| Daemon |
A
dormant background process on a Web
server (in a UNIX
environment), waiting to perform tasks. Well-known
daemons are the send
mail daemon and the HTTP
daemon.
|
| Data
Encryption Key |
String
of characters used to encode a message. This encoded
message can only be read by someone with another related
key.
|
| Dedicated
Line |
A
direct telephone line between two computers.
|
| Dial-up |
Temporary
connection (over a telephone line) to the computer of
your ISP
in order to establish a connection to the Internet.
|
| Digerati |
The
digital elite. Derived from "literati".
|
| DNS
- Domain Name Server or Domain Name System |
A
Domain Name Server
maps IP
numbers to a more easily remembered name. When you
type http://www.webguest.com
into your browser,
the DNS (specified when you installed dial-up
networking) searchs for a matching IP address
(208.28.202.95). If the DNS doesn't find an entry in its
database, it will ask other DNSs until the entry is
found, and you will see our site. Otherwise, you'll get
an error message from your browser.
|
| Domain
Name |
A
unique name that identifies an Internet
site.
A domain name points always to one specific server
while this server may host
many domain names. If you look at the URL
for this page, you'll see www.webguest.com at the
beginning. The "www" points to the server and
"webguest.com" is our domain name. Most domain
names are assigned by the InterNIC.
|
| Download |
Transfer
of data from a server
to your computer's hard disk. You can use your browser
or an FTP
program to download
files to your computer. When you're retrieving your email,
you're downloading your email to your computer.
|
| Email
- Electronic Mail |
Message,
usually text, transmitted over the Internet
and sent from one person to another (although you can
also sent email to a large number of email
addresses (mailing
list).
|
| Email
Address |
An
electronic mail address. Email addresses are in the form
of: user@domain (for example: chris@webguest.net). Most
local ISPs
offer you an email address - this is called a POP
account.
A POP account requires a username and password to access
your email. You have to configure your email software to
retrieve the email from your POP account. See also email
alias.
|
| Email
Alias |
Additional
email
address that points to another email address
(normally your current email address with your local ISP).
All messages sent to an email alias, are automatically
and immediately redirected (forwarded) to the specified
"real" email address, so you don't have to
configure your email software to retrieve email sent to
your email alias. See also email
address.
|
| Encryption |
Procedure
that scrambles the contents of a file before sending it
over the Internet.
The recipient must have software to "decrypt"
this file. If you want to transmit "hot stuff"
like credit card information or a password,
you have to use some form of encryption. PGP
is a commonly-used encryption program.
|
| Ethernet |
Standard
method of connecting computers to a LAN.
Ethernet can handle about 10,000,000 bits-per-second and
can be used with almost any computer.
|
| Excite |
Search
engine at http://www.excite.com.
|
| FAQ
- Frequently Asked Questions |
Document
that contains the most common questions and answers on a
particular subject.
|
| FidoNet |
Worldwide
network
of personal computers started in the 1980's. Used to
exchange email,
but also for discussion
groups.
|
| Finger |
Internet
utility for locating people on Internet sites.
Returns such information as whether a user is logged in,
where someone has an account, etc. Many site
administrators don't allow Finger requests, because it
can help hackers
to break into their server.
|
| Firewall |
Internet
security to protect a LAN
against hackers.
A combination of hardware and software acts as a
firewall to separate the LAN into two parts.
"Normal" data is available outside the
firewall, while "hot stuff" is inside the
firewall.
|
| Frame |
Technology
introduced in Netscape 2.0 that allows Web designers to
break the browser
window into several smaller windows, each of which can
load different HTML
pages. This means Web designers can create navigation
bars and ads that stay on the screen as you click
through a site.
|
| FTP
- File Transfer Protocol |
Internet
tool to transfer files through the Internet
from one computer to another. FTP is used to download
files from another computer, as well as to upload
files from your computer to a remote computer. Through
(regular) FTP you can login
to another Internet site
but you must have a user
ID and a password.
Anonymous
FTP servers don't require usernames or passwords,
but you can't upload files to anonymous FTP servers.
|
| Gateway |
An
interface that connects two different networks
(a LAN
can be connected to the Internet
through some kind of gateway). An interface that
translates between two different protocols
is also called a gateway.
|
| GIF
- Graphics Interchange Format |
Common
graphics file format on the Internet. This format can
display only 256 colors at the maximum (8 bits),
therefore a GIF is mostly used to show clip-art images
(photographic images are usually in the JPEG
format). The GIF 89a standard allows multiple images in
one file, so you can use a GIF file to show some
animation on your Web site (also called an animated
gif).
|
| Gigabyte
- Gb |
About
1 billion bytes.
1 Kb
= 1,024 bytes
1 Mb
= 1,024 Kb (= 1,048,576 bytes)
1 Gb = 1,024 Mb (= 1,073,741,824 bytes)
|
| Glitch |
Small
malfunction in a system.
|
| Gopher |
Forerunner
of the World
Wide Web, invented at the University of Minnesota
and named after its mascot. It was the most important
tool for finding Internet
resources, before the breaktrough of the World Wide Web.
|
| GUI
- Graphical User Interface |
Graphical
environment of an operating system. The Windows and
Macintosh operating systems use a GUI. UNIX
and DOS are command line operating systems.
|
| Guru |
In
the context of the WWW,
a person with exceptional skills who acts as an expert
or/and is a knowledge resource for the Internet
community.
|
| Hacker |
An
expert programmer who uses his skills to break into
computer systems or networks
just for the fun of it, or to expose security risks.
Unlike a cracker,
a real hacker doesn't want to harm anybody or anything.
|
| Hash
Table |
Table
that contains pointers for easy retrieving some sorted
information. For example, in the table above, each
letter points to another page
of WEBGUEST's Web Glossary. If you want to see words
beginning with an "H", you click on the
"H" in the hash table and a hyperlink
will bring you immediately to this page, so there is no
need to browse through the entire glossary.
|
| Hit |
A
single request from a browser
to a server.
Some servers also count each graphic on that page as a
hit. For this reason, it's doubtfully to use the number
of hits as an accurate measurement for the popularity of
a Web
site.
|
| Home
Page |
Main
page of a Web
site. A Web site containing only one page, is also
called a home page.
|
| Hop |
In
reference to the Web,
a small jump on the route from one main computer to
another. It can take you 15 hops or more to get from
your access
provider to a Web
server on the other hemisphere.
|
| Host |
The
server
on which a Web
site is stored. Hosting companies store Web sites of
their customers on powerful Web servers (with fast,
permanent connections to the Internet).
|
| HotBot |
Search
engine at http://www.hotbot.com.
|
| HREF
- Hyperlink Reference |
HTML
code. Specifies a URL
as the linked resource.
|
| HTML
- Hypertext Mark-up Language |
The
coding language to create hypertext
documents on the World
Wide Web. HTML is a way to format text by placing
marks ("tags") around the text (like
old-fashioned typesetting code).
|
| HTTP
- Hypertext Transfer Protocol |
The
World Wide Web protocol
for moving hypertext (HTML)
files across the Internet.
|
| Hyperlink |
A
highlighted word (or graphic) within a hypertext
document (Web
page). When you click a hyperlink, it will take you
to another place within the same page, or to another
page.
The phrase [Back To Top] on the next line is a
hyperlink.
|
| Hypermedia |
Pictures,
videos, and audio on a Web
page that act as hyperlinks.
|
| Hypertext |
Text
that includes links
to other Web
pages. By clicking on a link, the reader can easily
jump from one Web page to another related page.
Hypertext spins the Web
- no Web without hypertext!
|
