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W

• World Wide WebThe World Wide Web (commonly shortened to the Web) is a system of interlinked hypertext documents accessed via the Internet. With a Web browser, a user views Web pages that may contain text, images, videos, and other multimedia and navigates between them using hyperlinks. The World Wide Web was created in 1989 by Sir Tim Berners-Lee, working at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. Since then, Berners-Lee has played an active role in guiding the development of Web standards (such as the markup languages in which Web pages are composed), and in recent years has advocated his vision of a Semantic Web. 

• Web Robots or SpidersA web crawler (also known as a web spider or web robot or – especially in the FOAF community – web scutter) is a program or automated script which browses the World Wide Web in a methodical, automated manner. Other less frequently used names for web crawlers are ants, automatic indexers, bots, and worms. This process is called web crawler or spidering. Many sites, in particular search engines, use spidering as a means of providing up-to-date data. Web crawlers are mainly used to create a copy of all the visited pages for later processing by a search engine that will index the downloaded pages to provide fast searches. Crawlers can also be used for automating maintenance tasks on a website, such as checking links or validating HTML code. Also, crawlers can be used to gather specific types of information from Web pages, such as harvesting e-mail addresses (usually for spam). 

• WikiA wiki is a collection of web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content, using a simplified markup language. Wikis are often used to create collaborative websites and to power community websites. For example, the collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia is one of the best known wikis. Wikis are used in businesses to provide affordable and effective intranets and for Knowledge Management. Ward Cunningham, developer of the first wiki software, WikiWikiWeb, originally described it as “the simplest online database that could possibly work”. 

• Web 2Web 2.0 is a term describing the trend in the use of World Wide Web technology and web design that aims to enhance creativity, information sharing, and, most notably, collaboration among users. These concepts have led to the development and evolution of web-based communities and hosted services, such as social-networking sites, wikis, blogs, and folksonomies. The term became notable after the first O’Reilly Media Web 2.0 conference in 2004.[2] [3] Although the term suggests a new version of the World Wide Web, it does not refer to an update to any technical specifications, but to changes in the ways software developers and end-users use the Web. 

WiFiWi-Fi (IPA: /ˈwaɪfaɪ/) is the common name for a popular wireless technology used in home networks, mobile phones, video games and more. Wi-Fi is supported by nearly every modern personal computer operating system and most advanced game consoles. Web programmerA Web programmer translates the requirements of end-users and internal clients into a functional product. WebmasterThe webmaster (feminine: webmistress), also called the web architect, the web developer, the site author, or the website administrator, is the person responsible for designing, developing, marketing, or maintaining a website.Webmasters are practitioners of web communication. Typically, they are generalists with HTML expertise who manage all aspects of Web operations.On larger sites, the webmaster will act as a coordinator and overseer to the activities of other people working on the site and is usually an employee of the owner of the Web site, hence webmaster can also be listed as an occupation. If the webmaster is hired by a larger Web site, or promoted to the position, they could do things from web design, to project management, or employee supervision. WYSIWYG EditorsWYSIWYG (pronounced /wɪziwɪg/ or /wɪzɪwɪg/), is an acronym for What You See Is What You Get, used in computing to describe a system in which content displayed during editing appears very similar to the final output, which might be a printed document, web page, slide presentation or even the lighting for a theatrical event. (WAI) Web Accessibility InitiativeThe World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)’s Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) is an effort to improve the accessibility of the World Wide Web (WWW or Web) for people using a wide range of user agent devices, not just standard web browsers. This is especially important for people with physical disabilities which require such devices to access the Web.The W3C was founded in 1994 to advance the Web. It is responsible for the development of uniform protocols to assure the interoperability of the Web. The WAI, part of the W3C, has developed a number of guidelines that can help to make Web sites more accessible, especially from the view of physically disabled people. Web Safe PaletteWeb colors are colors used in designing web pages, and the methods for describing and specifying those colors.Authors of web pages have a variety of options available for specifying colors for elements of web documents. Colors may be specified as an RGB triplet in hexadecimal format (a hex triplet); they may also be specified according to their common English names in some cases. Often a color tool or other graphics software is used to generate color values. Windows MediaWindows Media is a multimedia framework for media creation and distribution for Microsoft Windows. It consists of a software development kit with several application programming interfaces and a number of prebuilt technologies. Web BannerA web banner or banner ad is a form of advertising on the World Wide Web. This form of online advertising entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. It is intended to attract traffic to a website by linking them to the web site of the advertiser. The advertisement is constructed from an image (GIF, JPEG, PNG), JavaScript program or multimedia object employing technologies such as Silverlight, Java, Shockwave or Flash, often employing animation or sound to maximize presence. Images are usually in a high-aspect ratio shape (i.e. either wide and short, or tall and narrow) hence the reference to banners. These images are usually placed on web pages that have interesting content, such as a newspaper article or an opinion piece. XXHTMLThe Extensible Hypertext Markup Language, or XHTML, is a markup language that has the same depth of expression as HTML, but also conforms to XML syntax. XMLThe Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a general-purpose specification for creating custom markup languages. It is classified as an extensible language because it allows its users to define their own elements. Its primary purpose is to facilitate the sharing of structured data across different information systems, particularly via the Internet, and it is used both to encode documents and to serialize data. In the latter context, it is comparable with other text-based serialization languages such as JSON and YAML.  YYahooYahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) is an American public corporation incorporated in Sunnyvale, California and a global Internet services company. It provides a range of products and services including a Web portal, a search engine, the Yahoo! Directory, Yahoo! Mail, news, and posting. It was founded by Stanford University graduate students Jerry Yang and David Filo in January of 1994 and incorporated on March 1, 1995. The company is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California in Silicon Valley. ZZip ArchiveThe ZIP file format is a popular lossless data compression and archival format. A ZIP file contains one or more files that have been compressed, to reduce their file size, or stored as-is. A number of compression algorithms are permitted in zip files but as of 2008 only DEFLATE is widely used and supported.

U

USB Port

Universal Serial Bus (USB) is a serial bus standard to interface devices. USB was designed to allow many peripherals to be connected using a single standardized interface socket and to improve the plug-and-play capabilities by allowing devices to be connected and disconnected without rebooting the computer (hot swapping). Other convenient features include providing power to low-consumption devices without the need for an external power supply and allowing many devices to be used without requiring manufacturer specific, individual device drivers to be installed.

URL

Uniform Resource Locator (URL), also known as Universal Resource Locator, is a technical, Web-related term used in two distinct meanings:

In popular usage and many technical documents, it is a synonym for Uniform Resource Identifier (URI). In popular usage, it means a web page address.

Strictly, it is a compact string of characters for a resource available via the Internet[1]. The idea of a uniform syntax for global identifiers of network-retrievable documents was the core idea of the World Wide Web. In the early times, these identifiers were variously called “document names”, “Web addresses” and “Uniform Resource Locators”. These names were misleading, however, because not all identifiers were locators, and even for those that were, this was not their defining characteristic. Nevertheless, by the time the RFC 1630 formally defined the term “URI” as a generic term best suited to the concept, the term “URL” had gained widespread popularity, which has continued to this day.

Upload

Uploading and downloading are related terms used to describe the transfer of electronic data between two computers or similar systems. More colloquially, they are sometimes applied to transfers to/from removable media such as CDs.

V

Vodcast

Video podcast (sometimes shortened to vidcast or vodcast) is a term used for the online delivery of video on demand video clip content via Atom or RSS enclosures. The term is an evolution specialized for video, coming from the generally audio-based podcast and referring to the distribution of video where the RSS feed is used as a non-linear TV channel to which consumers can subscribe using a PC, TV, set-top box, media center or mobile multimedia device.

Vector Graphics

Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and shapes or polygon(s), which are all based upon mathematical equations, to represent images in computer graphics.

Vector graphics formats are complementary to raster graphics, which is the representation of images as an array of pixels, as it is typically used for the representation of photographic images. There are instances when working with vector tools and formats is best practice, and instances when working with raster tools and formats is best practice. There are times when both formats come together. An understanding of the advantages and limitations of each technology and the relationship between them is most likely to result in efficient and effective use of tools.

Video Card

A video card, also referred to as a graphics accelerator card, display adapter, graphics card, and numerous other terms, is an item of personal computer hardware whose function is to generate and output images to a display. It operates on similar principles as a sound card or other peripheral devices.

Virtual memory

Virtual memory is a computer system technique which gives an application program the impression that it has contiguous working memory, while in fact may be physically fragmented and may even overflow on to disk storage. Systems that use this technique make programming of large applications easier and use real physical memory (e.g. RAM) more efficiently than those without virtual memory.

S

Search Engine

A Web search engine is a search engine designed to search for information on the World Wide Web. Information may consist of web pages, images and other types of files.

Some search engines also mine data available in newsgroups, databases, or open directories. Unlike Web directories, which are maintained by human editors, search engines operate algorithmically or are a mixture of algorithmic and human input.

Scripting Languages

A scripting language, script language or extension language, is a programming language that controls a software application. “Scripts” are often treated as distinct from “programs“, which execute independently from any other application. At the same time they are distinct from the core code of the application, which is usually written in a different language, and by being accessible to the end user they enable the behavior of the application to be adapted to the user’s needs. Scripts are often, but not always, interpreted from the source code or “semi-compiled” to bytecode which is interpreted, unlike the applications they are associated with, which are traditionally compiled to native machine code for the system on which they run. Scripting languages are nearly always embedded in the application with which they are associated.

Spam

Spamming is the abuse of electronic messaging systems to indiscriminately send unsolicited bulk messages. While the most widely recognized form of spam is e-mail spam, the term is applied to similar abuses in other media: instant messaging spam, Usenet newsgroup spam, Web search engine spam, spam in blogs, wiki spam, mobile phone messaging spam, Internet forum spam and junk fax transmissions.

SSL (Secure Sockets Layer)

Transport Layer Security (TLS) and its predecessor, Secure Sockets Layer (SSL), are cryptographic protocols that provide secure communications on the Internet for such things as web browsing, e-mail, Internet faxing, instant messaging and other data transfers. There are slight differences between SSL and TLS, but they are essentially the same.

Streaming Media

Streaming multimedia is multimedia that is constantly received by, and normally displayed to, the end-user while it is being delivered by the provider (the term “to display” is used in this article in a general sense that includes audio playback.) The name refers to the delivery method of the medium rather than to the medium itself. The distinction is usually applied to media that are distributed over telecommunications networks, as most other delivery systems are either inherently streaming (e.g. radio, television) or inherently non-streaming (e.g. books, video cassettes, audio CDs). The verb ‘to stream’ is also derived from this term, meaning to deliver media in this manner.

Scanner

In computing, a scanner is a device that optically scans images, printed text, handwriting, or an object, and converts it to a digital image. Common examples found in offices are variations of the desktop (or flatbed) scanner where the document is placed on a glass window for scanning. Hand-held scanners, where the device is moved by hand, were briefly popular but are now less common due to the difficulty of obtaining a high-quality image. Mechanically driven scanners that move the document are typically used for large-format documents, where a flatbed design would be impractical.

Stop Frame Animation

Stop motion (or frame-by-frame) animation is a general term for an animation technique which makes a physically manipulated object appear to move on its own. The object is moved by extremely small amounts between individually photographed frames, creating the illusion of movement when the series of frames are played as a continuous sequence. Clay figures are often used in stop motion animations, known as claymation, for their ease of repositioning. Software applications such as Stop Motion Pro, istopmotion and monkeyjam have made the technique popular among young filmmakers.

Stock Photos

Stock photography consists of existing photographs that can be licensed for specific uses. Publishers, advertising agencies, graphic artists, and others use stock photography to fulfill the needs of their creative assignments.

A customer who uses stock photography instead of hiring a photographer can save time and money, but can also sacrifice creative control. Stock images can be presented in searchable online databases, purchased online, and delivered via download or email.

A collection of stock photography may also be called a photo archive, picture library, image bank or photo bank. As modern stock photography distributors often carry stills, video, and illustrations, none of the existing terminology provides a perfect match.

Software Calibration

Calibration is the process of establishing the relationship between a measuring device and the units of measure. This is done by comparing a device or the output of an instrument to a standard having known measurement characteristics. For example the length of a stick can be calibrated by comparing it to a standard that has a known length. Once the relationship of the stick to the standard is known the stick can be used to measure the length of other things.

Saturation

Saturation or saturated generally means “thoroughly full”, while unsaturated means less than full.

SLR Camera

The single-lens reflex (SLR) camera uses an automatic moving mirror system which permits the photographer to see exactly what will be captured by the film or digital imaging system, as opposed to non-SLR cameras where the view through the viewfinder could be significantly different from what was captured on film.

Scrolling

In computer graphics and television, scrolling or text crawling is the act of sliding a horizontal or vertical presentation of content, such as text, drawings, or images, across a screen or display window. Scrolling is often used to show large amounts of data that could not fit on the viewport all at the same time, this is commonly used in window-based computer displays. The word scroll is derived from the way in which people read scrolls of paper, by rolling up the top of the page and allowing objects lower on the page to move up. Smooth scrolling refers to a scrolling display where text appears smoothly, rather than appearing as a whole line at a time.

T

Thumbnail

Thumbnails are reduced-size versions of pictures, used to make it easier to scan and recognize them, serving the same role for images as a normal text index does for words. Visual search engines and image-organizing programs normally use them, as can some modern operating systems or desktop environments, such as Windows XP, KDE, and GNOME.

Tiff File

Tagged Image File Format (abbreviated TIFF) is a file format for storing images, including photographs and line art. It is now under the control of Adobe Systems. Originally created by the company Aldus[1] for use with what was then called “desktop publishing”, the TIFF format is widely supported by image-manipulation applications, by publishing and page layout applications, by scanning, faxing, word processing, optical character recognition and other applications.  

 Adobe Systems, which acquired Aldus, now holds the copyright to the TIFF specification. TIFF has not had a major update since 1992, though several Aldus/Adobe technical notes have been published with minor extensions to the format, and several specifications, including TIFF/EP, have been based on the TIFF 6.0 specification.

Typography

Typography is the art, craft and techniques of type design, modifying type glyphs, and arranging type. Type glyphs (characters) are created and modified using a variety of illustration techniques. The arrangement of type is the selection of typefaces, point size, line length, leading (line spacing) and letter spacing.

Typography is performed by typesetters, compositors, typographers, graphic artists, art directors, and clerical workers. Until the Digital Age, typography was a specialized occupation. Digitization opened up typography to new generations of visual designers and lay users.

TCP/IP

The TCP/IP Model is a specification for computer network protocols created in the 1970s by DARPA, an agency of the United States Department of Defense. It laid the foundations for ARPANET, which was the world’s first wide area network and a predecessor of the Internet. The TCP/IP Model is sometimes called the Internet Reference Model, the DoD Model or the ARPANET Reference Model.

TCP/IP defines a set of rules to enable computers to communicate over a network. TCP/IP provides end to end connectivity specifying how data should be formatted, addressed, shipped, routed and delivered to the right destination. The specification defines protocols for different types of communication between computers and provides a framework for more detailed standards.

Text File

A text file (sometimes spelled “textfile”) is a kind of computer file that is structured as a sequence of lines. A text file exists within a computer file system. The end of a text file is denoted by placing one or more special characters, known as an end-of-file marker, after the last line in a text file.

Q

Quicktime

QuickTime is a multimedia framework developed by Apple Inc., capable of handling various formats of digital video, media clips, sound, text, animation, music, and several types of interactive panoramic images. Available for Classic Mac OS, Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows operating systems, it provides essential support for software packages including iTunes, QuickTime Player (which can also serve as a helper application for web browsers to play media files that might otherwise fail to open) and Safari.

Quick Mask Mode

Quick mask mode is a powerful way of selection in Photoshop. It is a selection based on the masking of the desired portion of an image. It is used for minute and accurate selections.

R

RGB

The RGB color model is an additive color model in which red, green, and blue light are added together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors. The name of the model comes from the initials of the three additive primary colors, red, green, and blue.

The main purpose of the RGB color model is for the sensing, representation, and display of images in electronic systems, such as televisions and computers, though it has also been used in conventional photography. Before the electronic age, the RGB color model already had a solid theory behind it, based in human perception of colors.

Resolution

The display resolution of a digital television or computer display typically refers to the number of distinct pixels in each dimension that can be displayed. It can be an ambiguous term especially as the displayed resolution is controlled by all different factors in cathode ray tube (CRT) and flat panel or projection displays using fixed picture-element (pixel) arrays.

Relative & Absolute URLS

Absolute URL

In addition to several other meanings, the word absolute, in English, means “not dependent on anything else”. It also means “free from doubt”. An Absolute URL is, thus, something that is independent or free from any relationship. When you use an absolute URL, you point directly to a file. Hence, an absolute URL specifies the exact location of a file/directory on the internet. It also follows that each absolute URL is unique, which means that if two URLs are identical, they point to the same file.

For example: http://www.webdevelopersnotes.com/images/email.gif specifies an image file email.gif located in the images directory, under www.webdevelopersnotes.com domain name. Similarly, the absolute URL of the document you are viewing is http://www.webdevelopersnotes.com/design/ relative_and_absolute_urls.php3 which is a page in the directory called design on this web site.

Relative URL

A relative URL points to a file/directory in relation to the present file/directory. Let us understand relative URLs through a small exercise. Look at the two URL above. We want to include (display) the image file email.gif stored in the images directory of www.webdevelopersnotes.com domain on this (relative_and_absolute_urls.php3 stored in the design directory) page. There are two ways to do this. We can either refer to it using an absolute URL or use a relative URL. The <IMG> tag for this image display will be as follows:

Using an Absolute URL in an <IMG> tag

<IMG src=http://www.webdevelopersnotes.com/images/email.gif width=”…” height=”…”>

Using a Relative URL in an <IMG> tag

<IMG src=”../images/email.gif” width=”…” height=”…”>

Raster Graphics

In computer graphics, a raster graphics image or bitmap, is a data structure representing a generally rectangular grid of pixels, or points of color, viewable via a monitor, paper, or other display medium. Raster images are stored in image files with varying formats (see Comparison of graphics file formats).

Rollover Button

RAM

Random access memory (usually known by its acronym, RAM) is a type of computer data storage. Today it takes the form of integrated circuits that allow the stored data to be accessed in any order, i.e. at random. The word random thus refers to the fact that any piece of data can be returned in a constant time, regardless of its physical location and whether or not it is related to the previous piece of data.

This contrasts with storage mechanisms such as tapes, magnetic discs and optical discs, which rely on the physical movement of the recording medium or a reading head. In these devices, the movement takes longer than the data transfer, and the retrieval time varies depending on the physical location of the next item.

O

OSP (Online Service Provider)

An online service provider can include internet service providers and web sites, such as Wikipedia‘s or Usenet (commonly accessed through Google Groups). In its original more limited definition it referred only to a commercial computer communication service in which paid members could dial via a computer modem the service’s private computer network and access various services and information resources such a bulletin boards, downloadable files and programs, news articles, chat rooms, and electronic mail services. The term “online service” was also used in references to these dial-up services. The traditional dial-up online service differed from the modern Internet service provider in that they provided a large degree of content that was only accessible by those who subscribed to the online service, while ISP mostly serves to provide access to the internet and generally provides little if any exclusive content of its own. In the U.S., the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act (OCILLA) portion of the U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act has expanded the legal definition of online service in two different ways for different portions of the law. It states in section 512(k)(1):

Open Source

Open source is a development methodology,[1] which offers practical accessibility to a product’s source (goods and knowledge). Some consider open source as one of various possible design approaches, while others consider it a critical strategic element of their operations. Before open source became widely adopted, developers and producers used a variety of phrases to describe the concept; the term open source gained popularity with the rise of the Internet, which provided access to diverse production models, communication paths, and interactive communities.

Opacity

Opacity is the measure of impenetrability to electromagnetic or other kinds of radiation, especially visible light. In radiative transfer, it describes the absorption and scattering of radiation in a medium, such as a plasma, dielectric, shielding material, glass, etc. An opaque object is neither transparent (allowing all light to pass through) nor translucent (allowing some light to pass through). When light strikes an interface between two substances, in general some may be reflected, some absorbed, some scattered, and the rest transmitted (also see refraction). An opaque substance transmits very little light, and therefore reflects, scatters, or absorbs most of it. Both mirrors and carbon black are opaque. Opacity depends on the frequency of the light being considered. For instance, some kinds of glass, while transparent in the visual range, are largely opaque to ultraviolet light. More extreme frequency-dependence is visible in the absorption lines of cold gases. In general, a material tends to emit light in the same proportions as it absorbs it.

P

Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop, or simply Photoshop, is a graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Systems. It is the current and primary market leader for commercial bitmap and image manipulation, and is the flagship product of Adobe Systems. It has been described as “an industry standard for graphics professionals”[1] and was one of the early “killer applications” on Macintosh.[2]

Photoshop CS3, the current tenth iteration of the program, was released on 16 April 2007. “CS” reflects its integration with other Creative Suite products, and the number “3″ represents it as the third version released since Adobe re-branded its products under the CS umbrella. Photoshop CS3 features additions such as the ability to apply non-destructive filters, as well as new selection tools named Quick Selection and Refine Edge that make selection more streamlined. On April 30th, Adobe released Photoshop CS3 Extended, which includes all the same features of Adobe Photoshop CS3 with the addition of capabilities for scientific imaging, 3D, and high end film and video users. The successor to Photoshop CS3, Photoshop CS4, will be the first 64-bit Photoshop.[

Portal

Web portal is a site that provides a single function via a web page or site. Web portals often function as a point of access to information on the World Wide Web. Portals present information from diverse sources in a unified way. Aside from the search engine standard, web portals offer other services such as e-mail, news, stock prices, infotainment and various other features. Portals provide a way for enterprises to provide a consistent look and feel with access control and procedures for multiple applications, which otherwise would have been different entities altogether. An example of a web portal is Yahoo!

Plug In

A plugin (plug-in, addin, add-in, addon, add-on or snap-in; but see extension) is a computer program that interacts with a host application (a web browser or an email client, for example) to provide a certain, usually very specific, function "on demand". Applications support plugins for many reasons. Some of the main reasons include: enabling third-party developers to create capabilities to extend an application, to support features yet unforeseen, reducing the size of an application, and separating source code from an application because of incompatible software licenses.

Podcast

A podcast is a series of digital-media files which are distributed over the Internet using syndication feeds for playback on portable media players and computers. The term podcast, like broadcast, can refer either to the series of content itself or to the method by which it is syndicated; the latter is also called podcasting. The host or author of a podcast is often called a podcaster.

Pixel

In digital imaging, a pixel (picture element[1]) is the smallest piece of information in an image. Pixels are normally arranged in a regular 2-dimensional grid, and are often represented using dots or squares. Each pixel is a sample of an original image, where more samples typically provide a more accurate representation of the original. The intensity of each pixel is variable; in color systems, each pixel has typically three or four components such as red, green, and blue, or cyan, magenta, yellow, and black.

PNG file

Portable Network Graphics (PNG) is a bitmapped image format that employs lossless data compression. PNG was created to improve upon and replace the GIF format, as an image-file format not requiring a patent license. PNG is pronounced /ˈpɪŋ/ both P-N-G and ping. The PNG initialism is optionally recursive, unofficially standing for “PNG’s Not GIF”. PNG supports palette-based (palettes of 24-bit RGB colors), greyscale or RGB images. PNG was designed for transferring images on the Internet, not professional graphics, and so does not support other color spaces (such as CMYK). PNG files nearly always use file-extension “PNG” or “png” and are assigned MIME media type “image/png” (approved October 14, 1996).

Pixelated

In computer graphics, pixelation (or pixellation in British English) is an effect caused by displaying a bitmap or a section of a bitmap at such a large size that individual pixels, small single-colored square display elements that comprise the bitmap, are visible to the eye. A picture that this has happened to has been pixelated.

PDF File

The Portable Document Format (PDF) is the file format created by Adobe Systems in 1993 for document exchange. PDF is a fixed-layout format used for representing two-dimensional documents in a manner independent of the application software, hardware, and operating system.[1] Each PDF file encapsulates a complete description of a 2-D document (and, with Acrobat 3-D, embedded 3-D documents) that includes the text, fonts, images, and 2-D vector graphics that compose the documents.

Proxy Server

In computer networks, a proxy server is a server (a computer system or an application program) which services the requests of its clients by forwarding requests to other servers. A client connects to the proxy server, requesting some service, such as a file, connection, web page, or other resource, available from a different server. The proxy server provides the resource by connecting to the specified server and requesting the service on behalf of the client. A proxy server may optionally alter the client’s request or the server’s response, and sometimes it may serve the request without contacting the specified server. In this case, it would ‘cache’ the first request to the remote server, so it could save the information for later, and make everything as fast as possible.

M

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) (SEHK: 4338) is an American multinational computer technology corporation. It develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of software products for computing devices.[9][8] Microsoft’s best-selling products are the Microsoft Windows operating system and the Microsoft Office suite of productivity software. These products have prominent positions in their respective markets, with market share estimates as high as 90% or more for Microsoft Windows as of 2006 and for Microsoft Office as of 2003.[citation needed] One of Bill Gates‘ key visions for the company is “to get a workstation running our software onto every desk and eventually in every home

Memory Stick

Memory Stick is a removable flash memory card format, launched by Sony in October 1998 [1], and is also used in general to describe the whole family of Memory Sticks. In addition to the original Memory Stick, this family includes the Memory Stick PRO, a revision that allows greater maximum storage capacity and faster file transfer speeds; Memory Stick Duo, a small-form-factor version of the Memory Stick (including the PRO Duo); and the even smaller Memory Stick Micro (M2). In December 2006 Sony added the Memory Stick PRO-HG, a high speed variant of the PRO, to be used for high definition still and video cameras.

Mouse

In computing, a mouse (plural mice, mouse devices, or mouses) is a pointing device that functions by detecting two-dimensional motion relative to its supporting surface. Physically, a mouse consists of a small case, held under one of the user’s hands, with one or more buttons. It sometimes features other elements, such as “wheels”, which allow the user to perform various system-dependent operations, or extra buttons or features can add more control or dimensional input. The mouse’s motion typically translates into the motion of a pointer on a display, which allows for fine control of a Graphical User Interface.

Mash Up

In technology, a mashup is a web application that combines data from more than one source into a single integrated tool; an example is the use of cartographic data from Google Maps to add location information to real-estate data, thereby creating a new and distinct web service that was not originally provided by either source. Mashup originally referred to the practice in pop music (notably hip-hop) of producing a new song by mixing two or more existing pieces.

Meta Tags

Meta elements are HTML or XHTML elements used to provide structured metadata about a web page. Such elements must be placed as tags in the head section of an HTML or XHTML document. Meta elements can be used to specify page description, keywords and any other metadata not provided through the other head elements and attributes. The meta element has four valid attributes: content, http-equiv, name and scheme. Of these, only content is a required attribute.

 Mirror

In computing, a mirror is a direct copy of a data set. On the Internet, a mirror site is an exact copy of another Internet site. Mirror sites are most commonly used to provide multiple sources of the same information, and are of particular value as a way of providing reliable access to large downloads. Mirroring is a type of file synchronization. A live mirror is automatically updated as soon as the original is changed.

Media File

Monitor

A visual display unit, often called simply a monitor, is a piece of electrical equipment which displays viewable images generated by a computer without producing a permanent record. The word “monitor” is used in other contexts; in particular in television broadcasting, where a television picture is displayed to a high standard. A computer display device is usually either a cathode ray tube or some form of flat panel such as a TFT LCD. The monitor comprises the display device, circuitry to generate a picture from electronic signals sent by the computer, and an enclosure or case. Within the computer, either as an integral part or a plugged-in interface, there is circuitry to convert internal data to a format compatible with a monitor.

Media Player

Media player is a term typically used to describe computer software for playing back multimedia files. Most software media players support an array of media formats, including both audio and video files.

Some media players focus only on audio or video and are known as audio players and video players respectively. The producers of these players usually focus on providing a better user experience as they are specifically tailored toward the media type.

Melbourne IT

Melbourne IT is an Australian Internet company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX:MLB). Formed in 1996, its primary business is domain name registration in most of the major national and global top-level domains. It also offers web and email hosting services.

The company is a profit-earning medium-sized (in the Australian context) Internet business, with 2004 earnings of approximately 4.5 million AUD (EBIT) on revenues of about 60 million AUD, and continues to grow steadily. It has operations in several European countries through the acquisition of Cogent, as well as a San Francisco office.

Megabyte

A megabyte is a unit of information or computer storage equal to either 10⁶ (1,000,000) bytes or 2²⁰ (1,048,576) bytes, depending on context. In rare cases, it is used to mean 1000×1024 (1,024,000) bytes. It is commonly abbreviated as Mbyte or MB (compare Mb, for the megabit). The term megabyte was coined in 1970.[1]Motherboard

The term “megabyte” is ambiguous because it is commonly used to mean either 1000² bytes or 1024² bytes. The confusion originated as compromise technical jargon for the byte multiples that needed to be expressed by the powers of 2 but lacked a convenient name. As 1024 (2¹⁰) is roughly equal to 1000 (10³), roughly corresponding SI multiples began to be used as approximate binary multiples. By the end of 2007, standards and government authorities including IEC, IEEE, EU, and NIST, had addressed this ambiguity by promulgating standards requiring the use of megabyte to describe strictly 1000² bytes and “mebibyte” to describe 1024² bytes. This is reflected in an increasing number of software projects, but most file managers still show file sizes in “megabytes” (“MB”) in the binary sense (1024² bytes). The term remains ambiguous and it can follow any one of the following common definitions:

N

Nano Technology

Nanotechnology is a highly multidisciplinary field, drawing from fields such as applied physics, materials science, interface and colloid science, device physics, supramolecular chemistry (which refers to the area of chemistry that focuses on the noncovalent bonding interactions of molecules), self-replicating machines and robotics, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, biological engineering, and electrical engineering. Grouping of the sciences under the umbrella of “nanotechnology” has been questioned on the basis that there is little actual boundary-crossing between the sciences that operate on the nano-scale. Instrumentation is the only area of technology common to all disciplines; on the contrary, for example pharmaceutical and semiconductor industries do not “talk with each other”. Corporations that call their products “nanotechnology” typically market them only to a certain industrial cluster.[1]

Notebook

(see laptop)

Network

computer network is an interconnected group of computers. Networks may be classified by the network layer at which they operate according to basic reference models considered as standards in the industry, such as the four-layer Internet Protocol Suite model. While the seven-layer Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) reference model is better known in academia, the majority of networks use the Internet Protocol Suite (IP).

K

Kai’s Power Tools

Kai’s Power Tools are a set of API plugins created by Kai Krause that were designed for use with Adobe Photoshop and Corel Photopaint. Kai’s Power Tools were sold to Corel when MetaCreations was closed.

Kilobyte

kilobyte (derived from the SI prefix kilo-, meaning 1,000) is a unit of information or computer storage equal to either 1,000 bytes or 1,024 bytes (2¹⁰), depending on context. It can be abbreviated a number of ways: kB, K and Kbyte. Kbps – (Kilobits Per Second) 

Kerberos

Kerberos is the name of a computer network authentication protocol, which allows individuals communicating over a non-secure network to prove their identity to one another in a secure manner. It is also a suite of free software published by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) that implements this protocol. Its designers aimed primarily at a client-server model, and it provides mutual authentication — both the user and the server verify each other’s identity. Kerberos protocol messages are protected against eavesdropping and replay attacks.

L

Laptop

A laptop computer, or simply laptop (also notebook computer, notebook and notepad) is a small mobile computer, which usually weighs 2-18 pounds[citation needed] (around 1 to 8 kilograms[citation needed]), depending on size, materials, and other factors.

Laptops usually run on a single main battery or from an external AC/DC adapter that charges the battery while also supplying power to the computer itself. Many computers also have a 3 volt cell to run the clock and other processes in the event of a power failure.

Laptops contain components that are similar to their desktop counterparts and perform the same functions, but are miniaturized and optimized for mobile use and efficient power consumption, although typically less powerful for the same price. Laptops usually have liquid crystal displays and most of them use different memory modules for their random access memory (RAM), for instance, SO-DIMM in lieu of the larger DIMMs. In addition to a built-in keyboard, they may utilize a touchpad (also known as a trackpad) or a pointing stick for input, though an external keyboard or mouse can usually be attached.

LOWSRC attribute

Basically the browser shows the lowsrc image first (or only) so something is visible, and then when the final image is loaded you show that.  If the browser knows that it has a fast connection to the target site, it can skip showing the lowsrc version entirely.

Lab Mode

You can use Lab mode to work with Photo CD images, edit the luminance and the color values in an image independently, move images between systems, and print to PostScript Level 2 and Level 3 printers. To print Lab images to other color PostScript devices, convert to CMYK first. Lab color is the intermediate color model Photoshop uses when converting from one color mode to another.

Lasso Tool

The lasso selection tools (shortcut L) are provided in three variations. The lasso tool and polygonal lasso tool which allow you to draw both freehand and straight edge selections, whilst the magnetic lasso is ideal for edges set against high contrast backgrounds. To change from one lasso to another press shift+L.

Layer Mask

Layer Masks are a very powerful part of Photoshop and that is for a couple of reasons: Layer Masks are editable selections that play an important role in non destructive editing Layer Masks offer flexibility because they can be almost completely treated as a full gray scale image, which allows the use of filters, selection tools, adjustment tools, etc. They have a visual strength, meaning that with a short look on the layers you can see how they affect the image They offer extra flexibility by being part of vector masks, layer sets, adjustment layers, etc. Layer masks allow you to save selections

LAN – (Local-Area Network)

A local-area network is a computer network covering a small geographic area, like a home, office, or group of buildings e.g. a school. The defining characteristics of LANs, in contrast to wide-area networks (WANs), include their much higher data-transfer rates, smaller geographic range, and lack of a need for leased telecommunication lines. Ethernet over unshielded twisted pair cabling, and Wi-Fi are the two most common technologies currently, but ARCNET, Token Ring and many others have been used in the past.

LCD (Liquid Crystal Display)

A liquid crystal display (LCD) is a thin, flat display device made up of any number of color or monochrome pixels arrayed in front of a light source or reflector. It is often utilized in battery-powered electronic devices because it uses very small amounts of electric power.

LED (Light-emitting Diode)

A light-emitting diode, usually called an LED, is a semiconductor diode that emits incoherent narrow-spectrum light when electrically biased in the forward direction of the p-n junction, as in the common LED circuit. This effect is a form of electroluminescence.

An LED is usually a small area light source, often with optics added to the chip to shape its radiation pattern. LEDs are often used as small indicator lights on electronic devices and increasingly in higher power applications such as flashlights and area lighting. The color of the emitted light depends on the composition and condition of the semiconducting material used, and can be infrared, visible, or ultraviolet. LEDs can also be used as a regular household light source. Besides lighting, interesting applications include sterilization of water and disinfection of devices.

LMS – (Learning Management System) 

A Learning Management System (or LMS) is a term used to describe software tools designed to manage user learning interventions. LMSs go far beyond conventional training records management and reporting. The value-add for LMSs is the extensive range of complementary functionality they offer. Learner self-service (e.g. self-registration on instructor-led training), training workflow (e.g. user notification, manager approval, waitlist management), the provision of on-line learning (e.g. Computer-Based Training, read & understand), on-line assessment, management of continuous professional education (CPE), collaborative learning (e.g. application sharing, discussion threads), and training resource management (e.g. instructors, facilities, equipment), are some of the additional dimensions to leading Learning Management Systems.

Lithium Ion

Lithium-ion batteries (sometimes abbreviated Li-ion batteries) are a type of rechargeable battery in which a lithium ion moves between the anode and cathode. The lithium ion moves from the anode to the cathode during discharge and from the cathode to the anode when charging.

Lossy Compression 

A Lossy compression method is one where compressing data and then decompressing it retrieves data that may well be different from the original, but is close enough to be useful in some way. Lossy compression is most commonly used to compress multimedia data (audio, video, still images), especially in applications such as streaming media and internet telephony. On the other hand lossless compression is required for text and data files, such as bank records, text articles, etc.

I

Image Capture

Image Capture is an application program that enables users to upload pictures from digital cameras or scanners which are either connected directly to the computer or the network. It provides no organizational tools like iPhoto but is useful for collating pictures from a variety of sources with no need for drivers. It was first introduced in Mac OS X version 10.0 (Cheetah)

Image Capture is scriptable with Applescript, and may be manipulated with Mac OS X v10.4 (Tiger)’s “Automator” application. As of Mac OS X 10.4, Image Capture’s AppleScript dictionary does not open in Script Editor.

iMac

The iMac is a desktop Macintosh computer designed and built by Apple Inc. It has been a large part of Apple’s consumer desktop offerings since its introduction in 1998, and has evolved through three distinct forms. In its original form, the G3, the iMac was egg-shaped with a CRT monitor, mainly enclosed by colored, translucent plastic. The second major revision, the G4, moved to a design of a hemispherical base containing all the main components and an LCD monitor on a freely-moving arm attached to the top of the base. The iMac G5 and the Intel iMac placed all the components immediately behind the monitor, creating a slim design which tilts only up and down on a simple metal base. The current iMac shares the same form as the previous models, but is now thinner and uses brushed aluminum and black-bordered glass for its case.

The machine enjoys a relatively high profile in popular culture due to its distinctive aesthetics and Apple’s successful marketing. The iMac and other Macintosh computers can also be seen in various movies, commercials, and TV shows (both live action and animated).

iTunes

iTunes is a digital media player application, introduced by Apple Inc. on January 8, 2001 at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco,[2] for playing and organizing digital music and video files. The program is also an interface to manage the contents on Apple’s popular iPod digital media players as well as the iPhone. Additionally, iTunes can connect to the iTunes Store via the internet to purchase and download digital music, music videos, television shows, iPod games, audiobooks, various podcasts, feature length films (available only in the USA), Movie Rentals and Ringtones.

Internet

The Internet is a worldwide, publicly accessible series of interconnected computer networks that transmit data by packet switching using the standard Internet Protocol (IP). It is a “network of networks” that consists of millions of smaller domestic, academic, business, and government networks, which together carry various information and services, such as electronic mail, online chat, file transfer, and the interlinked web pages and other resources of the World Wide Web (WWW).

Index Page

The homepage (often written as home page) or main page is the URL or local file that automatically loads when a web browser starts and when the browser’s “home” button is pressed. The term is also used to refer to the front page, webserver directory index, or main web page of a website of a group, company, organization, or individual. In some countries, such as Germany, Japan, and South Korea, and formerly in the US, the term “homepage” commonly refers to a complete website (of a company or other organization) rather than to a single web page. By the late 90s this usage had died out in the US, replaced by the more comprehensive term “web site”.

 ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network)

Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN), originally “Integriertes Sprach- und Datennetz” (German for “Integrated Speech and Data Net”), is a circuit-switched telephone network system, designed to allow digital transmission of voice and data over ordinary telephone copper wires, resulting in better voice quality than an analog phone. It offers circuit-switched connections (for either voice or data) in increments of 64 kbit/s. One of the major use cases is Internet access, where ISDN typically provides a maximum of 128 kbit/s (which cannot be considered to be a broadband speed). More broadly, ISDN is a set of protocols for establishing and breaking circuit switched connections, and for advanced call features for the user. It was introduced in the late 1980′s.[1]

ISP(Internet Service Provider)

An Internet service provider (abbr. ISP, also called Internet access provider or IAP) is a company or business that provides access to the Internet and related services. In the past, most ISPs were run by the phone companies. Now, ISPs can be started by just about any individual or group with sufficient money and expertise. In addition to Internet access via various technologies such as dial-up and DSL, they may provide a combination of services including Internet transit, domain name registration and hosting, web hosting, and colocation.

IP Address

An IP address (Internet Protocol address) is a unique address that certain electronic devices use in order to identify and communicate with each other on a computer network utilizing the Internet Protocol standard (IP)—in simpler terms, a computer address. Any participating network device—including routers, switches, computers, infrastructure servers (e.g., NTP, DNS, DHCP, SNMP, etc.), printers, Internet fax machines, and some telephones—can have its own address that is unique within the scope of the specific network. Some IP addresses are intended to be unique within the scope of the global Internet, while others need to be unique only within the scope of an enterprise.

Image Map 

In (X)HTML, an image map is a list of coordinates relating to a specific image, created in order to hyperlink areas of the image to various destinations (as opposed to a normal image link, in which the entire area of the image links to a single destination). For example, a map of the world may have each country hyperlinked to further information about that country. The intention of an image map is to provide an easy way of linking various parts of an image without dividing the image into separate image files.

J

Javascript

JavaScript is a scripting language most often used for client-side web development. It was the originating dialect of the ECMAScript standard. It is a dynamic, weakly typed, prototype-based language with first-class functions. JavaScript was influenced by many languages and was designed to have a similar look to Java, but be easier for non-programmers to work with.[1] The language is best known for its use in websites (as client-side JavaScript), but is also used to enable scripting access to objects embedded in other applications (for example Microsoft Gadgets in Windows Vista Sidebar).

JPEP File

In computing, JPEG (pronounced JAY-peg; IPA: /ˈdʒeɪpɛg/) is a commonly used method of compression for photographic images. The name JPEG stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group, the name of the committee that created the standard. The group was organized in 1986, issuing a standard in 1992, which was approved in 1994 as ISO 10918-1. JPEG is distinct from MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group), which produces compression schemes for video.

The JPEG standard specifies both the codec, which defines how an image is compressed into a stream of bytes and decompressed back into an image, and the file format used to contain that stream. The compression method is usually lossy compression, meaning that some visual quality is lost in the process and cannot be restored, although there are variations on the standard baseline JPEG that are lossless. There is also an interlaced “Progressive JPEG” format, in which data is compressed in multiple passes of progressively higher detail. This is ideal for large images that will be displayed while downloading over a slow connection, allowing a reasonable preview after receiving only a portion of the data. However, progressive JPEGs are not as widely supported.

Java Applets

A Java applet is an applet delivered in the form of Java bytecode. Java applets can run in a Web browser using a Java Virtual Machine (JVM), or in Sun‘s AppletViewer, a stand-alone tool for testing applets. Java applets were introduced in the first version of the Java language in 1995. Java applets are usually written in the Java programming language but they can also be written in other languages that compile to Java bytecode such as Jython.

Applets are used to provide interactive features to web applications that cannot be provided by HTML. Since Java’s bytecode is platform independent, Java applets can be executed by browsers for many platforms, including Windows, Unix, Mac OS and Linux.There are open source tools like applet2app which can be used to convert an applet to a stand alone Java application/windows executable/linux executable. This has the advantage of running a Java applet in offline mode without the need for internet browser software.

Juxtapose 

G

Google

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG and LSE:GGEA) is an American public corporation, earning revenue from online and mobile advertising related to its Internet search, web-based e-mail, online mapping, office productivity, social networking, and video sharing as well as selling advertising-free versions of the same technologies. Google’s headquarters, the Googleplex, is located in Mountain View, California, and the company has 16,805 full-time employees (as of December 31, 2007).[3] It is the largest American company (by market capitalization) that is not part of the Dow Jones Industrial Average (as of October 31, 2007).[4] [5]

Google was co-founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were students at Stanford University and the company was first incorporated as a privately held company on September 7, 1998. Google’s initial public offering took place on August 19, 2004, raising US$1.67 billion, making it worth US$23 billion. Google has continued its growth through a series of new product developments, acquisitions, and partnerships. Environmentalism, philanthropy, and positive employee relations have been important tenets during Google’s growth, the latter resulting in being identified multiple times as Fortune Magazine’s #1 Best Place to Work.[6] The company’s unofficial slogan is “Don’t be evil”, however Google is not without controversy related to its business practices; there are concerns regarding the privacy of personal information, copyright, censorship, and discontinuation of services.

GIF File

The Graphical Interchange Format (GIF) is one of the most widely used image formats on the web. GIF files are recognizable by their .gif file extension. GIF is suitable for images with sharp edges and relatively few gradations of color, such as line art, cartoons, and text. You can also create background transparencies and animations using GIF images.

Gaussian Blur

Gaussian blur is a widely used effect in graphics software such as Adobe Photoshop, GIMP, Inkscape, Paint.NET and PhotoFiltre. It is typically used to reduce image noise and reduce detail levels. The visual effect of this blurring technique is a smooth blur resembling that of viewing the image through a translucent screen, distinctly different from the bokeh effect produced by an out-of-focus lens or the shadow of an object under usual illumination. Gaussian smoothing is also used as a pre-processing stage in computer vision algorithms in order to enhance image structures at different scales—see scale-space representation and scale-space implementation.

Mathematically speaking, applying a Gaussian blur to an image is the same as convolving the image with a Gaussian or normal distribution. (In contrast, convolving by a circle (i.e., a circular box blur) would more-accurately reproduce the bokeh effect.) Since the Fourier transform of a Gaussian is another Gaussian, applying a Gaussian blur has the effect of low pass filtering the image.

Grayscale

In computing, a grayscale or greyscale digital image is an image in which the value of each pixel is a single sample, that is, it carries the full (and only) information about its intensity. Images of this sort are composed exclusively of shades of neutral gray, varying from black at the weakest intensity to white at the strongest.

Grayscale images are distinct from black-and-white images, which in the context of computer imaging are images with only two colors, black and white (also called bilevel, binary images or more commonly bitmapped images); grayscale images have many shades of gray in between. In most contexts other than digital imaging, however, the term “black and white” is used in place of “grayscale”; for example, photography in shades of gray is typically called “black-and-white photography”. The term monochromatic in some digital imaging contexts is synonymous with grayscale (as it denotes absence of any concrete hue), and in some contexts synonymous with black-and-white.

Gigabyte

A gigabyte (derived from the SI prefix giga-) is a unit of information or computer storage meaning either exactly 1 billion bytes (10003, or 109) or approximately 1.07 billion bytes (10243, or 230).[1]

The usage of the word “gigabyte” is ambiguous, depending on the context. When referring to RAM sizes and file sizes, it traditionally has a binary definition, of 10243 bytes. For other uses, it means exactly 10003 bytes. In order to address this confusion, currently the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) promotes the use of the term “gibibyte” for the binary definition. This position is endorsed by other standards organizations including the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the International Committee for Weights and Measures (CPIM) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

H

HTML

(PODCAST PRESENTATION)

Hyperlink

An element in an electronic document that links to another place in the same document or to an entirely different document. Typically, you click on the hyperlink to follow the link. Hyperlinks are the most essential ingredient of all hypertext systems, including the World Wide Web.

Helper Applications

helper application is an external viewer program launched to display content retrieved using a web browser. Some common examples include Windows Media Player and QuickTime Player for playing streaming content.

Unlike a plugin (whose full code is included into browser code), a small line is added to the browser code to tell it to open a certain helper application in case it encounters a certain file format.

Halo Effect

The halo effect refers to a cognitive bias whereby the perception of a particular trait is influenced by the perception of the former traits in a sequence of interpretations.

Edward L. Thorndike was the first to support the halo effect with empirical research. In a psychology study published in 1920, Thorndike asked commanding officers to rate their soldiers; Thorndike found high cross-correlation between all positive and all negative traits. People seem not to think of other individuals in mixed terms; instead we seem to see each person as roughly good or roughly bad across all categories of measurement.

A study by Solomon Asch suggests that attractiveness is a central trait, so we presume all the other traits of an attractive person are just as attractive and sought after.

The halo effect is involved in Harold Kelley‘s implicit personality theory, where the first traits we recognize in other people then influence the interpretation and perception of latter ones (because of our expectations). Attractive people are often judged as having a more desirable personality and more skills than someone of average appearance. Celebrities are used to endorse products that they have no expertise in evaluating.

 H.264 video

H.264 is a standard for video compression. It is also known as MPEG-4 Part 10, or MPEG-4 AVC (for Advanced Video Coding). It was written by the ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG) together with the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) as the product of a partnership effort known as the Joint Video Team (JVT). The ITU-T H.264 standard and the ISO/IEC MPEG-4 Part 10 standard (formally, ISO/IEC 14496-10) are jointly maintained so that they have identical technical content. The final drafting work on the first version of the standard was completed in May 2003.

Hard Drive

A hard disk drive (HDD), commonly referred to as a hard drive, hard disk or fixed disk drive,[1] is a non-volatile storage device which stores digitally encoded data on rapidly rotating platters with magnetic surfaces. Strictly speaking, “drive” refers to a device distinct from its medium, such as a tape drive and its tape, or a floppy disk drive and its floppy disk. Early HDDs had removable media; however, an HDD today is typically a sealed unit (except for a filtered vent hole to equalize air pressure) with fixed media.[2]

A HDD is a rigid-disk drive, although it is probably never referred to as such. By way of comparison, a so-called “floppy” drive (more formally, a diskette drive) has a disc that is flexible. Originally, the term “hard” was temporary slang, substituting “hard” for “rigid”, before these drives had an established and universally-agreed-upon name. Some time ago, IBM’s internal company term for an HDD was “file”.

Histogram

A histogram is a graphical display of tabulated frequencies. A histogram is the graphical version of a table that shows what proportion of cases fall into each of several or many specified categories. The histogram differs from a bar chart in that it is the area of the bar that denotes the value, not the height, a crucial distinction when the categories are not of uniform width (Lancaster, 1974). The categories are usually specified as non-overlapping intervals of some variable. The categories (bars) must be adjacent.

The word histogram is derived from Greek: histos ‘anything set upright’ (as the masts of a ship, the bar of a loom, or the vertical bars of a histogram); gramma ‘drawing, record, writing’. The histogram is one of the seven basic tools of quality control, which also include the Pareto chart, check sheet, control chart, cause-and-effect diagram, flowchart, and scatter diagram. A generalization of the histogram is kernel smoothing techniques. This will construct a very smooth probability density function from the supplied data.

Colour Histogram

In computer graphics and photography, a color histogram is a representation of the distribution of colors in an image, derived by counting the number of pixels of each of given set of color ranges in a typically two-dimensional (2D) or three-dimensional (3D) color space.

A histogram is a standard statistical description of a distribution in terms of occurrence frequencies of different event classes; for color, the event classes are regions in color space.

An image histogram of scalar pixel values is more commonly used in image processing than is a color histogram.

Hue

Hue is one of the three main attributes of perceived color, in addition to lightness and chroma (or colorfulness). Hue is also one of the three dimensions in some colorspaces along with saturation, and brightness (also known as lightness or value). Hue is that aspect of a color described with names such as “red“, “yellow“, etc.

Usually, colors with the same hue are distinguished with adjectives referring to their lightness and/or chroma, such as with “light blue”, “pastel blue”, “vivid blue”. Notable exceptions include brown, which is a dark orange,[1] and pink, a light red with reduced chroma.

Hostname

A hostname (occasionally also, a sitename) is the unique name by which a network-attached device (which could consist of a computer, file server, network storage device, fax machine, copier, cable modem, etc.) is known on a network. The hostname is used to identify a particular host in various forms of electronic communication such as the World Wide Web, e-mail or Usenet.

On the Internet, the terms “hostname” and “domain name” are often used interchangeably, but there are subtle technical differences between them.

E

• EncryptionIn cryptography, encryption is the process of transforming information (referred to as plaintext) using an algorithm (called cipher) to make it unreadable to anyone except those possessing special knowledge, usually referred to as a key. The result of the process is encrypted information (in cryptography, referred to as ciphertext). In many contexts, the word encryption also implicitly refers to the reverse process, decryption (e.g. “software for encryption” can typically also perform decryption), to make the encrypted information readable again (i.e. to make it unencrypted).Encryption has long been used by militaries and governments to facilitate secret communication. Encryption is now used in protecting information within many kinds of civilian systems, such as computers, networks (e.g. the Internet e-commerce), mobile telephones, wireless microphones, wireless intercom systems, Bluetooth devices and bank automatic teller machines. Encryption is also used in digital rights management to prevent unauthorized use or reproduction of copyrighted material and in software also to protect against reverse engineering (see also copy protection). Encryption, by itself, can protect the confidentiality of messages, but other techniques are still needed to protect the integrity and authenticity of a message; for example, verification of a message authentication code (MAC) or a digital signature. Standards and cryptographic software and hardware to perform encryption are widely available, but successfully using encryption to ensure security may be a challenging problem. A single slip-up in system design or execution can allow successful attacks. Sometimes an adversary can obtain unencrypted information without directly undoing the encryption. See, e.g., traffic analysis, TEMPEST, or Trojan horse.

• eMailE-mail, short for electronic mail and often abbreviated to e-mail, email or simply mail, is a store and forward method of composing, sending and storing messages over electronic communication systems. The term “e-mail” (as a noun or verb) applies both to the Internet e-mail system based on the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) and to X.400 systems, and to intranet systems allowing users within one organization to e-mail each other. Intranets may use the Internet protocols or X.400 protocols for internal e-mail service supporting workgroup collaboration. E-mail is often used to deliver bulk unsolicited messages, or “spam”, but filter programs exist which can automatically delete some or most of these, depending on the situation.

• eCommerceElectronic commerce, commonly known as e-commerce or eCommerce, consists of the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. The amount of trade conducted electronically has grown extraordinarily since the spread of the Internet. A wide variety of commerce is conducted in this way, spurring and drawing on innovations in electronic funds transfer, supply chain management, Internet marketing, online transaction processing, electronic data interchange (EDI), inventory management systems, and automated data collection systems. Modern electronic commerce typically uses the World Wide Web at least at some point in the transaction’s lifecycle, although it can encompass a wider range of technologies such as e-mail as well.A small percentage of electronic commerce is conducted entirely electronically for virtual items such as access to premium content on a website, but most electronic commerce involves the transportation of physical items in some way. Online retailers are sometimes known as e-tailers and online retail is sometimes known as e-tail. Almost all big retailers have electronic commerce presence on the World Wide Web.Electronic commerce that is conducted between businesses is referred to as Business-to-business or B2B. B2B can be open to all interested parties (e.g. commodity exchange) or limited to specific, pre-qualified participants (private electronic market).Electronic commerce is generally considered to be the sales aspect of e-business. It also consists of the exchange of data to facilitate the financing and payment aspects of the business transactions.

• Editable TextEncodingEncoding is the process of transforming information from one format into another. The opposite operation is called decoding.There are a number of more specific meanings that apply in certain contexts:Encoding (in cognition) is a basic perceptual process of interpreting incoming stimuli; technically speaking, it is a complex, multi-stage process of converting relatively objective sensory input (e.g., light, sound) into subjectively meaningful experience.Character encoding is a code that pairs a set of natural language characters (such as an alphabet or syllabary) with a set of something else, such as numbers or electrical pulses.Text encoding uses a markup language to tag the structure and other features of a text to facilitate processing by computers. (See also Text Encoding Initiative.)Semantics encoding of formal language A in formal language B is a method of representing all terms (e.g. programs or descriptions) of language A using language B.Electronic encoding transforms a signal into a code optimized for transmission or storage, generally done with a codec.Neural encoding is the way in which information is represented in neurons.Memory encoding is the process of converting sensations into memories.Encryption transforms information for secrecy. 

F

• FacebookFacebook is a social networking website that was launched on February 4, 2004. The website is owned and operated by Facebook, Inc., the parent company of the website and a privately held company. The free-access website allows users to join one or more networks, such as a school, place of employment, or geographic region to easily connect with other people in the same network. The name of the website refers to the paper facebooks depicting members of a campus community that some American colleges and preparatory schools give to incoming students, faculty, and staff as a way to get to know other people on campus.

• Fixed WirelessFixed wireless refers to wireless devices or systems that are situated in fixed locations, such as an office or home, as opposed to devices that are mobile, such as cell phones and PDAs. Fixed wireless devices normally derive their electrical power from utility mains, as opposed to portable wireless devices that normally derive their power from batteries.The point-to-point signal transmissions occur through the air over a terrestrial microwave platform rather than through copper or fiber cables; therefore, fixed wireless does not require satellite feeds or local phone service. The advantages of fixed wireless include the ability to connect with users in remote areas without the need for laying new cables and the capacity for broad bandwidth that is not impeded by fiber or cable capacities.

• FormsFTP ApplicationsSome WYSIWYG editors have built-in support for uploading your finished pages to the webserver. If you need to upload files to the webserver using a stand alone application, you will need an FTP tool.1. WSFTP2. FileZilla (my personal favorite) 3. Dreamweaver (ftp publishing is built into the interface) 4. FrontPage (forget about it) 5. Fetch

• FTP anonymous serverIn computing, the File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is a network protocol used to transfer data from one computer to another through a network, such as over the Internet.FTP is a commonly used protocol for exchanging files over any TCP/IP based network to manipulate files on another computer on that network regardless of which operating systems are involved (if the computers permit FTP access). There are many existing FTP client and server programs. FTP servers can be set up anywhere between game servers, voice servers, internet hosts, and other physical servers.

• File SizeFile size measures the size of a computer file. Typically it is measured in bytes with a prefix. The actual amount of disk space consumed by the file depends on the file system.The maximum file size a file system supports depends on the number of bits reserved to store size information. For example, with FAT32, the size of one file cannot exceed 4 GiB.Some common file size units are:1 KiB = 1,024 bytes1 MiB = 1,048,576 bytes 1 GiB = 1,073,741,824 bytes 1 TiB = 1,099,511,627,776 bytes These units are often described using the terms KB, MB, GB and TB respectively. This is technically imprecise, because the prefixes kilo, mega, giga and tera refer respectively to multiplication by 10^3, 10^6, 10^9 and 10^12. However, the power-of-two based prefixes have yet to find widespread usage, so some ambiguity remains. For example, a hard disk which is described by its maker as having a capacity of 200 GB will have a capacity very close to 200 * 10^9 bytes. Yet, when such a disk is freshly formatted and installed in a machine running Microsoft Windows XP, the operating system will report the size as approximately 186 GB. This value can vary slightly depending on the exact capacity of the drive, which file system is used and so on. This is because Windows is actually reporting the size in GiB and 186 GiB is approximately equal to 200 GB.

• FreezeThere are many reasons why a computer may freeze or completely crash. The most common reason is an overload in the memory. Computers have a set amount of memory to work with (this is their RAM, or “Random Access Memory”). If you attempt to do more with the computer than it’s capable of handling at one time, it may “crash” in an attempt to save itself. Generally, the cause of this is generally that too many programs are running at once for the computer to handle. If you are not using a program, close it.Conflicts between programs are other well-known reasons for crashes. Programssuch as virus detectors are notorious for conflicting with other applications andutilities. If you notice that crashes are occurring while the same two programs arerunning, try to avoid running these two programs at the same time.

• FeatherFile extensionFile extensions are usually three or four letter codes at the end of computer file names that tell to operating system (Microsoft Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows 95/98/ME/2000,MAC OS X, Linux and Unix operating systems etc.) what kind of file they are dealing with. Tell to OS which applications can automaticaly open or edit the file.

• FirewallA firewall is a dedicated appliance, or software running on another computer, which inspects network traffic passing through it, and denies or permits passage based on a set of rules.A firewall’s basic task is to regulate some of the flow of traffic between computer networks of different trust levels. Typical examples are the Internet which is a zone with no trust and an internal network which is a zone of higher trust. A zone with an intermediate trust level, situated between the Internet and a trusted internal network, is often referred to as a “perimeter network” or Demilitarized zone (DMZ).

• Format  A file format is a particular way to encode information for storage in a computer file.Since a disk drive, or indeed any computer storage, can store only bits, the computer must have some way of converting information to 0s and 1s and vice-versa. There are different kinds of formats for different kinds of information. Within any format type, e.g., word processor documents, there will typically be several different formats. Sometimes these formats compete with each other.

CONVERGENCE -Technological convergence is the modern presence of a vast array of different types of technology to perform very similar tasks.

The term convergence is commonly used in reference to the synergistic combination of voice (and telephony features), data (and productivity applications) and video onto a single network. These previously separate technologies are now able to share resources and interact with each other creating new efficiencies.

Also included in this topic is the basis of computer networks, wherein many different operating systems are able to communicate via different protocols. This could be a prelude to artificial intelligence networks on the internet and eventually to Technological singularity.

During the late 1800s, the machine tool industry was developed for use in armories, and then was expanded to form the basis of the American Industrial Revolution. For example, the same machines that Colt used to manufacture the first mass-produced guns were also used to make the first sewing machines in factories in America and, slightly later, the Coventry Sewing Machine Company made the first British bicycles. CONNECTIVITY- The pragmatic definition: Connectivity is the unbiased transport of packets between two end points. This is also the essential definition of “IP” (Internet Protocol).There is a strong boundary between the IP layer and the applications built upon it. TCP, for example, is an application protocol. In the term “TCP/IP” the slash emphasizes the separation of the two.Like any other system, our understanding of telecommunications has evolved and changed. In engineering the phone system, there were a myriad of technical problems to be solved in order to be able to carry voice conversations over long distances or even around the world. The signal had to be delivered with precise timing with every component of the network adjusted just right. Because the equipment was so expensive there was great emphasis on precise planning for capacity.Similarly, television was an amazing feat of engineering in the 1930′s. It took very precise engineering to synchronize the video beam in the kinescope (the camera) with the image shown in the receiver. Many technical tricks were used including interlacing so that successive scans filled alternating lines to produce a smoother image. People then took advantage of the accidental properties, such as adding closed captioning by using the “vertical blanking interval” (the time it took to move the beam from the bottom back to the top of the screen).The rise of the Internet in the 1990′s (though the process actually started decades earlier) has demonstrated that we can now treat both telephony and television as streams of bits over a packet network. In the network itself all packets are treated the same with no special handling for audio or video streams. The network doesn’t even have the notion of a circuit since successive packets needn’t go to the same destination.CD -Codecs -CATV lines -CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) -Content  Writer/editor -CMYK (Cyan,Magenta,Yellow,Black) -Computer Operating Systems -Calibration – Monitor / Printer - DDesktop -Default -DVD -Download -Domain Name -DNS Server -Digital Media -Digital TV -Dreamweaver -DSL -Database developer -Dynamically Generated Content -   

A

ANIMATION - 

Download 

ADSL2 - (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line service), adds new features and functionality targeted at improving performance and interoperability and adds support for new applications and services. Among the changes are improvements in ADSL’s data rate, an increase in the distance ADSL can reach from the local telephone exchange, dynamic data rate adaptation, better resistance to noise, diagnostics, and a stand-by mode to save power. ADSL2 also reduces the initialisation time from more than 10 seconds (as is required for ADSL) to less than 3 seconds. ADSL2 has the same signal footprint as ADSL.

AOL - 

ADOBE -  

AVI FILE - (Audio Video Interleave), known by its acronym AVI, is a multimedia container format introduced by Microsoft in November 1992 as part of its Video for Windows technology. AVI files can contain both audio and video data in a standard container that allows synchronous audio-with-video playback.

APPLE - (Apple Inc.), formerly Apple Computer Inc., is an American multinational corporation with a focus on designing and manufacturing consumer electronics and closely related software products. Established in Cupertino, California on April 1, 1976, Apple develops, sells, and supports a series of personal computers, portable media players, mobile phones, computer software, and computer hardware and hardware accessories. 

ANALOGUE - (Analog or analogue) may refer to: ANALOG SIGNAL (a variable signal continuous in both time and amplitude), ANALOG CIRCUITS (circuits which use analog signals), ANALOG TRANSMISSION (a transmission using analog signals), ANALOG TRANSDUCER (is  sensor that measures continuous information), ANALOGUE LITERATURE (a literary work that shares motifs, characters or events with another, but is not directly derived from it).

ALT TAG -

ANIME -  

ACTIVE SERVER PAGES - (ASP) is Microsoft‘s first server-side script engine for dynamically-generated web pages. It was initially marketed as an add-on to Internet Information Services (IIS) via the Windows NT 4.0 Option Pack, but has been included as a free component of Windows Server since the initial release of Windows 2000 Server. Programming ASP websites is made easier by various built-in objects. Each object corresponds to a group of frequently-used functionality useful for creating dynamic web pages.

B

BLU-RAY - (Blu-ray Disc – (BD), is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of the world’s leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers (including Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson). The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc. This extra capacity combined with the use of advanced video and audio codecs will offer consumers an unprecedented HD experience. 

BLACKBERRY, The - is a wireless handheld device introduced in 1999 which supports push e-mail, mobile telephone, text messaging, internet faxing, web browsing and other wireless information services. Developed by the Canadian company Research In Motion (RIM), it delivers information over the wireless data networks of mobile phone service companies. BlackBerry first made headway in the marketplace by concentrating on e-mail. RIM currently offers BlackBerry e-mail service to non-BlackBerry devices, such as the Palm Treo, through the BlackBerry Connect software. The original BlackBerry device had a monochrome display, but all current models have color displays.

BLUETOOTH - is an industrial specification for wireless (PANs). Bluetooth provides a way to connect and exchange information between devices such as mobile phones, laptops, personal computers,printers, digital cameras, and video game consoles over a secure, globally unlicensed short-range radio frequency. The Bluetooth specifications are developed and licensed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group.

BLOG - A blog (a portmanteau of web log) is a website where entries are commonly displayed in reverse chronological order. “Blog” can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog. Many blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject; others function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs. Most blogs are primarily textual, although some focus on art (artlog), photographs (photoblog), sketchblog, videos (vlog), music (MP3 blog), audio (podcasting) are part of a wider network of social media. Micro-blogging is another type of blogging which consists of blogs with very short posts. As of December 2007, blog search engine Technorati was tracking more than 112 million blogs. 

BROADBAND - in telecommunications is a term that refers to a signaling method that includes or handles a relatively wide range of frequencies, which may be divided into channels or frequency bins. Broadband is always a relative term, understood according to its context. The wider the bandwidth, greater is the information carrying capacity. In radio, for example, a very narrow-band signal will carry Morse code; a broader band will carry speech; a still broader band is required to carry music without losing the high audio frequencies required for realistic sound reproduction. 

BANDWIDTH - is the difference between the upper and lower cutoff frequencies of, for example, a filter, a communication channel, or a signal spectrum, and is typically measured in hertz. In case of a base band channel or signal, the bandwidth is equal to its upper cutoff frequency. Bandwidth in hertz is a central concept in many fields, including electronics, information theory, radio communications, signal processing, and spectroscopy.

In computer networking and other digital fields, the term bandwidth often refers to a data rate measured in bits/s, for example network throughput. The reason is that according Hartley’s law, the digital data rate limit (or channel capacity) of a physical communication link is related to its bandwidth in hertz, sometimes denoted analog bandwidth. For bandwidth (computers), less ambiguous terms are, for example, gross bit rate, net bit rate, throughput, good put or channel capacity. 

BITMAP - In computer graphics, a bitmap or pixmap is a type of memory organization or image file format used to store digital images. The term bitmap comes from the computer programming terminology, meaning just a map of bits, a spatially mapped array of bits. Now, along with pixmap, it commonly refers to the similar concept of a spatially mapped array of pixels. Raster images in general may be referred to as bitmaps or pixmaps, whether synthetic or photographic, in files or in memory. In some contexts, the term bitmap implies one bit per pixel, while pixmap is used for images with multiple bits per pixel. Many graphical user interfaces use bitmaps in their built-in graphics subsystems; for example, the Microsoft Windows and OS/2 platforms’ GDI subsystem, where the specific format used is the Windows and OS/2 bitmap file format, usually named with the file extension of .BMP (or .DIB for device-independent bitmap). Besides BMP, other file formats that store literal bitmaps include InterLeaved Bitmap (ILBM), Portable Bitmap (PBM), X Bitmap (XBM), and Wireless Application Protocol Bitmap (WBMP). Most other image file formats, such as JPEG, TIFF, PNG, and GIF, to name just a few, store bitmap images (as opposed to vector images), but they are not usually referred to as bitmaps, since they use compressed formats internally. 

BRACKET <HTML> - (HyperText Markup Language), is the predominant markup language for web pages. It provides a means to describe the structure of text-based information in a document — by denoting certain text as links, headings, paragraphs, lists, and so on — and to supplement that text with interactive forms, embedded images, and other objects. HTML is written in the form of tags, surrounded by angle brackets. HTML can also describe, to some degree, the appearance and semantics of a document, and can include embedded scripting language code (such as JavaScript) which can affect the behavior of web browsers and other HTML processors.

HTML is also often used to refer to content of the MIME type text/html or even more broadly as a generic term for HTML whether in its XML-descended form (such as XHTML 1.0 and later) or its form descended directly from SGML (such as HTML 4.01 and earlier). 

BROWSER, WEB - is a software application which enables a user to display and interact with text, images, videos, music and other information typically located on a Web page at a website on the World Wide Web or a local area network. Text and images on a Web page can contain hyperlinks to other Web pages at the same or different website. Web browsers allow a user to quickly and easily access information provided on many Web pages at many websites by traversing these links. Web browsers format HTML information for display, so the appearance of a Web page may differ between browsers .

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