Since most web pages are static documents with little interactivity, Microsoft created a programing language, called ActiveX, to remedy this situation. ActiveX "controls" promise to make the web-surfing experience comparable to that of highly produced CD-ROMS, where you can listen to music, watch animation and video clips, and interact with the program.

Even web sites have a place that they call home, also known as a URL. It usually looks something like this: http://cable-lynx.net

The space on the top of your browser that lets you type in the place a web site is located, or its address, and takes you there. When you browse to a web site you can look in the address bar to see its address.

Any software which serves banner ads or pop-up ads to you while in use. It is sometimes installed in freeware or shareware which you download from the nets, and provides one more channel for advertisers to reach you. Some adware will also track your files, net usage, and software and report it back to advertisers to help them channel relevant ads to you.

(acceptable use policy) A definition of content and uses permitted on a site or network as conditions of using that site or network. AUP are often stated for ISPs, networks, organizations, and universities.

Buttons in most browsers' Tool Button Bar, upper left. BACK returns you to the document previously viewed. FORWARD goes to the next document, after you go BACK. If it seems like the BACK button does not work, check if you are in a new browser window; some Web pages are programmed to open a new window when you click on some links. Each window has its own short-term search HISTORY. If this does not work, right click on the BACK button to select the page you want (some Web pages are programmed to disable BACK).

A high-speed line or series of connections that forms a major pathway within a network. The term is relative as a backbone in a small network will likely be much smaller than many non-backbone lines in a large network.

How much stuff you can send through a connection. Usually measured in bits-per-second (bps.) A full page of English text is about 16,000 bits. A fast modem can move about 57,000 bits in one second. Full-motion full-screen video would require roughly 10,000,000 bits-per-second, depending on compression.

Blind Carbon Copy. Unlike the Cc option (Carbon Copy), when the Bcc address option is selected in e-mail, other addressees do not see the Bcc address. This is a good way to help keep address of your friends and family anonymous when forwarding emails to others.

(Binary DigIT) A single digit number in base-2, in other words, either a 1 or a zero. The smallest unit of computerized data. Bandwidthis usually measured in bits-per-second.

(weB LOG) A blog is basically a journal that is available on the web. The activity of updating a blog is "blogging" and someone who keeps a blog is a "blogger." Blogs are typically updated daily using software that allows people with little or no technical background to update and maintain the blog. Postings on a blog are almost always arranged in chronological order with the most recent additions featured most prominently. It is common for blogs to be available as RSS feeds.

Way in browsers to store in your computer direct links to sites you wish to return to. Netscape, Mozilla, and Firefox use the term Bookmarks. The equivalent in Internet Explorer (IE) is called a "Favorite." To create a bookmark, click on BOOKMARKS or FAVORITES, then ADD. Or left-click on and drag the little bookmark icon to the place you want a new bookmark filed. To visit a bookmarked site, click on BOOKMARKS and select the site from the list. You can download a bookmark file to diskette and install it on another computer. In most browsers now, you can do this with an Import... and Export... set of commands which can be found under FILE or in the Manage Bookmarks window's FILE.

(Bits-Per-Second) A measurement of how fast data is moved from one place to another. A 56K modem can move about 57,000 bits per second.

Generally refers to connections to the Internet with much greater bandwidth than you can get with a modem. There is no specific definition of the speed of a "broadband" connection but in general any Internet connection via Cable-TV may be considered a broadband connection.

To follow links in a page, to shop around in a page, exploring what's there, a bit like window shopping. The opposite of browsing a page is searching it. When you search a page, you find a search box, enter terms, and find all occurrences of the terms throughout the site. When you browse, you have to guess which words on the page pertain to your interests. Searching is usually more efficient, but sometimes you find things by browsing that you might not find because you might not think of the "right" term to search by.

A Client program (software) that is used to look at various kinds of Internet resources.

A set of Bits that represent a single character. Usually there are 8 Bits in a Byte, sometimes more, depending on how the measurement is being made.

In browsers, "cache" is used to identify a space where web pages you have visited are stored in your computer. A copy of documents you retrieve is stored in cache. When you use GO, BACK, or any other means to revisit a document, the browser first checks to see if it is in cache and will retrieve it from there because it is much faster than retrieving it from the server.

Capital letters (upper case) retrieve only upper case. Most search tools are not case sensitive or only respond to initial capitals, as in proper names. It is always safe to key all lower case (no capitals), because lower case will always retrieve upper case.

(Common Gateway Interface) A set of rules that describe how a Web Server communicates with another piece of software on the same machine, and how the other piece of software (the ?CGI program?) talks to the web server. Any piece of software can be a CGI program if it handles input and output according to the CGI standard.

A form of spam which asks you to distribute the letter to many other people. They are against the policies of most Internet service providers, and almost always are hoaxes. Many of them promise quick ways to make money, usually on the basis of pyramid or Ponzi schemes, which are illegal. Some make pie-in-the-sky promises, for example, that Bill Gates will give everyone $1000 for just helping test his new mail distribution scheme. Many of them prey on your sympathy and tell stories of a sick child who has asked that word be spread about the illness by chain letters. They may involve the Make-a-Wish Foundation, which states that they support no chain letters. Many report a virus warning, and ask you tell everyone about it. The virus warnings are invariably hoaxes. None of these purposes are legitimate.

An electronic space, typically a website or a section of an online service, where people can go to communicate online in real time. Chat rooms are often organized around specific interests, such as small business owners, gardening, etc.

A software program that is used to contact and obtain data from a Server software program on another computer, often across a great distance. EachClient program is designed to work with one or more specific kinds of Server programs, and each Server requires a specific kind of Client. A Web Browser is a specific kind of Client.

Most often used to refer to having a server that belongs to one person or group physically located on an Internet-connected network that belongs to another person or group. Usually this is done because the server owner wants their machine to be on a high-speed Internet connection and/or they do not want the security risks of having the server on thier own network.

(Coaxial Cable) A type of cable which contains two conductors, one inside and the other outside around it, separated by an insulating layer. They share the same axis, giving the cable its name co-axial. It is the same kind of cable that brings cable TV into your house.

The most common meaning of "Cookie" on the Internet refers to a piece of information sent by a Web Server to a Web Browser that the Browser software is expected to save and to send back to the Server whenever the browser makes additional requests from the Server. Depending on the type of Cookie used, and the Browsers' settings, the Browser may accept or not accept the Cookie, and may save the Cookie for either a short time or a long time. Cookies might contain information such as login or registration information, online "shopping cart" information, user preferences, etc. When a Server receives a request from a Browser that includes a Cookie, the Server is able to use the information stored in the Cookie. For example, the Server might customize what is sent back to the user, or keep a log of particular users' requests. Cookies are usually set to expire after a predetermined amount of time and are usually saved in memory until the Browser software is closed down, at which time they may be saved to disk if their "expire time" has not been reached. Cookies do not read your hard drive and send your life story to the CIA, but they can be used to gather more information about a user than would be possible without them.

The technique of copying text from one location or file to another. If the text in the original location is deleted, it is called cut-and-paste. Whether cutting or copying, the process begins by positioning the cursor at one end of the text to be copied, and clicking and dragging to the other end to highlight the text. Or if you want to copy the entire text on a page, use Edit/Select All or press Control and the letter A simultaneously.

(Cascading Style Sheet) A standard for specifying the appearance of text and other elements. CSS was developed for use with HTML in Web pages but is also used in other situations, notably in applications built using XPFE. CSS is typically used to provide a single "library" of styles that are used over and over throughout a large number of related documents, as in a web site. A CSS file might specify that all numbered lists are to appear in italics. By changing that single specification the look of a large number of documents can be easily changed.

A collection of data records. On web databases, records may consist of web pages, or graphics, or audio files, or newspaper files, or books, or movies, or press releases, or almost anything from very general to very specific areas of interest. Records may or may not be further broken into fields. Database records are usually indexed and come with a search interface to find records of interest.

(Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) DHCP is a protocol by which a machine can obtain an IP number (and other network configuration information) from a server on the local network.

(Dynamic HyperText Markup Language) DHTML refers to web pages that use a combination of HTML, JavaScript, and CSS to create features such as letting the user drag items around on the web page, some simple kinds of animation, and many more.

(Domain Name System) The Domain Name System is the system that translates Internet domain names into IP numbers. A "DNS Server" is a server that performs this kind of translation.

The unique name that identifies an Internet site. Domain Names always have 2 or more parts, separated by dots. The part on the left is the most specific, and the part on the right is the most general. A given machine may have more than one Domain Name but a given Domain Name points to only one machine. For example, the domain names: optic-lynx.net mail.optic-lynx.net support.optic-lynx.net can all refer to the same machine, but each domain name can refer to no more than one machine. Usually, all of the machines on a given Network will have the same thing as the right-hand portion of their Domain Names (optic-lynx.net in the examples above). It is also possible for a Domain Name to exist but not be connected to an actual machine. This is often done so that a group or business can have an Internet e-mail address without having to establish a real Internet site. In these cases, some real Internet machine must handle the mail on behalf of the listed Domain Name.

Acronym for Disk Operating System. Literally, the term refers that portion of an operating system that controls writing, storage, and retrieval of data from storage media, usually spinning disks of various types. In common usage, the term refers to MS DOS, the complete operating system developed by Microsoft for IBM-compatible personal computers in text (non-Windows) modes. Could also mean Denial-Of-Service, a form of assault on an Internet site which floods the site with packets requiring a response, thus slowing down or preventing normal access to the site.

Transferring data (usually a file) from a another computer to the computer you are are using. The opposite of upload.

This is an abbreviation for dots per inch, a measurement of print image resolution and quality. A larger number of dots allows for more detail, and therefore a higher resolution image. The average laser printer has a resolution of 300 x 300 dpi which means it can print 300 dots per inch horizontally and 300 dots per inch vertically, or 90,000 dots per square inch. A high-resolution, professional quality laser printer prints at 1200 dpi or 2400 dpi.

(Electronic Mail) Messages, usually text, sent from one person to another via computer. E-mail can also be sent automatically to a large number of addresses.

A very common method of networking computers in a LAN. There is more than one type of Ethernet. By 2001 the standard type was "100-BaseT" which can handle up to about 100,000,000 bits-per-second and can be used with almost any kind of computer.

An executable file refers to a program file. Executables in DOS and Windows usually have an .exe or a .com extension. In UNIX and Macintosh environments, executable files can have any name.

In Windows, DOS and some other operating systems, one or several letters at the end of a filename. Filename extensions usually follow a period (dot) and indicate the type of file. For example, this.txt denotes a plain text file, that.htm or that.html denotes an HTML file. Some common image extensions are picture.jpg or picture.jpeg or picture.bmp or picture.gif

An intranet that is accesible to computers that are not physically part of a companys' own private network, but that is not accessible to the general public, for example to allow vendors and business partners to access a company web site. Often an intranet will make use of a Virtual Private Network. (VPN.)

(Frequently Asked Questions) FAQs are documents that list and answerthe most common questions on a particular subject. There are hundreds of FAQs on subjects as diverse as Pet Grooming and Cryptography. FAQs are usually written by people who have tired of answering the same question over and over.

Tool in most browsers to search for word(s) keyed in document in screen only. Useful to locate a term in a long document. Can be invoked by the keyboard command, Ctrl+F.

A combination of hardware and/or software that separates a Network into two or more parts for security purposes.

Software that is available free of charge for personal use.

(File Transfer Protocol) A very common method of moving files between two Internet sites. FTP is a way to login to another Internet site for the purposes of retrieving and/or sending files. There are many Internet sites that have established publicly accessible repositories of material that can be obtained using FTP, by logging in using the account name "anonymous", thus these sites are called "anonymous ftp servers". FTP was invented and in wide use long before the advent of the World Wide Web and originally was always used from a text-only interface.

Graphical Interchange Format is a commonly used graphics file format for image files on the Internet.

1024 Megabytes

Invented at the University of Minnesota in 1993 just before the Web, gopher was a widely successful method of making menus of material available over the Internet. Gopher was designed to be much easier to use than FTP, while still using a text-only interface. Gopher is a Client and Server style program, which requires that the user have a Gopher Client program. Although Gopher spread rapidly across the globe in only a couple of years, it has been largely supplanted by Hypertext, also known as WWW (World Wide Web). There are still thousands of Gopher Servers on the Internet and we can expect they will remain for a while.

Graphical User Interface. Pronounced "gooey". An operating system interace between the user and the computer based on graphics. GUIs typically use a mouse or other tracking device and icons. First developed by XEROX as an easier to learn interface than text-based ones, it was adopted by Apple for the Macintosh, Microsoft for Windows, and even for unix systems as XWindows.

Hacker is a slang term for a technically sophisticated computer user who enjoys exploring computer systems and programs, sometimes to the point of obsession.

As used in reference to the World Wide Web, 'hit' means a single request from a web browser for a single item from a web server; thus in order for a web browser to display a page that contains 3 graphics, 4 ?hits? would occur at the server: 1 for the HTML page, and one for each of the 3 graphics.

Several meanings. Originally, the web page that your browser is set to use when it starts up. The more common meaning refers to the main web page for a business, organization, person or simply the main page out of a collection of web pages, e.g. "Check out so-and-so's new Home Page."

Any computer on a network that is a repository for services available to other computers on the network. It is quite common to have one host machine provide several services, such as SMTP (email) and HTTP (web).

(HyperText Markup Language) The coding language used to create Hypertext documents for use on the World Wide Web. HTML looks a lot like old-fashioned typesetting code, where you surround a block of text with codes that indicate how it should appear. The "hyper" in Hypertext comes from the fact that in HTML you can specify that a block of text, or an image, is linked to another file on the Internet. HTML files are meant to be viewed using a "Web Browser". HTML is loosely based on a more comprehensive system for markup called SGML, and is expected to eventually be replaced by XML-based XHTML standards.

(HyperText Transfer Protocol) The protocol for moving hypertextfiles across the Internet. Requires a HTTP client program on one end, and an HTTP server program (such as Apache) on the other end. HTTP is the most important protocol used in the World Wide Web (WWW).

Generally, any text that contains links to other documents - words or phrases in the document that can be chosen by a reader and which cause another document to be retrieved and displayed.

(Information Technology) A very general term referring to the entire field of Information Technology - anything from computer hardware to programming to network management. Most medium and large size companies have IT Departments.

The vast collection of inter-connected networks that are connected using the TCP/IP protocols and that evolved from the ARPANET of the late 60's and early 70's. The Internet connects tens of thousands of independent networks into a vast global internet and is probably the largest Wide Area Network in the world.

A private network inside a company or organization that uses the same kinds of software that you would find on the public Internet, but that is only for internal use. Compare with extranet.

(Internet Protocol Number) Sometimes called a dotted quad. A unique number consisting of 4 parts separated by dots, e.g. 165.113.245.2 Every machine that is on the Internet has a unique IP number - if a machine does not have an IP number, it is not really on the Internet. Many machines (especially servers) also have one or more Domain Names that are easier for people to remember.

(Internet Protocol, version 4) The most widley used version of the Internet Protocol (the "IP" part of TCP/IP.) IPv4 allows for a theoretical maximum of approximately four billion IP Numbers (technically 232), but the actual number is far less due to inefficiencies in the way blocks of numbers are handled by networks. The gradual adoption of IPv6 will solve this problem.

(Internet Protocol, version 6) The successor to IPv4. Already deployed in some cases and gradually spreading, IPv6 provides a huge number of available IP Numbers - over a sextillion addresses (theoretically 2128). IPv6 allows every device on the planet to have its own IP Number.

(Internet Relay Chat) Basically a huge multi-user live chat facility. There are a number of major IRC servers around the world which are linked to each other. Anyone can create a channel and anything that anyone types in a given channel is seen by all others in the channel. Private channels can (and are) created for multi-person conference calls.

(Internet Service Provider) An institution that provides access to the Internet in some form.

Java is a network-friendly programming language invented by Sun Microsystems. Java is often used to build large, complex systems that involve several different computers interacting across networks, for example transaction processing systems. Java is also used to create software with graphical user interfaces such as editors, audio players, web browsers, etc. Java is also popular for creating programs that run in small electronic devicws, such as mobile telephones. Using small Java programs (called "Applets"), Web pages can include functions such as animations,calculators, and other fancy tricks.

JavaScript is a programming language that is mostly used in web pages, usually to add features that make the web page more interactive. When JavaScript is included in an HTML file it relies upon the browser to interpret the JavaScript. When JavaScript is combined with Cascading Style Sheets(CSS), and later versions of HTML (4.0 and later) the result is often called DHTML.

(Joint Photographic Experts Group) JPEG is most commonly mentioned as a format for image files. JPEG format is preferred to the GIF format for photographic images as opposed to line art or simple logo art.

kilobytes per second

kilobits per second

1024 bytes.

(Local Area Network) A computer network limited to the immediate area, usually the same building or floor of a building.

The URL imbedded in another document, so that if you click on the highlighted text or button referring to the link, you retrieve the outside URL. If you search the field "link:", you retrieve on text in these imbedded URLs which you do not see in the documents.

Noun or a verb. Noun: The account name used to gain access to a computer system. Not a secret (contrast with Password). Verb: the act of connecting to a computer system by giving your credentials (usually your "username" and "password")

Media Access Control address, given to a device in a network. It consists of a 48-bit hexadecimal number (12 characters). The address is normally assigned to a device, such as a network card, when it is manufactured

Abbreviation for megabytes per second.

Abbreviation for megabits per second.

1024 Kilobytes

A specific kind of HTML tag that contains information not normally displayed to the user. Meta tags contan information about the page itself, hence the name ("meta" means "about this subject") Typical uses of Meta tags are to include information for search engines to help them better categorize a page. You can see the Meta tags in a page if you view the pages' source code.

Any time you connect 2 or more computers together so that they can share resources, you have a computer network. Connect 2 or more networks together and you have an internet.

The name for discussion groups on USENET.

(Network Information Center) Generally, any office that handles information for a network. The most famous of these on the Internet was the InterNIC, which was where most new domain names were registered until that process was decentralized to a number of private companies. Also means "Network Interface card", which is the card in a computer that you plug a network cable into.

(Network News Transport Protocol) The protocol used by clientand server software to carry USENET postings back and forth over a TCP/IP network. If you are using any of the more common software such as Netscape, Nuntius, Internet Explorer, etc. to participate in newsgroups then you are benefiting from an NNTP connection.

Any single computer connected to a network.

A common Internet utility like ping and traceroute. Given an IP address or a DNS address, it will look up and show the corresponding DNS or IP address.

A packet is a self-contained bundle of data sent over a packet switching network. Packets are typically less than 1500 bytes in size. Longer files are broken into multiple packets for transmission and reassembled at the other end. A packet includes a header with to and from addresses, relation to other packets (sequencing), and error checking information. On the Internet, datagram is a synonym for packet.

A code used to gain access (login) to a locked system. Good passwords contain letters and non-letters and are not simple combinations such as virtue7.

(Portable Document Format) A file format designed to enable printing and viewing of documents with all their formatting (typefaces, images, layout, etc.) appearing the same regardless of what operating system is used, so a PDF document should look the same on Windows, Macintosh, linux, OS/2, etc. The PDF format is based on the widely used Postcript document-description language. Both PDF and Postscript were developed by the Adobe Corporation.

(Practical Extraction and Report Language) Perl is a programming language that is widely used for both very simple, small tasks and for very large complex applications. During the 1990s it became the de-facto standard for creating CGI programs. Perl is known for providing many ways to accomplish the same task, with "there's more than one way to do it" being something of a motto in the Perl community. Because it is so easy to perform simple tasks in Perl it is often used by people with little or no formal programming training, and because Perl provides many sophisticated features it is often used by professionals for creating complex data-processing software, including the "server-side" of large web sites. Perl does not provide significant support for creating programs with a graphical user interface.

(PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor) PHP is a programming language used almost exclusively for creating software that is part of a web site. The PHP language is designed to be intermingled with the HTML that is used to create web pages. Unlike HTML, the PHP code is read and processed by the web server software (HTML is read and processed by the web browser software.)

To check if a server is running. From the sound that a sonar systems makes in movies, you know, when they are searching for a submarine. This command helps testing and debugging network and/or Internet connections. An 'Echo' command is sent to a specified computer and then waits for a response. The result is a report that displays the success or failure, usually a report back of a timed response in seconds, of the intended action.

One dot on a computer screen. Todays least expensive monitors typically are 640 pixels wide and 480 pixels high. Larger and more expensive monitors range up to 1600 x 1200 pixels and special purpose monitors may go much higher than that.

A (usually small) piece of software that adds features to a larger piece of software. Common examples are plug-ins for the Netscape® browser and web server. Adobe Photoshop® also uses plug-ins.

(Portable Network Graphics) PNG is a graphics format specifically designed for use on the World Wide Web. PNG enable compression of images without any loss of quality, including high-resolution images. Another important feature of PNG is that anyone may create software that works with PNG images without paying any fees - the PNG standard is free of any licensing costs.

A form of audio broadcasting using the Internet, podcasting takes its name from a combination of "iPod" and broadcasting. iPod is the immensely popular digital audio player made by Apple computer, but podcasting does not actually require the use of an iPod. Podcasting involves making one or more audio files available as "enclosures" in an RSS feed. A pod-caster creates a list of music, and/or other sound files (such as recorded poetry, or "talk radio" material) and makes that list available in the RSS 2.0 format. The list can then be obtained by other people using various podcast "retriever" software which read the feed and makes the audio files available to digital audio devices (including, but not limited to iPods) where users may then listen to them at their convenience.

(Point of Presence, also Post Office Protocol) Two commonly used meanings: Point of Presence and Post Office Protocol. A Point of Presence usually means a city or location where a network can be connected to, often with dial up phone lines. So if an Internet company says they will soon have a POP in Belgrade, it means that they will soon have a local phone number in Belgrade and/or a place where leased lines can connect to their network. A second meaning, Post Office Protocol refers to a way that e-mail client software such as Eudora gets mail from a mail server. When you obtain an account from an Internet Service Provider (ISP) you almost always get a POP account with it, and it is this POP account that you tell your e-mail software to use to get your mail.

3 meanings. First and most generally, a place where information goes into or out of a computer, or both. E.g. the serial port on a personal computer is where a modem would be connected. On the Internet port often refers to a number that is part of a URL, appearing after a colon (:) right after the domain name. Every service on an Internet server listens on a particular port number on that server. Most services have standard port numbers, e.g. Web servers normally listen on port 80. Services can also listen on non-standard ports, in which case the port number must be specified in a URL when accessing the server, so you might see a URL of the form: gopher://peg.cwis.uci.edu:7000/ This shows a gopher server running on a non-standard port (the standard gopher port is 70). Finally, port also refers to translating a piece of software to bring it from one type of computer system to another, e.g. to translate a Windows program so that is will run on a Macintosh.

A single message entered into a network communications system.

(Point to Point Protocol) The most common protocol used to connect home computers to the Internet over regular phone lines. Most well known as a protocol that allows a computer to use a regular telephone line and a modem to make TCP/IP connections and thus be really and truly on the Internet.

On the Internet "protocol" usually refers to a set of rules that define an exact format for communication between systems. For example the HTTP protocol defines the format for communication between web browsers and web servers, the IMAP protocol defines the format for communication between IMAP email servers and clients, and the SSL protocol defines a format for encrypted communications over the Internet. Virtually all Internet protocls are defined in RFC documents.

A Proxy Server sits in between a Client and the "real" Server that a Client is trying to use. Client's are sometimes configured to use a Proxy Server, usually an HTTP server. The clients makes all of it's requests from the Proxy Server, which then makes requests from the "real" server and passes the result back to the Client. Sometimes the Proxy server will store the results and give a stored result instead of making a new one (to reduce use of a Network). Proxy servers are commonly established on Local Area Networks

(Public Switched Telephone Network) The regular old-fashioned telephone system.

A backup of packets or messages awaiting processing.

Redundant Arrays of Independent Disks. Using duplicated disks for error recovery and more efficient operation.

A special-purpose piece of hardware (or software package) that handles the connection between 2 or more Packet-Switched networks. Routers spend all their time looking at the source and destination addresses of the packets passing through them and deciding which route to send them on.

(Rich Site Summary or RDF Site Summary or Real Simple Syndication) A commonly used protocol for syndication and sharing of content, originally developed to facilitate the syndication of news articles, now widely used to share the contents of blogs. Mashups are often made using RSS feeds. RSS is an XML-based summary of a web site, usually used for syndication and other kinds of content-sharing. There are RSS "feeds" which are sources of RSS information about web sites, and RSS "readers" which read RSS feeds and display their content to users. RSS is being overtaken by a newer, more complex protocol called Atom.

A (usually web-based) system for searching the information available on the Web. Some search engines work by automatically searching the contents of other systems and creating a database of the results. Other search engines contains only material manually approved for inclusion in a database, and some combine the two approaches.

A chunk of information (often stored as a text file) that is used by the SSL protocol to establish a secure connection.

(Search Engine Optimization) The practice of designing web pages so that they rank as high as possible in search results from search engines. There is "good" SEO and "bad" SEO. Good SEO involves making the web page clearly describe its subject, making sure it contains truly useful information, including accurate information in Meta tags, and arranging for other web sites to make links to the page. Bad SEO involves attempting to deceive people into believing the page is more relevant than it truly is by doing things like adding inaccurate Meta tags to the page.

A computer, or a software package, that provides a specific kind of service to client software running on other computers. The term can refer to a particular piece of software, such as a WWW server, or to the machine on which the software is running, e.g. "Our mail server is down today, that's why e-mail isn't getting out." A single server machine can (and often does) have several different server software packages running on it, thus providing many different servers to clients on the network. Sometimes server software is designed so that additional capabilities can be added to the main program by adding small programs known as servlets.

A small computer program designed to be add capabilities to a larger piece of server software. Common examples are "Java servlets", which are small programs written in the Java language and which are added to a web server. Typically a web server that uses Java servlets will have many of them, each one designed to handle a very specific situation, for example one servlet will handle adding items to a "shopping cart", while a different servlet will handle deleting items from the "shopping cart."

Copyrighted software that is available for personal use for a small fee, and often downloadable from the Internet.

An acronym for Serial Line Internet Protocol, SLIP is a communications protocol that, like PPP, allows you to connect your computer to the Internet itself using a telephone line. It is part of the TCP/IP suite of programs necessary to connect to and use the Internet. If you have a dial-up account to an Internet service provider, you are using either PPP or SLIP to make your connection to the Internet. Although SLIP is easy to install and use, it does not provide the error correction or negotiation features that PPP has. For this reason, PPP is rapidly replacing SLIP as the more common standard.

(Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) The main protocol used to send electronic mail from server to server on the Internet.

Simple Network Management Protocol) A set of standards for communication with devices connected to a TCP/IP network. Examples of these devices include routers, hubs, and switches.

(Simple Object Access Protocol) A protocol for client-server communication that sends and receives information "on top of" HTTP. The data sent and received is in a particular XML format specifically designed for use with SOAP. SOAP is similar to the XMLRPC protocol except that SOAP provides for more sophisticated handling of complex data being sent between a client and a server. SOAP actually grew from the work that created XMLRPC. Microsoft's ".NET" system is largely based on SOAP.

A software robot that serves a search engine by exploring the net, collecting web page addresses and page contents, and following links from them to other addresses to collect still more web information. Also known as a worm or crawler.

A somewhat vague term generally referring to software that is secretly installed on a users computer and that monitors use of the computer in some way without the users' knowledge or consent. Most spyware tries to get the user to view advertising and/or particular web pages. Some spyware also sends information about the user to another machine over the Internet. Spyware is usually installed without a users' knowledge as part of the installation of other software, especially software such as music sharing software obtained via download.

(Structured Query Language) A specialized language for sending queries to databases. Most industrial-strength and many smaller database applications can be addressed using SQL. Each specific application will have its own slightly different version of SQL implementing features unique to that application, but all SQL-capable databases support a common subset of SQL.

(Secure Socket Layer) A protocol designed by Netscape Communications to enable encrypted, authenticated communications across the Internet.

A network configuration (topology) in which all computers and devices are connected by direct cables to a central hub.

A leased-line connection capable of carrying data at 1,544,000 bits-per-second. At maximum theoretical capacity, a T-1 line could move a megabyte in less than 10 seconds. That is still not fast enough for full-screen, full-motion video, for which you need at least 10,000,000 bits-per-second. T-1 lines are commonly used to connect large LANs to the Internet.

A leased-line connection capable of carrying data at 44,736,000 bits-per-second. This is more than enough to do full-screen, full-motion video.

The term "tag" can be used as a noun or verb. As a noun, a tag is a basic element of the languages used to create web pages (HTML) and similar languages such as XML. Another, more recent meaning of tag is related to reader-crearted tags where blogs and other content (such as photos, music, etc.) may be "tagged" which means to assign a keyword, such as "politics" or "gardening", this enables searches for "all the blog postings in the past week that are tagged 'prenatal care'"

(Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) This is the suite of protocols that defines the Internet. Originally designed for the UNIX operating system, TCP/IP software is now included with every major kind of computer operating system. To be truly on the Internet, your computer must have TCP/IP software.

The command and program used to login from one Internet siteto another. The telnet command/program gets you to the login: prompt of another host.

1024 Gigabytes.

A device that allows you to send commands to a computer somewhere else. At a minimum, this usually means a keyboard and a display screen and some simple circuitry. Usually you will use terminal software in a personal computer - the software pretends to be (emulates) a physical terminal and allows you to type commands to a computer somewhere else.

A series of messages with the same subject. It consists of an original message and all the replies and replies to replies that follow. Sometimes the replies will stray from the original subject, and this is called 'thread drift'.

(Top Level Domain) The last (right-hand) part of a complete Domain Name. For example in the domain name www.matisse.net ".net" is the Top Level Domain. There are a large number of TLD's, for example .biz, .com, .edu, .gov, .info, .int, .mil, .net, .org, and a collection of two-letter TLD's corresponding to the standard two-letter country codes, for example, .us, .ca, .jp, etc.

An Internet utility that will show you the full connection path between your site and another Internet address. You can run your own traceroute software with a PPP or net connection. Windows 95, NT and beyond include a traceroute program (tracert.exe) which you can use from Start/Run. First type command (or cmd in XP) to call a DOS window. Then type the command tracert websitename.com (also may use IP address)

A computer program is either hidden inside another program or that masquerades as something it is not in order to trick potential users into running it. For example a program that appears to be a game or image file but in reality performs some other function. The term "Trojan Horse" comes from a possibly mythical ruse of war used by the Greeks sometime between 1500 and 1200 B.C. A Trojan Horse computer program may spread itself by sending copies of itself from the host computer to other computers, but unlike a virus it will (usually) not infect other programs.

(User Datagram Protocol) One of the protocols for data transfer that is part of the TCP/IP suite of protocols. UDP is a "stateless" protocol in that UDP makes no provision for acknowledgement of packets received.

Transferring data (usually a file) from a the computer you are using to another computer. The opposite of download.

(Uniform Resource Identifier) An address for s resource available on the Internet. The first part of a URI is called the "scheme". the most well known scheme is http, but there are many others. Each URI scheme has its own format for how a URI should appear. Here are examples of URIs using the http, telnet, and news schemes: http://www.cable-lynx/glossary.html telnet://well.sf.ca.us news:new.ne wusers.questions

(Uniform Resource Locator) The term URL is basically synonymous with URI. URI has replaced URL in technical specifications.

(Uniform Resource Name) A URI that is supposed to be available for along time. For an address to be a URN some institution is supposed to make a commitment to keep the resource available at that address.

A world-wide system of discussion groups, with comments passed among hundreds of thousands of machines. Not all USENET machines are on the Internet. USENET is completely decentralized, with over 10,000 discussion areas, called newsgroups.

A chunk of computer programming code that makes copies of itself without any concious human intervention. Some viruses do more than simply replicate themselves, they might display messages, install other software or files, delete software of files, etc. A virus requires the presence of some other program to replicate itself. Typically viruses spread by attaching themselves to programs and in some cases files, for example the file formats for Microsoft word processor and spreadsheet programs allow the inclusion of programs called "macros" which can in some cases be a breeding ground for viruses.

(Voice Over IP) A specification and various technologies used to allow making telephone calls over IP networks, especially the Internet. Just as modems allow computers to connect to the Internet over regular telephone lines, VOIP technology allows humans to talk over Internet connections. Costs for VOIP calls can be a lot lower than for traditional telephone calls. Because the IP networks are packet-switched this allows for vastly different ways of handling connections and more efficient use of network resources.

(Virtual Private Network) Usually refers to a network in which some of the parts are connected using the public Internet, but the data sent across the Internet is encrypted, so the entire network is "virtually" private.

(Wide Area Network) Any internet or network that covers an area larger than a single building or campus.

Refers to pirated/stolen software.

Short for "World Wide Web"

A document designed for viewing in a web browser. Typically written in HTML. A web site is made of one or more web pages.

The entire collection of web pages and other information (such as images, sound, and video files, etc.) that are made available through what appears to users as a single web server. Typically all the of pages in a web site share the same basic URL, for example the following URLs are all for pages within the same web site: http://www.cable-lynx.net/ http://www.cable-lynx.net/page1/ http://www.cable-lynx.net/page2/ The term has a somewhat informal nature since a large organization might have separate "web sites" for each division, but someone might talk informally about the organizations' "web site" when speaking of all of them.

An Internet database that provides information on a person or an organization. Usually used to look up the Owner or Technical Contact of a Domain Name.

(Wireless Fidelity) A popular term for a form of wireless data communication, basically Wi-Fi is "Wireless Ethernet".

Short for Windows Sockets, WinSock describes a standard way for Windows programs to work with TCP/IP. You use WinSock if you directly connect your Windows PC to the Internet, either with a permanent connection or with a modem by using SLIP or PPP.

A worm is a virus that does not infect other programs. It makes copies of itself, and infects additional computers (typically by making use of network connections) but does not attach itself to additional programs; however a worm might alter, install, or destroy files and programs.

(World Wide Web) World Wide Web (or simply Web for short) is a term frequently used (incorrectly) when referring to "The Internet", WWW has two major meanings: First, loosely used: the whole constellation of resources that can be accessed using Gopher, FTP, HTTP,telnet, USENET and some other tools. Second, the universe of hypertext servers (HTTP servers), more commonly called "web servers", which are the servers that serve web pages to web browsers.

Acronym for "What You See Is What You Get". The term applies to word processors and web page development software where you manipulate text and images directly without writing codes (such as HTML or dot codes) for each attribute.

A variant of HTML. Stands for Extensible Hypertext Markup Language is a hybrid between HTML and XML that is more universally acceptable in Web pages and search engines than XML.

Extensible Markup Language, a dilution for Web page use of SGML (Standard General Markup Language), which is not readily viewable in ordinary browsers and is difficult to apply to Web pages. XML is very useful (among other things) for pages emerging from databases and other applications where parts of the page are standardized and must reappear many times.

A method of file compression originally used with MSDOS and a file extension for files which are zip compressed.