| Internet Terms - Glossary | |
| by Matisse Enzer | |
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| A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X | |
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Usually refers to a 56Kbps
leased-line.
A DSL line where the
upload speed is different from the download speed. Usually the download
speed is much greater.
See:
A small Java program
that can be embedded in an HTML page. Applets differ from
full-fledged Java applications in that they are not allowed to access
certain resources on the local computer, such as files and serial devices
(modems, printers, etc.), and are prohibited from communicating with most
other computers across a network. The common rule is that an applet can only
make an Internet connection to the computer from which the applet was sent.
A tool (software) for
finding files stored on anonymous FTP sites. You need to know the
exact file name or a substring of it. By 1999 Archie had been almost
completely replaced by web-based search engines. The precursor to the
Internet. Developed in the late 60's and early 70's by the US Department
of Defense as an experiment in wide-area-networking to connect together
computers that were each running different system so that people at one
location could use computing resources from another location.
This is the defacto
world-wide standard for the code numbers used by computers to represent all
the upper and lower-case Latin letters, numbers, punctuation, etc. There are
128 standard ASCII codes each of which can be represented by a 7 digit
binary number: 0000000 through 1111111.
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. 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.
In common usage the baud rate of a modem
is how many bits it can send or receive per second. Technically, baud
is the number of times per second that the carrier signal shifts value - for
example a 1200 bit-per-second modem actually runs at 300 baud, but it moves
4 bits per baud (4 x 300= 1200 bits per second).
A computerized meeting and announcement
system that allows people to carry on discussions, upload and download
files, and make announcements without the people being connected to the
computer at the same time. In the early 1990's there were many thousands
(millions?) of BBSs around the world, most are very small, running on a
single IBM clone PC with 1 or 2 phone lines. Some are very large and the
line between a BBS and a system like AOL gets crossed at some point, but it
is not clearly drawn.
Information consisting entirely of ones and
zeros. Also, commonly used to refer to files that are not simply text files,
e.g. images.
A method for converting non-text files
(non-ASCII) into ASCII. This is needed because Internet e-mail can
only handle ASCII.
A single digit number in base-2, in other
words, either a 1 or a zero. The smallest unit of computerized data.
Bandwidth is usually measured in bits-per-second.
A network of educational sites
separate from the Internet, but e-mail is freely exchanged between BITNET
and the Internet. Listservs®, a popular form of e-mail discussion
groups, originated on BITNET. At its peak (the late 1980's and early 1990's)
BITNET machines were usually mainframes, often running IBM's MVS operating
system. BITNET is probably the only international network that is shrinking.
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. A measurement of how fast data is moved
from one place to another. A 56K modem can move about 57,000 bits per
second.
A Client program (software) that is
used to look at various kinds of Internet resources.
A shorthand appended to a comment written
in an online forum.
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.
Common method of moving caffeine across Wide Area Networks such as the Internet CATP was first used at the Binary Cafe in Cybertown and quickly spread world-wide. There are reported problems with
short-circuits and rust and decaffeinated beverages were not supported until
version 1.5.3
An issuer of Security Certificates
used in SSL connections.
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.
The most common name of a directory on a
web server in which CGI programs are stored.
A software program that is used to contact
and obtain data from a Server software program on another computer,
often across a great distance. Each Client 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 their own network.
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.
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.
Cyberpunk was originally a cultural
sub-genre of science fiction taking place in a not-so-distant, dystopian,
over-industrialized society. The term grew out of the work of William Gibson
and Bruce Sterling and has evolved into a cultural label encompassing many
different kinds of human, machine, and punk attitudes. It includes clothing
and lifestyle choices as well.
Term originated by author William Gibson in
his novel Neuromancer the word Cyberspace is currently used to
describe the whole range of information resources available through computer
networks.
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.
The digital version of literati, it is a
reference to a vague cloud of people seen to be knowledgeable, hip, or
otherwise in-the-know in regards to the digital revolution.
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.
See also:
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: matisse.net mail.matisse.net workshop.matisse.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 (matisse.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.
Transferring data (usually a file) from a
another computer to the computer your are using. The opposite of upload.
A method for moving data over regular phone lines. A DSL circuit is much faster than a regular phone connection, and the wires coming into the subscriber's premises are the same (copper) wires used for regular phone service. A DSL circuit must be configured to connect two specific locations, similar to a leased line (however a DSL circuit is not a leased line. A common configuration of DSL allows downloads at speeds of up to 1.544 megabits (not megabytes) per second, and uploads at speeds of 128 kilobits per second. This arrangement is called ADSL: Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line. Another common configuration is symmetrical: 384 Kilobits per second in both directions. In theory ADSL allows download speeds of up to 9 megabits per second and upload speeds of up to 640 kilobits per second. DSL is now a popular alternative to Leased
Lines and ISDN, being faster than ISDN and less costly than traditional
Leased Lines.
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 intranet that is accessible to computers that are not physically part of a company's' 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.)
FAQs are documents that list and
answer the
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.
A standard for transmitting data on optical
fiber cables at a rate of around 100,000,000 bits-per-second (10 times as
fast as 10-BaseTEthernet, about twice as fast as T-3).
An Internet software tool for locating
people on other Internet sites. Finger is also sometimes used to give access
to non-personal information, but the most common use is to see if a person
has an account at a particular Internet site. Many sites do not allow
incoming Finger requests, but many do.
A combination of hardware and software that
separates a Network into two or more parts for security purposes.
Originally, "flame" meant to carry forth in
a passionate manner in the spirit of honorable debate. Flames most often
involved the use of flowery language and flaming well was an art form. More
recently flame has come to refer to any kind of derogatory comment no matter
how witless or crude.
When an online discussion degenerates into
a series of personal attacks against the debaters, rather than discussion of
their positions. A heated exchange.
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.
The technical meaning is a hardware or
software set-up that translates between two dissimilar protocols, for
example America Online has a gateway that translates between its internal,
proprietary e-mail format and Internet e-mail format. Another, sloppier
meaning of gateway is to describe any mechanism for providing access to
another system, e.g. AOL might be called a gateway to the Internet.
A common format for image files, especially
suitable for images containing large areas of the same color. GIF format
files of simple images are often smaller than the same file would be if
stored in JPEG format, but GIF format does not store photographic
images as well as JPEG.
1000 or 1024 Megabytes, depending on
who is measuring. 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.
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).
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.
The protocol for moving
hypertext files
across the Internet. Requires a HTTP client program on one
end, and an HTTP server program 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.
IMAP is gradually replacing POP as the main protocol used by email clients in communicating with email servers. Using IMAP an email client program can not only retrieve email but can also manipulate message stored on the server, without having to actually retrieve the messages. So messages can be deleted, have their status changed, multiple mail boxes can be managed, etc. IMAP is defined in RFC 2060.
A shorthand appended to a comment written
in an online forum, IMHO indicates that the writer is aware that they
are expressing a debatable view, probably on a subject already under
discussion. One of many such shorthands in common use online, especially in
discussion forums.
Any time you connect 2 or more networks
together, you have an internet - as in inter-national or inter-state.
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.
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.
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.
Basically a way to move more data over existing regular phone lines. ISDN is available to much of the USA and in most markets it is priced very comparably to standard analog phone circuits. It can provide speeds of roughly 128,000 bits-per-second over regular phone lines. In practice, most people will be limited to 56,000or 64,000 bits-per-second. Unlike DSL, ISDN can be used to
connect to many different locations, one at a time, just like a regular
telephone call, as long the other location also has ISDN.
An institution that provides access to the Internet in some form, usually for money. 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. Jav |
