GLOSSARY OF TERMS

AJAX [Asynchronous JAvaScript and XML] - Using an enhancement in JavaScript that allows Web pages to be more interactive and behave like local applications, which are also known as "rich client" applications. AJAX allows the Web page to retrieve small amounts of data from the server without reloading the entire page.

ASP [Active Server Pages] - Microsoft technology similar to CGI that is used to create dynamic content for a web page. Pages using ASP are created with programming scripts (eg; JavaScript) and integrated with the HTML of a page. It is a server-side scripting language and is mostly used on Windows platforms.

ASP.NET - Also known as ASP+, is an enhanced version of ASP for the .NET platform. It supports executable programs compiled from C#, C++ and other languages and is not backward compatible with regular ASP code. ASP.NET pages are always compiled rather than interpreted as are ASP pages.

Bandwidth - Bandwidth is the amount of data that can be transferred over the network in a fixed amount of time. On the Internet, it is usually expressed in bits per second (bps). A hosting server will allocate your site a fixed amount of bandwidth usage within a regular period of time.

CSS [Cascading Style Sheets] - A simple mechanism for adding style (e.g. fonts, colors, spacing) to Web documents. Not all browsers (of specific versions) implement the full specification of CSS.

DHTML [Dynamic HTML] - A combination of HTML enhancements, scripting language and interface that are used to deliver animations, interactions and dynamic updating on Web pages. The two major elements are the ECMAScript language and the DOM object model. ECMAScript is a derivative of JavaScript, and DOM is an interface that presents the HTML document to the programmer as an object model for ease in updating.

DNS [Domain Name System (Service)] - An Internet system/service that translates domain names into IP addresses. Domain names are alphabetic so they're easier to remember. The Internet however, is really based on IP addresses. Every time you use a domain name, therefore, a DNS service must translate the name into the corresponding IP address.

Domain Name - An unique name that identifies one or more IP addresses. Domain names are used in URLs' to identify particular Web sites. Every web site is located by its unique IP address.

Frames - An HTML technique for combining two or more separate HTML documents within a single web browser screen. A web site using frames often causes great problems for search engines, and may not be spidered and indexed correctly.

FTP [File Transfer Protocol] - One of the common methods of transferring files over the Internet. A typical method used for uploading files (pages) to a hosting server for viewing on the Internet.

Hosting - Usually refers to a computer (or a network of servers) that stores the files of a web site which has web server software running on it, connected to the Internet. Your site is then said to be Hosted.

HTML [HyperText Markup Language] - HTML is a basic markup language derived from the Standardized General Markup Language (SGML), providing the means for creating simple hypertext documents, intended for publishing on the World Wide Web.

Image Map - An image that has several links geographically mapped onto it.

Internet - A global network connecting millions of computers. Each Internet computer, called a host, is independent. The Internet is not synonymous with World Wide Web. The Internet and the Web are two related but separate things.

IP [Internet Protocol] - The method or protocol by which data is sent from one computer to another on the Internet. Each computer (known as a host) on the Internet has at least one IP address that uniquely identifies it from all other computers on the Internet.

JavaScript - JavaScript is an object-based, client-side scripting language developed by Netscape. Embedded in the head section of a web document, It can produce interactivity to a web page dynamically.

Link [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.

Meta Tag - A special HTML tag that provides information about a Web page. Unlike normal HTML tags, meta tags do not affect how the page is displayed.

Mouseover - A JavaScript element that triggers a change on an item (typically a graphic change, such as making an image or hyperlink appear) in a Web page when the mouse pointer passes over it.

PHP [PHP Hypertext Preprocessor] - A server-side, HTML embedded scripting language used to create dynamic Web pages. Designed for Windows and Unix type platforms.

Pixel - Refers to how monitors divide the display screen into thousands or millions of individual dots to display an image. A pixel is one dot.

Ranking - The number (order of ranking; ie 1 being the highest) that a web site is listed for a specific search term in a specific search engine. Search Engines utilize a ranking algorithm (mathematical formulas, variables, and set of weights) to determine a site's ranking for a particular keyword or keyword phrase.

Resolution - The resolution of an image describes how fine the dots are that make up that image. The more dots, the higher the resolution. When displayed on a monitor, the dots are called pixels. A 640 x 480 screen (resolution) is capable of displaying 640 distinct dots on each of its 480 lines, or about 300,000 pixels.

RSS [Really Simple Syndication] - RSS Feeds are a fairly new format of XML that is intended to share information in a condensed format (such as a title, description and link to a news article). They provide users with an easy way to receive your up-to-date news and announcements without having to check back to your site every-so-often.

Script - A script is an executable list of commands created by a scripting language. Scripts that are executed on a web server (eg; Perl, PHP) are said to be server-side scripts. Scripts that execute on your own home PC (eg; JavaScript) are said to be client-side scripts. Scripts can be embed within HTML to produce a web page with dynamic actions.

Scripting Language - A scripting language is a simple programming language used to write an executable list of commands, called a script. JavaScript, Perl, VBscript are scripting languages rather than general-purpose programming languages.

Search Engine - A server (computer) or commonly a collection of servers dedicated to indexing internet web pages, storing the results in a giant database and returning lists of pages which match particular searched queries from within its database. The indexes are normally and automatically generated using spiders.

Server - A computer, program or process which responds to requests for information from an user. On the internet, all web pages reside on servers (computers).

Spider - An automated software robot that continuously crawls hyperlinks and pages on the Internet and collects data that is returned to its database for indexing. This is how Search Engines function. The process of crawling the web, storing URLs' and indexing keywords, links and text, is the act of Spidering.

SSI [Server-Side Includes] - Tells a server to include information (source from a separate file) in a document before sending it to the browser. A very effective method of producing the same information over many pages as one file can be altered to produce the changes over the many the pages that includes the SSI file.

Sub-Domain (Name) - A sub-domain is a domain that is part of a larger domain name. DNS hierarchy consists of the root-level domain at the top, underneath which are the top-level domains, followed by second-level domains and finally sub-domains.

Tag - An HTML tag is a formatting command written into a document that specifies how it should be formatted. A web browser interprets these tags and outputs the intended command (action).

Template - HTML templates are skeletal HTML pages with the main content left out. Templates provide an effective solution in creating many pages with an identical look or navigational structure but different content.

Traffic - Similar to a real-world sense of traffic on a road or freeway, traffic in a web-sense is a measurement of the amount of users that visit a Web site.

URI [Uniform Resource Identifier] - The generic term for all types of names and addresses that refer to objects on the World Wide Web. A URL is one kind of URI.

URL [Uniform Resource Locator] - Each separate page accessible on the Web has a unique address which can by identified by it's URL. The first part of the address (eg; http or ftp etc) indicates what protocol to use, and the second part specifies the IP address or the domain name where the resource is located.

Usability - Refers to the level or degree of a page's operating friendliness for the user.

Validation - Validation is a way to make sure that your (HTML) code is compliant with current HTML specifications.

W3C [World Wide Web Consortium] - Established in October 1994 to lead the World Wide Web to its full potential by developing common protocols that promote its evolution and ensure its interoperability.

XHTML [EXtensible HyperText Markup Language] - A markup language for Web pages from the W3C. XHTML combines HTML and XML into a single format (HTML 4.0 and XML 1.0). Like XML, XHTML can be extended with proprietary tags. Also like XML, XHTML must be coded more rigorously than HTML. Over the years, HTML coders have become sloppy, because Web browser software was originally written to tolerate many variations in HTML coding. With XHTML, coders must conform to the rules.

XML [EXtensible Markup Language] - An open standard for describing data from the W3C. It is used for defining data elements on a Web page and business-to-business documents. XML uses a similar tag structure as HTML; however, whereas HTML defines how elements are displayed, XML defines what those elements contain. While HTML uses predefined tags, XML allows tags to be defined by the developer of the page. Thus, virtually any data items, such as "product," "sales rep" and "amount due," can be identified, allowing Web pages to function like database records. By providing a common method for identifying data, XML supports business-to-business transactions and has become "the" format for electronic data interchange and Web services.