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56k Line
A digital phone-line connection (leased line) capable of carrying 56,000
bits-per-second. At this speed, a Megabyte will take about 3 minutes
to transfer. This is 4 times as fast as a 14,400bps modem.
See Also: Bandwidth
, T-1
ADN
(Advanced Digital Network) — Usually refers to a 56Kbps leased-line.
Anonymous FTP
See Also: FTP
Archie
A tool (software) for finding files stored on anonymous FTP sites.
You need to know the exact file name or a substring of it.
ARPANet
(Advanced Research Projects Administration Network) —
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
that would survive a nuclear war.
See Also: Internet
ASCII
(American Standard Code for Information Interchange) —
This is the de facto 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.
Backbone
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.
See Also: Network
Bandwidth
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 15,000 bits in one second. Full-motion full-screen
video would require roughly 10,000,000 bits-per-second, depending on compression.
See Also: 56K Line , Bps
, Bit , T-1
Baud
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 -
so a 2400 bit-per-second modem actually runs at 300 baud, but it moves 4
bits per baud (4 x 300 = 1200 bits per second).
See Also: Bit , Modem
BBS
(Bulletin Board System) — 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. There are many thousands (millions?)
of BBS's 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 CompuServe gets crossed at some point, but it is
not clearly drawn.
Bi-directional
In the Cable Modem world, bi-directional capability, is the ability to transmit
and receive data using just the the coax/rf. In other words no telephone
line needed.
Binhex
(BINary HEXadecimal) — A method for converting
non-text files (non-ASCII) into ASCII. This is needed because Internet
e-mail can only handle ASCII.
See Also: ASCII
Bit
(Binary DigIT) — A single digit number in
base-2, in other words, either a 1 or a zero. The smallest unit of computerized
data. Bandwidth is usally measured in bits-per-second.
See Also: Bandwidth , Bps
, Byte , Kilobyte
, Megabyte
BITNET
(Because It's Time NETwork) — A network
of educational sites seperate from the Internet, but e-mail is freely exchanged
between BITNET and the Internet. Listservs, the most popular
form of e-mail discussion groups, originated on BITNET. BITNET machines
are IBM VM machines, and the network is probably the only international
network that is shrinking.
Bps
(Bits-Per-Second) — A measurement of how
fast data is moved from one place to another. A "28.8 modem"
can move 28,800 bits per second.
See Also: Bandwidth , Bit
Browser
A client program (software) that is used to looking at various kinds
of Internet resources.
See Also: Client , URL
, WWW
BTW
(By The Way) — A shorthand appended to a
comment written in an online forum.
See Also: IMHO , TTFN
Byte
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.
Cable Modem
A "Cable Modem" is a device that allows high-speed access to the
Internet via a cable TV (CATV) network. A cable modem will typically have
two connections, one to the cable wall outlet and the other to a computer
(PC).
Client
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.
See Also: Server
Cyberpunk
Cyberpunk was originally a cultural sub-genre of science fiction taking
place in a not-so-distant, utopian, 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.
See Also: Cyberspace
Cyberspace
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.
Digerati
The digital version of literati, it is a reference to a vague cloud of people
seen to be knowlegeable, hip, or otherwise in-the-know in regards to the
digital revolution.
DOCSIS
Now known as CableLabs Certified Cable Modems, DOCSIS (Data Over Cable Service
Interface Specifications) is a A Tour of the Internet, Who Runs It, Standards
Org interface for cable modem, the devices that handle incoming and outgoing
data signals between a cable TV operator and a personal or business computer
or television set. DOCSIS 1.0 was ratified by the International Telecommunication
Union (ITU-TS) in March of 1998. Although "DOCSIS" continues to
be used, the newer name emphasizes that the standard is now being used to
certify the products of cable modem makers. Cable modems conforming to DOCSIS
are now being marketed.
Cable operators whose existing customers have non-standard cable modems
can handle them by adding backwards-compatible support to the DOCSIS card
at the cable operator's end. As DOCSIS continues to evolve to new versions,
existing modems can be upgraded to the newer versions by changing the programming
in the cable modem's electrically erasable programmable read-only memory
memory. DOCSIS-compliant cable modems are being integrated into set-top
box for use with television sets. DOCSIS must also support or converge with
the high definition television (high definition television) standard. The
set-top box itself follows a standard known as OpenCable.
DOCSIS specifies schemes and the protocol for exchanging bidirectional signals
over cable. It supports downstream-to-the-user data rates up to 27 Mbps
(megabits per second). Since this data rate is shared by a number of users
and because many cable operators will be limited by a connection to the
Internet, the actual downstream data rate to an individual business or home
will be more like 1.5 to 3 Mbps. Since the upstream data flow has to support
much smaller amounts of data from the user, it's designed for an aggregate
data rate of 10 Mbps with individual data rates between 500 Kbps and 2.5
Mbps.
Domain Name
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.
Usually, all of the machines on a given Network will have the same
thing as the right-hand portion of their Domain Names, e.g.
gateway.gbnetwork.com
mail.gbnetwork.com
www.gbnetwork.com
and so on. 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.
See Also: IP Number
E-mail
(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 (Mailing List).
See Also: Listserv , Maillist
Ethernet
A very common method of networking computers in a LAN. Ethernet will handle
about 10,000,000 bits-per-second and can be used with almost any kind of
computer.
See Also: Bandwidth , LAN
FAQ
(Frequently Asked Questions) — 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 Groooming and Cryptography.
FAQs are usually written by people who have tired of answering the same
question over and over.
FDDI
(Fiber Distributed Data Interface) — 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 Ethernet, about twice as fast
as T-3).
See Also: Bandwidth , Ethernet
, T-1 , T-3
Finger
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.
Fire Wall
A combination of hardware and software that seperates a LAN into two or
more parts for security purposes.
See Also: Network , LAN
Flame
Originally, flame meant to carry forth in a passionate manner in the spirit
of honorable descent. They 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 wittless or crude.
See Also: Flame War
Flame War
When an online discussion degenerates into a series of personal attacks
against the debators, rather than discussion of their positions. A heated
exchange.
See Also: Flame
FTP
(File Transfer Protocol) — A very common
method of moving files between two Internet sites. FTP is a special way
to login to another Internet site for the purposes of retrieving
and/or sending files. There are many Internet sites that have established
pubicly 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".
Gateway
The technical meaning is a hardware or software set-up that translates between
two dissimilar protocols, for example Prodigy 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.
Gopher
A widely successful method of making menus of material available over the
Internet. 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 is being largely
supplanted to 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.
See Also: Client , Server
, WWW , Hypertext
Host
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 WWW and USENET.
See Also: Node , Network
HTML
(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,
additionally, in HTML you can specify that a block of text, or a word, is
"linked" to another file on the Internet. HTML files are meant
to be viewed using a World Wide Web Client Program, such as Mosaic.
See Also: Client , Server
, WWW
HTTP
(HyperText Transport Protocol) — 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).
See Also: Client , Server
, WWW
Hypertext
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.
IMHO
(In My Humble Opinion) — 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 may such shorthands in common use online,
especially in discussion forums.
See Also: TTFN , BTW
Internet
(Upper case I) The vast collection of inter-connected networks that all
use the TCP/IP protocols and that evolved from the ARPANET of the
late 60's and early 70's. The Internet now (July 1995) connects roughly
60,000 independant networks into a vast global internet.
See Also: internet
internet
(Lower case i) Any time you connect 2 or more networks together,
you have an internet - as in inter-national or inter-state.
See Also: Internet
IP Number (or IP Address)
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.
Most machines also have one or more Domain Names that are easier
for people to remember.
See Also: Domain Name , Internet
IRC
(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".
ISDN
(Integrated Services Digital Network) — Basically
a way to move more data over existing regular phone lines. ISDN is rapidly
becoming 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 56,000 or 64,000 bits-per-second.
ISP
(Internet Service Provider) — An institution
that provides access to the Internet in some form, usually for money.
See Also: Internet
Kilobyte
A thousand bytes. Actually, usually 1024 (2^10) bytes.
See Also: Byte , Bit
LAN
(Local Area Network) — A computer network
limited to the immediate area, usually the same building or floor of a building.
See Also: Ethernet
Leased-line
Refers to a phone line that is rented for exclusive 24-hour, 7-days-a-week
use from your location to another location. The highest speed data connections
require a leased line.
See Also: 56K Line , T-1
, T-3
Listserv
The most common kind of maillist, Listservs originated on BITNET
but they are now common on the Internet.
See Also: BITNET , E-mail
, Maillist
Login
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 entering into a computer system, e.g. "Login
to the WELL and then go to the GBN conference."
See Also: Password
Maillist
(or Mailing List) A (usually automated) system that allows people to send
e-mail to one address, whereupon their message is copied and sent
to all of the other subscribers to the maillist. In this way, people who
have many different kinds of e-mail access can participate in discussions
together.
Megabyte
A million bytes. A thousand kilobytes.
See Also: Byte , Bit
, Kilobyte
Modem
(MOdulator, DEModulator) — A device that
you connect to your computer and to a phone line, that allows the computer
to talk to other computers through the phone system. Basically, modems do
for computers what a telephone does for humans.
MOO
(Mud, Object Oriented) — One of several kinds
of multi-user role-playing environments, so far only text-based.
See Also: MUD , MUSE
Mosaic
The first WWW browser that was available for the Macintosh, Windows,
and UNIX all with the same interface. "Mosaic" really started
the popularity of the Web. The source-code to Mosaic has been licensed by
several companies and there are several other pieces of software as good
or better than Mosaic, most notably, "Netscape".
See Also: Browser , Client
, WWW
MUD
(Multi-User Dungeon or Dimension) — A (usually
text-based) multi-user simulation environment. Some are purely for fun and
flirting, others are used for serious software development, or education
purposes and all that lies in between. A significant feature of most MUDs
is that users can create things that stay after they leave and which other
users can interact with in their absence, thus allowing a "world"
to be built gradually and collectively.
See Also: MOO , MUSE
MUSE
One kind of MUD — usually with little or
no violence.
See Also: MOO , MUD
Netiquette
The etiquette on the Internet.
See Also: Internet
Netizen
Derived from the term citizen, referring to a citizen of the Internet,
or someone who uses networked resources. The term cannotes civic responsibility
and participation.
See Also: Internet
Network
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.
See Also: Internet
Newsgroup
The name for discussion groups on.
See Also: Usenet
NIC
(Network Interface Card) — A network interface
card (NIC) is a computer circuit board or card that is installed in a computer
so that it can be connected to a network. Personal computers and workstations
on local area networks (LANS) typically contain a network interface card
specifically designed for the LAN transmission technology, such as Ethernet
or Token Ring, Network interface cards provide a dedicated, full-time connection
to a network.
We require a 10/100 baseT Ethernet Card - NIC compliant to IEEE802.3 most
standard NIC cards meet this requirement.
Node
Any single computer connected to a network.
See Also: Network , Internet
, internet
Packet Switching
The method used to move data around on the Internet. In packet switching,
all the data coming out of a machine is broken up into chunks, each chunk
has the address of where it came from and where it is going. This enables
chunks of data from many different sources to co-mingle on the same lines,
and be sorted and directed to different routes by special machines along
the way. This way many people can use the same lines at the same time.
Password
A code used to gain access to a locked system. Good passwords contain letters
and non-letters and are not simple combinations such as "virtue7".
A good password might be: Hot$1-6
See Also: Login
POP
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 dialup 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 the way e-mail software such
as Eudora gets mail from a mail server. When you obtain a SLIP, PPP, or
shell account 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.
See Also: SLIP , PPP
Port
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 person
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/
which 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.
See Also: Domain Name , Server
, URL
Posting
A single message entered into a network communications system.
EX: A single message "posted" to a newsgroup or message
board.
See Also: Newsgroup
PPP
(Point to Point Protocol) — Most well known
as a protocol that allows a computer to use a regular telephone line and
a modem to make TCP/IP connection and thus be really and truly
on the Internet.
See Also: IP Number , Internet
, SLIP , TCP/IP
RFC
(Request For Comments) — The name of the
result and the process for creating a standard on the Internet. New
standards are proposed and published on line, as a "Request For Comments".
The Internet Engineering Task Force is a consensus-building body that facilitates
discussion, and eventually a new standard is established, but the reference
number/name for the standard retains the acronym "RFC", e.g. the
official standard for e-mail is RFC 822.
Router
A special-purpose computer (or software package) that handles the connection
between 2 or more networks. Routers spend all their time looking
at the destination addresses of the packets passing through them
and deciding which route to send them on.
See Also: Network , Packet
Switching
Server
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 mahchne
could have several different server software packages running on it, thus
providing many different servers to clients on the network.
See Also: Client , Network
SLIP
(Serial Line Internet Protocol) — A standard
for using a regular telephone line (a "serial line") and a modem
to connect a computer as a real Internet site. SLIP is gradually
being replaced by PPP.
See Also: Internet , PPP
SMDS
(Switched Multimegabit Data Service) — A
new standard for very high-speed data transfer.
Spam (or Spamming)
An inappropriate attempt to use a mailing list, or USENET
or other networked communications facility as if it was a broadcast medium
(which it is not) by sending the same message to a large number of people
who didn't ask for it. The term probably comes from a famous Monty Python
skit which featured the word "spam" repeated over and over. The
term may also have come from someone's low opinion of the food product with
the same name, which is generally perceived as a generic content-free waste
of resources. (Spam is a registered trademark of Hormel Corporation, for
its processed meat product.)
EX: Mary spammed 50 USENET groups by posting the same message to each.
See Also: Maillist , Usenet
Sysop
(Systems Operator) — Anyone responsible for
the physical operations of a computer system or network resource. A System
Administrator decides how often backups and maintenance should be performed
and the System Operator performs those tasks.
T-1
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 is the fastest speed commonly used to connect networks to the
Internet.
See Also: 56K , Bandwidth
, Bit , Byte
, Ethernet , T-3
T-3
A leased-line connection capable of carrying data at 45,000,000 bits-per-second.
This is more than enough to do full-screen, full-motion video.
See Also: 56K , Bandwidth
, Bit , Byte
, Ethernet , T-3
TCP/IP
(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 available
for every major kind of computer operating system. To be truly on the Internet,
your computer must have TCP/IP software.
See Also: IP Number , Internet
, UNIX
Telco-return
Using an analog modem (usually builit inside a cable modem) to establish
upstream (return) connectivity.
Telnet
The command and program used to login from one Internet site
to another. The telnet commmand/program gets you to the "login:"
prompt of another host.
Terminal
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.
Terminal Server
A special purpose computer that has places to plug in many modems
on one side, and a connection to a LAN or host machine on
the other side. Thus the terminal server does the work of answering the
calls and passes the connections on to the appropriate node. Most
terminal servers can provide PPP or SLIP services if connected
to the Internet.
See Also: LAN , Modem
, Host , Node
, PPP , SLIP
TTFN
(Ta Ta For Now) — A shorthand appended to
a comment written in an online forum.
See Also: IMHO , BTW
UNIX
A computer operating system (the basic software running on a computer, underneath
things like word processors and spreadsheets). UNIX is designed to be used
by many people at the same time (it is "multi-user") and has TCP/IP
built-in. It is the most common operating system for servers on the
Internet.
URL
(Uniform Resource Locator) — The standard
way to give the address of any resource on the Internet that is part of
the World Wide Web (WWW). A URL looks like this:
http://www.matisse.net/seminars.html
or
telnet://well.sf.ca.us
or
news:new.newusers.questions
etc.
The most common way to use a URL is to enter into a WWW browser program,
such as Netscape, or Lynx.
See Also: Browser , WWW
USB Ethernet Adapter
An external Network Interface Card which interfaces to your computer using
the USB (Universal Serial Bus) port.
Usenet
A world-wide system of discussion groups, with comments passed among hundreds
of thousands of machines. Not all Usenet machines are on the Internet,
maybe half. Usenet is completely decentralized, with over 10,000 discussion
areas, called newsgroups.
See Also: Newsgroup
Veronica
(Very Easy Rodent Oriented Net-wide Index to Computerized Archives) —
Developed at the University of Nevada, Veronica is a constantly updated
database of the names of almost every menu item on thousands of gopher
servers. The Veronica database can be searched from most major gopher
menus.
See Also: Gopher
WAIS
(Wide Area Information Servers) — A commercial
software package that allows the indexing of huge quantities of information,
and then making those indices searchable across networks such as
the Internet. A prominent feature of WAIS is that the search results
are ranked ('scored") according to how relevant the "hits"
are, and that subsequent searches can find "more stuff like that last
batch" and thus refine the search process.
WAN
(Wide Area Network) — Any internet
or network that covers an area larger than a single building or campus.
See Also: Internet , internet
, LAN , Network
WORM
A worm is a self-replicating virus that does not alter files but resides
in active memory and duplicates itself. Worms use parts of an operating
system that are automatic and usually invisible to the user. It is common
for worms to be noticed only when their uncontrolled replication consumes
system resources, slowing or halting other tasks.
WWW
(World Wide Web) — Two meanings - First,
loosely used: the whole constellation of resources that can be accessed
using Gopher, FTP, HTTP, telnet, Usenet, WAIS and some other tools.
Second, the universe of hypertext servers (HTTP servers) which are
the servers that allow text, graphics, sound files, etc. to be mixed together.
See Also: Browser , FTP
, Gopher , HTTP
, Telnet , URL
, WAIS
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