lots of info that none of us have time to type here.

Its basically the graphical interface that allqwos you to browse directories, copy files, open files, etc. etc.

Grant

"Finder" is the (beter named) equivalent of Windows Explorer. As it was explained to me, Windows lets you "explore" for things, Mac lets you "find" them.