Access Provider

The remote computer system to which you connect your personal computer and through which you connect to the Internet. An access provider is the company that provides you with Internet access and in some cases, an online account on their computer system. An access provider can be a large commercial service, which will charge you by the hour for your Internet access, or a small local company, which might charge you a flat rate per month for unlimited hours. If you access the Internet directly from a company account, then your company is your access provider.


ActiveX

Most web pages are static documents with little interactivity. Microsoft has 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.

ADSL

An acronym for Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line. ADSL is a method of transmitting data over traditional copper telephone lines at speeds higher than are currently available. Data can be downloaded at speeds of up to 1.544 megabits per second and uploaded at speeds of 128 kilobits per second. (That's why it's termed asymmetric.) This technology is well suited to the Web, where much more data is sent from a server to your computer than you send to the server.

Agent

An agent is a type of software program that is instructed to go out onto the Internet and perform a specific function on behalf of a user. The most common type of agents are programs called spiders and worms, which roam the Internet, collecting and indexing its content and creating their own searchable databases of the content found. New and custom uses for agents are being developed that will let users do things such as searching online music sites to compare prices for a specific CD title.

Applet

An applet is a small software application, typically in the Java programming language.

Archie

A software utility for finding files stored on FTP servers, Archie is a system for locating files on the Internet. Using Archie you can search through more than 2 million files available on the Internet and find a specific one you are looking for. The Archie database is made up of only the names (and sometimes short descriptions) of the files, so it is best to know the actual name of the file you are looking for. The more specific your request, the more likely you will find the file you want.

Archie can be very slow. The Archie database is carried on many different sites, but the information on each one is the same.

ARPANET

The computer network system that gave birth to the Internet. ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Administration Network) began in 1969 as a U.S. Department of Defense experiment in packet-switched networking.

ASCII

An acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange. This 7-bit code represents the most basic letters of the Roman alphabet, numbers, and other characters used in computing. Computers cannot understand human languages such as English. They speak a language of their own called binary, which is made up of 0s and 1s.

Humans can communicate with computers using a set of characters called ASCII. Each character in the ASCII set is made up of 7 bits of information, which the computer sees as a combination of 0s and 1s. This allows us to type alphabetical characters and numbers, which look like English to us, but can be read, stored and manipulated by computers. ASCII files are also called text files.

Avatar

Anyone who has participated in a web chat realizes that exchanging typed messages can get boring very quickly. But what if you could assume a visual identity, say a frog or a clown? An avatar is a graphic facsimile that you can use in chat rooms. It lets you role play and interact with people you meet online. The term was popularized in the novel Snow Crash written by Neal Stephenson.

Backbone

A high-speed line or series of connections that forms a major pathway within a network. For example, NSFNET was, for many years, the backbone of the Internet. See also Network.

Bandwidth

The maximum amount of data that can travel a communications path in a given time, usually measured in seconds. If you think of the communications path as a pipe, then bandwidth represents the width of the pipe that determines how much data can flow through it all at once.

BBS

Acronym for Bulletin Board System, which is a system that lets people read each other's messages and post new ones. The Usenet is, in effect, the world's largest distributed BBS. Typically, the term BBS is used to describe private systems, run by individuals that often require membership.

BFN

Abbreviation for bye for now. Used in various online communications such as e-mail messages or postings to newsgroups or BBSs, it usually appears in brackets like this: <BFN>.

Binary File

A file that contains more than plain text (i.e. photos, sounds, a spreadsheet, or a formatted word-processing document). In contrast to ASCII files, which contain only characters (plain text), binary files contain additional code information. A binary file is made up of machine-readable symbols that represent 1s and 0s. Binary files include sound files, graphics files, and software, and are frequently called binaries.

This all becomes important when you wish to transmit a file over the Internet. Let's say you want to download a neat piece of software called "Fitware" to help you keep track of your fitness regime. Depending on the software you use, you may find yourself confronted with a choice of file formats to download. If the file is a piece of software (like the "Fitware" program), a sound file, or a picture file, you will choose the "binary" option.

Bit

Short for binary digit, a bit is the smallest unit of data a computer can handle. Bits are used in various combinations to represent different kinds of data. Each bit has a value of 0 or 1.

Bitmap

A bitmapped image is one made out of an array of dots rather than continuous lines or areas.

Bot

Derived from the word "robot," a bot is a software program that performs repetitive functions, such as indexing information on the Internet.

Also see Robots and Agent.

BPS

Abbreviation for Bits Per Second and a measurement of how fast data is transmitted. BPS is usually used to describe modem speeds or the speed of a digital connection. See ISDN.

Browser

A software program that allows you to view and interact with various kinds of Internet resources available on the World Wide Web. A browser is commonly called a web browser.

Cache

When you download a web page, the data is cached, meaning it is stored temporarily on your computer. The next time you want that page, instead of requesting the file from the web server, your web browser just accesses it from the cache. That way, the page loads quickly. But if the web page is updated frequently, as may be the case with news, sports scores or financial data, you won't get the most current information. By using the Reload button on your browser, this timely data is updated by downloading fresh data from the server.

Chat Room

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.

Client

A program that uses the services of another program. The client is the program used to contact and obtain data or request a service from the server.

Computer Virus

A computer program created specifically to invade computers and networks and wreak havoc on them. The mischief caused can be very minor: it may cause a funny image or cryptic message to be displayed on your screen, or it can do some serious damage by altering or even destroying files.

Cookies

A cookie is a file sent to a web browser by a web server that is used to record one's activities on a website. For instance, when you buy items from a site and place them in a so-called virtual shopping cart, that information is stored in the cookie. When the browser requests additional files, the cookie information is sent back to the server. Cookies can remember other kinds of personal information --your password, so you don't have to re-enter it each time you visit the site; your preferences, so the next time you return to a site, you can be presented with customized information. Some people regard cookies as an invasion of privacy; others think they are a harmless way to make websites more personal.

Most cookies have an expiration date and either reside in your computer's memory until you close your browser or they are saved to your hard drive. By the way, cookies cannot read information stored in your computer.

You can use a text editor to view cookie files. Internet Explorer creates separate files for each cookie and stores them in folders named "Cookies" or "Temporary Internet Files."For Windows users of Navigator, the file is called cookies.txt and is located in the the same folder as Netscape.

Cryptography

The process of securing private information that is passed through public networks, by mathematically scrambling (i.e. encrypting) it in a way that makes it unreadable to anyone except the person or persons holding the mathematical "key" that can unscramble (decrypt) it. The two most common types of cryptography are "same-key" and "public-key". In same-key cryptography, a message is encrypted and decrypted using the same key, which is passed along from one party to another in a separate transmission. A more secure method is public-key cryptography which uses a pair of different keys (one public, one private) that have a particular relationship to one another, such that any message encrypted with one key can only be decrypted with the other key and vice-versa.

Dial - up Account

A type of account available for connecting to the Internet. Having an account on a computer system means you have a login name and a password that lets you access some parts of that system. A dial-up account through an Internet Service Provider allows you to use your modem to make a connection to your provider's system. Once you have dialed your provider's local number and are connected, the provider then connects you directly to the Internet, where you can run any Internet navigation software (like a web browser), just as you would if you had a direct connection to the Net.

Different types of dial-up accounts are available. A SLIP or PPP account allows you to navigate the World Wide Web directly from your Windows or Mac operating system. A UNIX shell account allows you to use UNIX commands on your service provider's system.

To connect to the Internet with a dial-up account you need a modem.

Domain Name

The unique name that identifies an Internet site. The Internet is made up of hundreds of thousands of computers and networks, all with their own domain name or unique address. Domain names always have two or more parts separated by dots. A given server may have more than one domain name, but a given domain name points to only one server.

Domain names typically consist of some form of the organization's name and a suffix that describes the type of organization. For example, Tata has registered the domain name "tata.com" . Registration is on a first come, first served basis. The domain name suffix is assigned based on the type of organization. For U.S. domains, the suffixes are:

    • .com - corporations
    • .edu - educational institutions
    • .org - non-profit organizations
    • .mil - military organization
    • .net - network provider
    • .gov - government institution

In addition, non-U.S. sites have an additional extension that indicates the country where the domain is located. For example:

    • .au - Australia
    • .dk - Denmark
    • .ge - Germany
    • .uk - United Kingdom

In the United States, domain names are assigned and indexed by the InterNIC project (a joint project of the National Science Foundation, AT&T, and Network Solutions, Inc.). Each of these addresses is actually an alias of a numerical address (called an IP address). The IP number for the Whitehouse for example, is 198.137.240.100. To access the Whitehouse Internet site, you could use the IP number if you like, but most people prefer to use the quasi-English domain name alias "whitehouse.gov."

E-mail

Short for electronic mail, e-mail consists of messages, often just text, sent from one user to another via a network. E-mail can also be sent automatically to a number of addresses.

Emoticon

Another name for a smiley -- a sequence of keyboard characters used to punctuate a message or posting by expressing the writer's emotional state. For example:

a smile

:-)


sadness or consternation

:-(


a wink

;-)

Extranet

An extranet is a network that allows a company to share information with other businesses and customers. Extranets transmit information over the Internet and require a user to have a password to access data on internal company servers.

Also see Intranet.

File Compression

A way of reducing the size of a file, or files, so that they don't take up a lot of space on a server or hard drive and can travel faster over a network. File compression is accomplished with software that uses mathematical equations (algorithms) to condense repeated data into smaller codes. You need another separate software program to decompress the data, and restore it to its original form.

Finger

A program that displays information about someone on the Internet. When you are logged in, type finger followed by the e-mail address of the person you want to know more about and it can tell you whether or not a person is logged on, what their actual name is, and when they last logged on. Not all Internet Service Providers support this feature. Even for the ones that do, the user has to give file permission to allow people from other hosts to see this information.

Firewall

A combination hardware and software buffer that many companies or organizations have in place between their internal networks and the Internet. A firewall allows only specific kinds of messages from the Internet to flow in and out of the internal network. This protects the internal network from intruders or hackers who might try to use the Internet to break into those systems.

Flaming/Flame War

Reacting to someone's newsgroup posting or e-mail in a hostile manner by publicly chastising the person or bombarding the person with nasty e-mail. Flaming may occur to users who ask stupid questions or who engage in behavior that violates what is considered proper online netiquette. A flame war occurs when two or more users flame each other in an escalating manner that threatens to continue unabated.

Forms

Forms are web pages comprised of text and "fields" for a user to fill in with information. They are an excellent way of collecting and processing information from people visiting a website, as well as allowing them to interact with web pages. Forms are written in HTML and processed by CGI programs. The output can be sent as an e-mail form, stored online, printed, and/or returned to the user as an HTML page. When you enter a keyword in the search field of an Internet directory, you are filling in a form. It is then processed by a CGI program, returning a list of possible matches with your keyword. Forms are also used for online catalogs, surveys, requests for information, and conferencing.

FTP

An acronym for File Transfer Protocol -- a very common method of transferring one or more files from one computer to another. FTP is a specific way to connect to another Internet site to retrieve and send files. FTP was developed in the early days of the Internet to copy files from computer to computer. With the advent of the World Wide Web, and web browser software, you no longer need to know arcane FTP commands to copy to and from other computers. In your browser, you can use FTP by typing the URL into the location box at the top of your screen. For example: ftp://name.of.site/directory/filename.zip will transfer filename.zip to your computer's hard disk. You can also use ftp://name.of.site/directory/ which will give you a listing of all the files available in that directory.

If you are using a web browser that doesn't have built-in FTP capability, or if you want to upload files to a remote computer, you will need to use an FTP client program to transfer files. To use FTP you need to know the name of the file, the computer where it resides, and the directory it's in. Most files are available via "anonymous FTP," which means you can log into the machine with the user name "anonymous" and use your e-mail address as your password.

Gateway

Hardware or software that bridges the gap between two otherwise incompatible applications or networks so that data can be transferred among different computers. This is common with e-mail that gets sent back and forth between Internet sites and commercial online services which have their own internal e-mail systems.

GIF

Acronym for Graphics Interchange Format. This graphics file format uses a compression scheme originally developed by CompuServe. Because they are compressed, the file sizes can be quickly and easily transmitted over a network. That's why it is the most commonly used graphics format on the World Wide Web.

Hacker

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

Hits

This term refers to the number of files that are downloaded from a web server. It's a way of measuring traffic to a website that can be misleading. The number of hits a site receives is usually much greater than the number of visitors it gets. That's because a web page can contain more than one file. For example, each graphic element is a separate file, so a page with nine graphics would count as ten hits, one for each graphic and one for the HTML file. In this scenario a page may have 10,000 hits, but only 1,000 visits.

Home Page

Also referred to as a web page. The starting point of a Web presentation and a sort of table of contents for what is at the website, offering direct links to the different parts of the site.

Host

Any computer directly connected to a network that acts as a repository for services (e.g. e-mail, Usenet newsgroups, ftp or World Wide Web) available for other computers on the network. See also Server.

Hotlists

A standard feature of most web browsers is the ability to compile and maintain a list of interesting, useful, or important URLs into a hotlist of links you can click on to go directly to a web site. In some browsers hotlists are called bookmarks.

Host Name

Every computer that is directly connected to the Internet has a numerical identification, called an IP address, and a name, called a host name. Most people using the internet don't need to know the host name of a computer in order to link to it. The Web URLs and e-mail addresses are all you really need to know

HTML

Acronym for HyperText Markup Language, HTML is the computer language used to create hypertext documents. HTML utilizes a finite list of tags that describe the general structure of various kinds of documents linked together on the World Wide Web.

HTTP

HTTP stands for HyperText Transfer Protocol -- the method by which hypertext files are transferred across the Internet. Letâs examine these terms one at a time. "Hypertext" was coined by Ted Nelson in 1965 to mean "text which is not constrained to be linear." When used with the web, it is text that is linked to something else. When you click on a word and you are shown another page (or a sound file or a picture), you are using hypertext. Hypertext allows you to jump around between files, following your own interests and train of thought. World Wide Web pages written in HTML use hypertext to link to other documents.

Hypertext transfer is simply the tranfer of hypertext files from computer to computer.

Hypertext

A way of presenting information in which text, sounds, images, and actions are linked together in a way that allows you to jump around between them in whatever order you choose. Hypertext usually refers to any text available on the World Wide Web that contains links to other documents.

 

 

Icon

A small image, usually a symbol, used to graphically represent a software program, file, or function on a computer screen. Icons make it easier to recognize and locate these things.

Internet Service Provider

Also called ISPs or access providers. The remote computer system to which you connect your personal computer and through which you connect to the Internet. ISPs that you access by modem and telephone line are often called dial-up services.

Internet Telephony

Internet telephony is the conversion of analog speech signals used on current telephone systems into digital data, allowing calls to be sent over the Internet, bypassing long distance charges. While the Internet was first devised as a way of transmitting data, it is now being used to make voice calls. Internet telephony is projected to explode as the costs plummet.

Intranet

You can think of an intranet as an internal Internet designed to be used within the confines of a company, university or organization. What distinguishes an intranet from the freely accessible Internet, is that intranets are private. Until recently most corporations relied on proprietary hardware and software systems to network its computers, a costly and time-consuming process made more difficult when offices are scattered around the world. Even under the best of conditions, sharing information among different hardware platforms, file formats and software is not an easy task. By using off-the-shelf Internet technology, intranets solve this problem, making internal communication and collaboration much simpler.

Intranets use TCP/IP to transmit information across the network, as well as HTML to create documents.Information is stored on one or more company servers and accessed by using a web browser, such as Navigator or Explorer. This self-contained, miniature Internet can have all the same features -- individual home pages, newsgroups, e-mail - but they are restricted to company employees and contractors.

IP Address

A numeric code that uniquely identifies a particular computer on the Internet. Just as a street address identifies the location of your home or office, every computer or network on the Internet has a unique address, too. Internet addresses are assigned to you by an organization called InterNIC. You register your address with InterNIC as both a name (whitehouse.gov), which is referred to as the domain name, and a number (198.137.240.100), which is generally referred to as the IP address or IP number.

Because the numeric addresses are difficult to understand or remember, most people use names instead like microsoft.com or ibm.com. A software database program called Domain Name Service (DNS) tracks the names and translates them into their numerical equivalent so that the computers can understand what they are and find them. See Domain Name.

When you have a standard dial-up account with an Internet provider, you will either be assigned a "permanent" or "static" IP address (i.e. its always the same), or the system will use "dynamic" IP addressing, which assigns you an address everytime you log on. If you are an organization and want all of your employees' computers to have Internet access, you can apply to the InterNIC for a range of IP addresses. Most likely, the InterNIC will assign you a Class C address, which consists of 255 unique IP numbers for you to assign to your employees.

If you need more than 255 IP address, you can apply for a Class B address, which will give you over 65,000 unique IP addresses. Class A addresses are for very large companies. Both Class A and Class B addresses are very hard, if not impossible, to get. Usually, companies will get multiple Class C addresses. Actually, we're quickly running out of IP addresses. So the Internet Engineering Task Force, which standardized the IP protocol, is working on a solution.

IRC (Internet Relay Chat)

An acronym for Internet Relay Chat, a program that allows you to carry on "live" conversations with people all over the world by typing messages back and forth across the Internet. You can talk in groups or in private with only one person. IRC consists of "channels," which usually are devoted to specific topics. Anyone can create a "channel" and any message typed in a given channel is seen by all others in the channel.

There is no limit to the number of people who can chat on a particular channel. Because of this unique feature, IRC channels have served as unofficial "news" sites during times of crisis, such as the Gulf War and the 1994 southern California earthquake. Mostly, though, you will find the same thing as on the Net - people talking about things they are interested in, from Aardvarks to Zombies.

To run IRC, you need to have an account on a server that is running an IRC client.

IRC can be difficult to get the hang of at first, but once you get past the initial learning curve you may come to love it. How else can you talk to someone in US for an hour without paying long-distance telephone charges?

ISDN

An acronym for Integrated Services Digital Network. ISDN lines are connections that use ordinary phone lines to transmit digital instead of analog signals, allowing data to be transmitted at a much faster rate than with a traditional modem.

ISDN converts audio signals - your voice for instance - into digital bits. Since bits can be transmitted very quickly, you can get much faster speed out of the same telephone line - four times faster than a 14.4 kbps modem. In addition, ISDN connections are made up of two different channels, allowing two simultaneous "conversations" so you can speak on one channel and send a fax or connect to the Internet over another channel. All of these transactions occur on the same twisted-pair phone line currently plugged into your telephone. To find out if you can get ISDN, contact your local phone company or call around to a few local Internet service providers.

ISDN is a powerful tool for Internet communications, but it is not available everywhere. Traditionally, it has been used in urban business zones and large corporate settings with special digital switching equipment, but residential ISDN service is expanding rapidly. If you are shopping for an Internet access provider that offers you ISDN, be sure to thoroughly evaluate the equipment costs. An ISDN line can offer you inexpensive, high-bandwidth connections, but you may have to buy special equipment (like routers and switchers) that allow ISDN to communicate with your internal networks.

 

Java

Java is an object-oriented programming language developed by Sun Microsystems, Inc. to create executable content (i.e self-running applications) that can be easily distributed through networks like the Web. Developers use Java to create special programs called applets that can be incorporated in a web page to make it interactive. A Java-enabled web browser like Sun's HotJava is required to interpret and run the Java applets.

Java is activated by a special HTML tag on a web page. It enables developers to create content that can be delivered to and run by users on their computers. This software can support anything that programmers can dream up, from spreadsheets and tutorials to interactive games and animation.

JavaScript

JavaScript is a scripting language that allows dynamic behavior to be specified within HTML documents.

JPEG

Acronym for Joint Photographic Experts Group, an industry committee that developed a compression standard for still images. JPEG refers to the graphics file format that uses this compression standard. You will find JPEG files on the World Wide Web with the file extension .JPG.

LAN

Acronym for Local Area Network, it refers to a local network of computers that are located on the same floor or in the same building or nearby buildings. See WAN.

Link

Generally refers to any highlighted words or phrases in a hypertext document that allow you to "jump" to another section of the same document or to another document on the World Wide Web.

List Administrator

A person who manages a mailing list, adding and deleting members and tending to the general administrative details of maintaining the list. The List Administrator sometimes moderates the discussion and intervenes when there are disputes or flame wars.

Login

The account name used to access a computer system. It is the way people identify themself to their online service or Internet access provider. Also called User ID, User Name, or Account Name.

Mailing List

A way of having a group discussion by electronic mail. Also used to distribute announcements to a large number of people. A mailing list is very much like a conference on a bulletin board system, except the conversation comes to you in your e-mail box. Each time you or any member of the list posts a reply to the conversation, it is distributed to the e-mail box of every member of the list. All of this traffic is automated and managed by programs called mailing list managers (MLM's) or mail servers. The two most frequently used programs are Listserv and Majordomo.

Mailing lists are the most basic form of Internet conferencing. They can be public or private and, unlike Usenet newsgroups, which require additional software to run, all you need to participate is an e-mail address.

A mailing list is said to be "unmoderated" if all of the messages sent to the list are automatically forwarded to each member of the list. In a "moderated" list, all messages are sent first to a list moderator, who makes decisions about which postings will or will not be sent to everyone on the list.

If many people are on a mailing list, the traffic in your e-mail box can be overwhelming. One way to deal with this is to subscribe to the "digest" version of the list (not all mailing lists have digest versions). In a digest version, postings are collected into a single file and distributed to the list on a regular basis (usually daily). In this way you receive only one big file at regular intervals rather than hundreds of small ones everyday.

You join a mailing list by subscribing to it. This doesn't mean you have to pay money, it just means you are asking to have your e-mail address added to the distribution list. To get off the mailing list, you have to unsubscribe from the list. You do both by sending an e-mail message to the list administrator with the following in the body of your message:

subscribe name-of-list your e-mail address

or

unsubscribe name-of-list your e-mail address

The exact way of doing this varies a little from list to list. It's best to request information about the list first and that will tell you exactly what you need to do. Once you've subscribed to a list you will receive an e-mail message with details about how the list works and how to unsubscribe.

Here are some tips for using mailing lists:

MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension)

MIME stands for Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension, a standard system for identifying the type of data contained in a file based on its extension. MIME is an Internet protocol that allows you to send binary files across the Internet as attachments to e-mail messages. This includes graphics, photos, sound and video files, and formatted text documents. MIME has to negotiate many different operating systems and types of software to perform this amazing feat. Its invention has been a major step forward in the exchange of non-text information over the Internet.

E-mail programs that allow you to send and receive these types of files are said to be MIME-compliant. Many of these programs now incorporate MIME and have made it practically invisible to the user. You are probably using MIME when you send e-mail with an "attachment" of a formatted file. If not, then your mail program is using something very similar called UUencoding and UUdecoding to achieve the same result.

Mirror

An FTP server that provides copies of the same files as another server. Used when an FTP site is so popular that the volume of users accessing it keeps others from getting through. A mirror site provides an alternate way to access the same files.

Modem

The term is short for Modulator/Demodulator. A device that allows remote computers to communicate, to transmit and receive data using telephone lines.

MPEG

Acronym for Moving Pictures Experts Group, an industry committee that is developing a set of compression standards for moving images (i.e. film, video and animation) that can be downloaded and viewed on a computer.

Multimedia

Using more than one type of media simultaneously, like text with sound, moving or still images, music, etc.

Navigation Tools

Navigation tools allow users to find their way around a website or multimedia presentation. They can be hypertext links, clickable buttons, icons, or image maps. Navigation tools are usually present either at the bottom or top (sometimes both) of each page or screen and typically allow users to return to the previous page, move forward to the next page, jump to the top of the current page and return to the home page.

Network

Two or more computers connected to each other so they can share resources. The Internet is a "network of networks," whereby anyone from an individual at a home with a PC to a large corporate multi-department system can freely and easily exchange information.

Newsgroups

Electronic discussion groups consisting of collections of related postings (also called articles) on a particular topic that are posted to a news server which then distributes them to other participating servers. There are thousands of newsgroups covering a wide range of subjects. You must subscribe to a newsgroup in order to participate in it or to track the discussion on an on-going basis. Unlike with a magazine or newspaper, subscribing to a newsgroup does not cost anything.

Newsgroups are found primarily on Usenet. Usenet is the collection of computers that participate in a global conferencing system that make newsgroups perhaps the largest distributed bulletin board system in the world. Newsgroups are one of the oldest and most widely used services on the Internet. There are more than 13,000 of them, with new ones coming online all the time. Not all newsgroups are carried by Usenet, and Usenet is carried by networks that are not on the Internet.

Various programs called newsreaders let you subscribe, read and post to newsgroups. Newsreaders usually are distributed with, or included in your web browser.

Newsgroup topics cover the entire range of human interests, from Autos to Zaire. Some newsgroups are "moderated," which means that a person decides which postings will become part of the conversation. Most are unmoderated, which means that any posting sent to the list is automatically added to the group.

Before you post to a newsgroup, do yourself a big favor and read other postings carefully for a few days. Newsgroups are famous for "flames" (viscous haranguing for an innocent mistake or a breach of netiquette). Read the FAQ about the newsgroup if there is one. It is considered a major breach of netiquette to ask a question that is clearly answered in the FAQ. It is also considered a poor use of bandwidth to post a reply to millions of users saying "me too!" Replies of this sort can and should be directed to the sender directly by e-mail.

Newsreader

A software program that lets you subscribe to newsgroups as well as read and post messages to them. A newsreader is like a friendly librarian who keeps track of the articles posted to the newsgroups you like to read and locates them when you want to read them.

Node

An addressable point on a network. A node can connect a computer system, a terminal, or various peripheral devices to the network. Each node on a network has a distinct name. On the Internet, a node is a host computer with a unique domain name and address that has been assigned to it by InterNIC.

 

NSFNET

Abbreviation for National Science Foundation's network --the NSFNET. This part of the Internet was devoted to research and education and funded by the U.S. government. It superseded ARPANET as the backbone of the Internet, but has since been replaced by commercial networks.

In the 1960s, the U.S. Department of Defense wanted to create a computer network that would continue operating in the event of a disaster, such as a nuclear war. If part of the network were destroyed, the rest of the system still had to work. They created ARPANET, linking the U.S. scientific and research communities, mostly at universities, with defense contractor sites. This was the forerunner of the Internet.

In 1985, the National Science Foundation(NSF) created NSFNET, a series of networks for research and education communication. NSFNET was based on ARPANET protocols. NSFNET created a national "backbone" service provided free to any U.S. research and education institution. At the same time, regional networks were created to bring electronic traffic from individual institutions to the national backbone service.

NSFNET grew rapidly as people discovered its potential and new applications were created to make access easier. Communication corporations like PSI, Alternet, followed by Sprint and MCI began to build their own networks and linked to NSFNET.

Recently, NSF has withdrawn from the "backbone" business. Commercial firms and other regional network providers have begun taking over the operation of the major Internet arteries.

NSF also funded a service that maintained the registration of all addresses on the Internet so that data could be routed to the right system. This service, called the InterNIC, has been taken over by AT&T and Network Solutions, Inc., in cooperation with NSF. For information on the InterNic Directory go to the new InterNIC site.

Packet/Packet Switching

A packet is a chunk of information sent over a network. Packet-switching is the process by which a carrier breaks up data into these chunks or "packets." Each packet contains the address of origin, the address of its destination, and information about how to reunite with other related packets. This process allows packets from many different locations to co-mingle on the same lines and be sorted and directed to different routes by special machines along the way.

Password

A password is a code or word used to gain access to restricted data on a computer network. While passwords provide security against unauthorized users, the security system can only confirm that the password is legitimate, not whether the user is authorized to use the password. That's why it is important to safeguard passwords:

Pathname

A pathname indicates the location of a particular file or directory by outlining the route or "path" from the host name (if the file resides on a remote server) through the directory structure to the desired filename or directory name. Each name in the series of names that define a path are separated by a slash. If the file is located in the current working directory on your computer, it is referred to only by its filename.

Pathnames can be absolute or relative. An absolute pathname provides the full path (address) of a file, including the computer system, directories, and subdirectories (if any) it resides in. Relative pathnames are used to describe a file or directory location on the user's system relative to the user's current location on the system (i.e. based on which level of the directory structure the user is in).

PDF (Portable Document Format)

An acronym for Portable Document Format. A file type created by Adobe Systems Incorporated that allows fully formatted, high-resolution, postscript documents to be easily transmitted across the Internet and viewed on any computer that has Adobe Acrobat Reader software.

Ping

Ping tests the Internet to see what systems are working. Ping can also test and record the response time of accessing other companies. This provides a systems administrator with valuable information on what networks are overloaded so access times can be optimized.

Pointer

A pointer is a word, picture, or navigation element that when clicked on, moves a user from one point in a document to another or to another document altogether. It is the same as a link

POP

A server using the Post Office Protocol, which holds users' incoming e-mail until they read or download it.

Port

1. Verb: To transfer or translate data or program files from one computer platform to another (i.e. from PC to Macintosh). Software programs usually have to be rewritten to be successfully ported.

2. Noun: Connector on the computer to which peripheral devices (like a printer or modem) are attached. Typically, these are serial ports, parallel ports, and modem ports.

PPP

PPP (Point-to-Point Protocol) is a communications protocol used to transmit network data over telephone lines. It allows you to connect your computer to the Internet itself, rather than logging on through an Internet Service Provider's host computer and using UNIX commands through a shell. This type of connection lets you communicate directly with other computers on the network using TCP/IP connections. It is part of the TCP/IP suite of programs necessary to connect to and use the Internet.

Having a dial-up account with Dishnet Limited, you are using PPP to make your connection to the Internet. PPP (Point-to-Point Protocol) is rapidly replacing SLIP (Serial Line Internet Protocol) as the more common standard. PPP provides error correction and negotiation features that are not present in SLIP.

Protocol

A protocol is the standard or set of rules that two computers use to communicate with each other. Also known as a communications protocol or network protocol, this is a set of standards that assures that different network products or programs can work together. Any product that uses a given protocol should work with any other product using the same protocol.

Protocols dictate the "whats" and the "hows" of the various systems on the Internet. The success of the Internet, its very existence, in fact, depends on people voluntarily agreeing to configure their hardware and software to the TCP/IP standard.

How do protocols work? Take FTP (File Transfer Protocol) as an example. When you contact a computer to download a file, the computers communicate with each other in a series of pre-agreed-upon rules. The "conversation" between the computers goes something like this: "I want that file," "here it comes," "didn't get it, please resend," "here it is again," "got it," "goodbye," "goodbye."

Internet protocols are constantly evolving. The standards are set by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). The IETF is a large international community of network designers, operators, vendors, and researchers concerned with the evolution and smooth operation of the Internet. It is open to any interested individual.

Pull Technology

You use pull technology when you surf the World Wide Web, to seek out and download information to your computer. This contrasts with push technology, where data is automatically delivered to your computer.

Push Technology

You use push technology when you allow data to be sent automatically to your computer at regular intervals, such as news updates every hour, or when triggered by an event, such as when a web page is updated. Push technology has been touted as an alternative to the way the World Wide Web currently operates, where users go online to search for information.

Also see Pull Technology.

Query

The process by which a web client requests specific information from a web server, based on a character string that is passed along. A query typically takes the form of a database search for a particular keyword or phrase. The keyword is entered into the search field of an Internet directory such as InfoSeek and then passed onto the web server.

RGB Mode

Short for Red, Green, and Blue, it is a color model commonly used to display color in video systems, film recorders and computer monitors. It represents all colors as combinations of red, green and blue light. RGB mode is the most common color mode for viewing and working with digital images on a screen.

Robots

Programs that are designed to automatically go out and explore the Internet for a variety of purposes. Robots that record and index all of the contents of the network to create searchable databases are sometimes called Spiders or Worms. WebCrawler and Lycos are popular examples of this.

Router

A piece of hardware or software that connects two or more networks. A router functions as a sorter and interpreter as it looks at addresses and passes bits of information to their proper destination. Software routers are sometimes referred to as gateways.

Scripts

A type of program that consists of a set of instructions for another application or utility to use.

Search Engines

A search engine is a type of software that creates indexes of databases or Internet sites based on the titles of files, key words, or the full text of files. The search engine has an interface that allows you to type what you're looking for into a blank field. It then gives you a list of the results of the search. When you use a search engine on the Web, the results are presented to you in hypertext, which means you can click on any item in the list to get the actual file. If the file you select doesn't have what you're looking for, you can use the Back button on your browser to return to the list of search results and try something else.

Most search engines on the Web are very fast and powerful, hence redoing a search doesn't really take a lot of time. In fact, because the Web changes constantly, with new information being added all the time, it probably makes more sense to do a new search rather than rely on the results of an older one.

The other nice feature about search engines on the web is that if you have a website or page of your own, you can register it. When you submit key information about your page or site, it gets added to the index. This is a very good (but often overlooked) way to get people to visit your site.

Server

A computer that handles requests for data, electronic mail, file transfers, and other network services from other computers (i.e clients). See Host.

Shareware

Software that is freely distributed for a small fee paid on an "honor system." You are not required to pay the fee to try the program, but if you like the software enough to use it, you are expected to send the fee directly to the creator.

Shockwave

Shockwave is a set of programs that allow Macromedia Director animation files to be played over the Internet with a web browser. Possible uses for this type of animation on the Web include online advertising, games, training, and animated logos.

Signature

Text automatically included at the bottom of an e-mail message or newsgroup posting to personalize it. This can be anything from a clever quote to some additional information about the sender, like their title, company name and additional e-mail addresses they may have. Netiquette suggests that signatures be four lines or fewer.

SLIP

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.

SMTP

An acronym for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, SMTP is the protocol used for routing e-mail across the Internet.

Secure Socket layer (SSL)

A protocol developed by Netscape Communications Corporation for securing data transmission in commercial transactions on the Internet. Using public-key cryptography, SSL provides server authentication, data encryption, and data integrity for client/server communications.

Streaming Media

Streaming data refers to multimedia files, such as video clips and audio, that begin playing seconds after it is received by your computer from the World Wide Web. The media is delivered in a "stream" from the server so that you don't have to wait several minutes or longer to download multimedia files.

Syntax Error

Syntax is the order in which words and phrases are put together, such as a URL (web address) which consists of several phrases that are strung together to define a location or service on the Internet. A syntax error occurs when a user (or programmer) has put words in an order that a program does not understand. A syntax error while surfing the Web may be caused by a mistyped or inadvertently rearranged URL, making it incomprehensible to a web browser.

Tags

The set of descriptive formatting codes used in HTML documents that instruct a web browser how to display text and graphics on a web page. For example, to make text bold, the tag <B> is used at the beginning and end of the text.

TCP/IP

Stands for Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol. This is the language governing communications between all computers on the Internet. TCP/IP is a set of instructions that dictates how packets of information are sent across multiple networks. Also included is a built-in error-checking capability to ensure that data packets arrive at their final destination in the proper order.

IP, or Internet Protocol, is the specification that determines where packets are routed to, based on their destination address. TCP, or Transmission Control Protocol, makes sure that the packets arrive correctly at their destination address. If TCP determines that a packet was not received, it will try to resend the packet until it is received properly. You must bee running TCP/IP to have full Internet access.

Telnet

A software program that allows you to log in to other remote computers on the Internet to which you have access. Once you are logged into the remote system, you can download files, engage in conferencing, and perform the same commands as if you were directly connected by computer. You need an Internet account to be able to use a telnet program.

Upgrade

An upgrade is a later release of a software program. Most software companies work to improve their existing software by upgrading it periodically by adding new features and functions.

Upload

Often confused with download, uploading a file means loading it from your computer onto a remote one. Most people do a lot more downloading than uploading.

URL (Uniform Resource Locator)

An acronym for Uniform Resource Locator. URL is the address for a resource or site (usually a directory or file) on the World Wide Web and the convention that web browsers use for locating files and other remote services.

Here are some examples of URL's:

http://www.yahoo.com

This is a web page at a commercial site called Yahoo.

ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/

This is a directory of files at MIT that are available for downloading.

news:rec.gardens.roses

This is a newsgroup on rose gardening.

The first part of a URL tells you the type of resource (or method of access) at that address.

The second part of a URL is typically the address of the computer where the data or service is located. Additional parts may specify the names of files, the port to connect to, or the text to search for in a database.

Most of the URLs you'll be using start with "http" which stands for "hypertext transport protocol". Http is the method by which HTML files are transferred over the Web. Here are a couple of other important things to remember about URLs:

3. A URL has no spaces.

4. A URL always uses forward slashes.

5. If you enter a URL incorrectly, your browser will not be able to locate the site or resource you want.

6. You can find the URL behind any link by passing your mouse pointer over the link. The pointer will turn into a hand and the URL will appear in the browser's status bar.

Usenet

Usenet refers to the collection of newsgroups (sometimes called the Big Eight hierarchies) and a set of agreed-upon rules for distributing and maintaining them. More than 13,000 newsgroups exist around the world and the majority of them are a part of Usenet. However, a fairly large number of alternative newsgroups have emerged outside of Usenet.

Usenet newsgroups are arranged hierarchically first by the name of the group, followed by the name of the subgroups. Each name in the hierarchy is separated by a period. For example, the discussion group about rose gardening is rec.gardens.roses. This means the conversation is in the general grouping of rec. (which stands for recreation), and a subgroup of recreation called gardens. In this particular case, an additional subgroup of gardens has been created for roses. Each additional subgroup in a hierarchy defines how narrow or specialized the discussion topic is. It's not uncommon to find newsgroups with several subgroups.

The Usenet Big Eight hierarchies are:

Not all newsgroups are part of Usenet. For example, the newsgroups with a prefix of alt. are not part of the core Usenet newsgroups, although they may look just like Usenet newsgroups to the average user. Another example of a non-Usenet newsgroup is the Clarinet news feed, which is a commercial information service that also looks like any other newsgroup to the end-user.

System administrators decide which newsgroups will be carried on their systems. Making newsgroups available to their users means dedicating hard-drive space for storage, so decisions have to be made about the allocation of those resources. Many administrators will not carry the "alt." groups. Some even refuse to carry any group with the word "sex" in the name. You have to check with your provider to find out what newsgroups they carry.

Also see Newsgroups.

User Name

Same as your login. This is the name by which you and your electronic mailbox are identified online. Also called User ID and Account Name.

UUCP

An acronym for UNIX to UNIX Copy Program. UUCP is a protocol for transferring files, news, and mail, and executing remote commands between machines.

Veronica

An acronym for Very Easy Rodent Oriented Netwide Index to Computerized Archives. Veronica is a network utility that lets you search all of the world's gopher server (which is where the "rodent" part figures in) by key words. This amounts to over 10 million items from over 6,000 gopher servers. You can then display a list of Gopher menus and articles containing the search text. Use Veronica if you don't know which Gopher server has the information you need.

Veronica can also search some World Wide Web pages, Usenet newsgroups, and ftp directories. To use Veronica, you enter your search request in a gopher search form, and the results of a veronica search are presented as a gopher menu of items, each of which is a direct pointer to a gopher data source. You can then navigate that list like you do any other gopher directory.

Searching with Veronica is as simple as entering a word and hitting return. Veronica searches for keywords in gopher server menu titles, but it does not do a full-text search of the documents' contents, the way other search engines do.

Wherever you find a Veronica search form, you will usually also find many server sites listed. You can choose any of these to search from. If you get a message that the server is busy, simply choose another one and do the search again.

Veronica searches understand the logical operators AND, NOT, OR. Use "and" between multiple word searches if you only want results that find all the words. Using "or" is usually not recommended. An asterisk (*) at the END of a word will match anything. For example, the search "dead*" will find dead, deadlines, deadhead, etc.

Viewer

A software application or tool designed to display a specific type of file (usually one that contains something other than text) that your web browser normally can't display on its own. There are viewers to display graphics files, and to play sound or video files.

Virtual Reality (VR)

Computer simulations of real-world "environments" that use 3-D graphics and external devices like a dataglove or helmet to allow users to interact with the simulation. Users move through virtual reality (VR) environments as though they were navigating in the real worlds -- walking through structures and interacting with objects in the environment.

WAIS

WAIS is an acronym for Wide Area Information Servers. It is a network information retrieval service that you can use to search for key words or phrases in specially indexed files. Unlike Gopher, which searches files by their titles, WAIS engines search the full text of files and return a list of documents that contain the key word you are searching for. Most search engines on the Web use the WAIS method of search and retrieval.

Although the name "wide area" implies the use of large networks such as the Internet, WAIS is frequently used to index and retrieve documents on only one machine or on a local area network.

WAN

An acronym for Wide Area Network. A network that connects computers over long distances via telephone lines or satellite links. In a wide area network, the computers are physically and sometimes geographically far apart. See LAN.

Web Page

A web page is a document created with HTML (HyperText Markup Language) that is part of a group of hypertext documents or resources available on the World Wide Web. Collectively, these documents and resources form what is known as a website.

You can read HTML documents that reside somewhere on the Internet or on your local hard drive with a piece of software called a web browser. Web browsers read HTML documents and display them as formatted presentations, with any associated graphics, sound, and video, on a computer screen.

Web pages can contain hypertext links to other places within the same document, to other documents at the same web site, or to documents at other web sites. They also can contain fill-in forms, photos, large clickable images (image maps), sounds, and videos for downloading.

To post a web page or pages on the Internet, you must have an account with a provider who has a web server connected to the Internet, or a web server and Internet connection of your own.

 

Web Ring

A web ring is a collection of subject-related websites. Web rings link sites with similar topics, allowing you to navigate from site to site.

Webmaster

A webmaster is a person in charge of maintaining a web site. This may include writing HTML files, setting up more complex programs, and responding to e-mail. Many sites encourage you to mail comments and questions about the site's web pages to the webmaster.

Website

The collection of network services, primarily HTML documents, that are linked together and that exist on the Web at a particular server. Exploring a website usually begins with the home page, which may lead you to more information about that site. A single server may support multiple websites.

WinSock

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

World Wide Web

The exact definition for the World Wide Web (popularly known as the Web) varies, depending on whom you ask. Three common descriptions are:

1. A collection of resources (Gopher, FTP, http, telnet, Usenet, WAIS and others) which can be accessed via a web browser.

2. A collection of hypertext files available on web servers.

3. A set of specifications (protocols) that allows the transmission of web pages over the Internet.

You can think of the Web as a worldwide collection of text and multimedia files and other network services interconnected via a system of hypertext documents. HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) was created in 1990, at CERN, the European Particle Physics Laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland, as a means for sharing scientific data internationally, instantly, and inexpensively. With hypertext a word or phrase can contain a link to other text. To achieve this they developed a programming language called HTML, that allows you to easily link you to other pages or network services on the Web.

If you encounter a page with a word that is highlighted in some way (usually in a different color and underlined), you can click on that word and "go to" the page or resource to which connects. Of course, you are not actually "going" anywhere when you do this, but rather, you are summoning the file or resource that the link points to. This non-linear, non-hierarchical method of accessing information was a breakthrough in information sharing and quickly became the major source of traffic on the Internet.

The basic elements of the World Wide Web are:

ZIP

A popular standard for file compression on the PC. You can recognize it by the .zip file extension.