The PEGG

February 2002

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Whats Online

APPEGGA Members Surf Their Site

Talking the Talk
A Brief Glossary of Common Web Terms

Bandwidth
Although it has a number of technical definitions, bandwidth has become a general shorthand term for "Internet airtime." Posters to newsgroups will say, "Sorry for wasting bandwidth" if they posted something in error. Disliked items may be criticized for "burning bandwidth."

Banner
Marks a place where the reader can click to get more information. Very popular sites actually sell banner space on their pages as advertisements.

Bookmark
An address book entry for a Web address. Some browsers call this a favourite place or a hot spot. Most browsers contain a simple "address book" where the reader can store addresses favourite places. Click on the name of the place, and the browser automatically goes there, like an online phone book with an autodialer.

Browser
An essential tool of the Web. It's the software program that runs on your computer and lets you see Web pages. Sometimes, in an effort to gain a competitive edge, a browser manufacturer introduces features that are incompatible with other browsers.

Cache
A file on your computer that stores a copy of things you've asked for recently. If you ask for the same thing again, the computer will, instead of issuing another Internet request, use the copy from the Cache, sometimes saving as much as 10 or 20 seconds.

Click, Click On, Double Click, Left Click, Right Click
Mouse functions you use to make selections, start programs or otherwise operate your computer.

Content
Editorial information found the Web, as opposed to Web advertising.

Cookies
An information tracking system that tells a site you've been there before. Cookies are located on your browser, and interact with their specific sites only, and only when you visit those sites. The server and the site do not keep the information between visits or send it elsewhere. The cookie merely makes your visit more efficient by "remembering" what you did there before.

E-Mail Marketing
A system of marketing that directs advertising to e-mail addresses. Not always popular, this junk mail tends to clutter up electronic mailboxes. When a marketer hits many addresses at once, this is also referred to as "spam."

Flame, Flame War
A nasty note, or hostile letter, either written to a public forum or sent privately. A flame war is an exchange of this type of note between two people.

Frames
A way of dividing a browser window into two or more parts. This allows the reader to scroll through one part while leaving another part available at all times.

Hit
A hit on a website is one "visit" from a reader. Different statistical packages count hits differently, but in theory a hit is one visit to one site, no matter how many of the site's pages are opened. If the same reader visits nine times, that's counted as nine hits.

Hypertext
Text that, when clicked on, jumps the reader to somewhere else. Appears not only on-line but also in your e-mail.

Internet Access
Internet Access Provider (IAP)
Internet Services Provider (ISP)
When it comes to the Internet, think of computer plus your modem as your "phone" - so your access account will come from an Internet services provider, much like the phone company opens an account in your name to allow you to start making calls.

Intranet
When a company or other group uses Internet technology to deliver information to a closed group of its own employees or members, the system is called an Intranet system. APEGGA's site, however, is Internet, because the public has access.

Jump Page
A Web page whose primary purpose is to allow you to "jump" to another location. Serves as a reminder that you're leaving one place and headed to another.

Keywords
Words that appear in a site and are searchable from search engines. If you have a site about dogs, the keyword "dog" in a search engine should bring a computer user to your site.

Link, Reciprocal Link
Normally a hypertext entry that lets the reader jump to a new location. In current Web use, it specifically means a Web address, or URL, which, when clicked on, transfers the reader to that location.

Online Brochure
A small, simple website, the online equivalent of a business envelope-sized paper brochure. This is essentially a description of a business, product, or service, with an e-mail link to allow customers to get more information.

Open Web
This term normally refers to those Web addresses that are available to anyone with Internet access. For example, some America Online information is available only to America Online members.

Reach
Commonly used in Web marketing to show the degree of penetration into a target audience. It can be given as either a number of individuals or as a percentage.

Screen Resolutions (640 x 480, 800 x 600)
Printers print in "dots per inch," to explain the detail or quality of their pictures. The same type of measurements hold true for computer screens, but there it's called screen resolution

Search Engines
The automated card catalogues of the Web. They keep huge files with short catalogue entries of literally millions of websites. Then, when you want to find information, the search engines do their best to make a list of all the entries that might be what you're looking for.

Secure Server
One that uses a special code to make sensitive information difficult to read for anyone not authorized to access it.

Shopping Cart
A program or a series of programs that let site visitors make selections from more than one page before sending in an order. Think of a site as the store, its pages as aisles and shelves, with shopping carts going up and down the aisles.

Spiders, Robots, Bots
Automated programs that explore the Web, looking for information. The most common kinds of spiders are the ones that collect Web addresses for the search engines to catalogue.

URL
A Universal Resource Location is just your Web address, much like a phone number. It's the way that people find you. Starts with http://, which gives the computer information to process the page it finds, followed by www for World Wide Web, followed by the domain (such as APEGGA.org). The .org part means non-profit, as opposed to .com, a commercial site, and several other endings.

website and Web Page
website is a collection of one or more Web pages. A Web page is a single file that can be displayed on the Web. Some Web pages are just a few lines of text. Some have as much text as several book pages.

WWW
Stands for World Wide Web. This is the same as the open Web. Most people use the terms Web and World Wide Web interchangeably. Strictly speaking, the Web and the Internet are slightly different. The Web is the form of the Internet most people use: the one with pictures, and sometimes moving pictures and sounds, as well as text.