alt tags
see tagging.
back / forward
buttons in most browsers and in some web sites. back returns you to the page previously viewed, forward goes to the next page.
blog or web log
a blog (short for "web log") is a type of web page that offers a series of short articles, photos, diary entries, etc. blogs have become a common medium for communication in professional, political, news, trendy, and other specialized web communities. many blogs allow subscriptions to rss feeds.
boolean logic
a system of standardized words used to connect search terms. the most common of these are and, or, not: brown and rice returns records with the term “brown rice”; brown or rice returns records with either the term “brown” or the term “rice”; brown not rice returns all records with the term “brown” except records that also include the term “rice”
browse
browsing is much like window shopping, going through a page, exploring what's there and seeing where the links take you. the opposite of browsing is searching.
browsers
software programs that allow you to view web pages and/or other documents on the internet. the most commonly used browsers are microsoft internet explorer (often called ie), firefox, safari, opera, and chrome.
cache
a space where web pages you have visited are stored in your computer. when you revisit a page (such as clicking back), your browser checks to see if that page is in cache; if it is, the browser will load it from there instead of directly from the internet, because it is much faster.
case sensitive
most search tools ignore whether or not you use a capital or a lower-case letter in your search. “case sensitive” means that you must use the exact upper- or- lower-case letters.
chat (instant messaging)
instant, real-time communication over the internet. it’s less formal than email and can involve several users at once.
coffee
primary nutrition source for programmers. see also cookie
cookie (i)
a tiny little message sent to your computer from a web server computer. the next time your browser talks to the server computer, the information in cookie is sent back to the server, allowing it to respond according to the cookie's contents.
so what information is in the cookie? personal preferences, mostly: the main use for cookies is to provide web pages customized to your profile. the plus is, you don’t have to fill out a form every time you enter a site. the con is you might be opening yourself up to more spam. you can set your browser to not accept the cookie, but some sites on the internet might not work properly for you.
cookie (ii)
so what information is in the cookie? personal preferences, mostly: the main use for cookies is to provide web pages customized to your profile. the plus is, you don’t have to fill out a form every time you enter a site. the con is you might be opening yourself up to more spam. you can set your browser to not accept the cookie, but some sites on the internet might not work properly for you.
secondary nutrition source for programmers. see also coffee.
crawler
see spider.
domain/top level domain (tld)
those three little letters that come after the “dot” in a web address? that’s based on the domain. in the us, common domains are .edu (education), .gov (government agency), .net (network related), .com (commercial), .org (nonprofit and research organizations). outside the us, domains indicate country: ca (canada), uk (united kingdom), au (australia), etc. neither of these lists is exhaustive, and not everyone plays by the rules: occasionally a “.org” will be an adult site. but overall, the system works.
download
to copy something from a primary source to a secondary one, such as saving something found on the web to a file on your hard drive. the opposite of upload.
email
more formal messages sent directly over the internet to other users.
extension or file extension
a dot and several letters at the end of a filename that indicate the type of file. for example, “.txt” denotes a plain text file. other common image extensions include “.jpg”, “.bmp”, “.png”, or “.gif”. it’s just a way for computers to recognize file types.
feed reader
software that takes the code in which rss feeds are written and translates it into something you can actually read. kinda like translating pig latin into english.
flash
a popular program used for adding animation and interactivity to web pages. flash is commonly used to create animation and other various web page components, to integrate video into web pages, and more recently, to develop rich internet applications
freshness (i)
how current a search engine database is, based primarily on how often its spiders crawl the internet, update their web pages, and discover new ones. generally speaking, two weeks old is still considered “fresh” in this context. .
freshness (ii)
general state of all cookies around the wowwebnow office. normally used with a negative qualifier. generally speaking, two weeks old is still considered “fresh” in this context.
frames
a programming format for web pages that divides the screen into segments, each with a scroll bar as if it were a "window" within the window.
ftp
file transfer protocol. in layman’s terms, it’s a way to quickly transfer big honkin’ files across the internet, specifically files that are too large to attach to an email.
host/hosting
a host is a server computer -- directly connected to the internet -- where your website files are stored.
html
hypertext markup language. sounds like science fiction, but basically, html is a standard language of computer code that translates raw code (the stuff that looks like you sat a monkey in front of your keyboard) into something your web browser can read. browsers, in turn, are programmed to interpret html for display so you can read it.
http
hypertext transfer protocol - the standard operating rules used by the world wide web. http defines how messages are formatted and transmitted, and what actions web servers and browsers should take in response to various commands.
https
see ssl
hypertext
hypertext is a web language, built into html, that allows a word, image, or other object to become a link to another page on the internet.
intranet
a private network inside a company or organization that uses the same kinds of software that you would find on the public internet, but only for internal use.
ip address/ip number
every machine that is on the internet has a unique internet protocol (ip) address. as humans, we prefer to think in terms of domain names (www.wowwebnow.com), but the internet actually responds to the ip address. each unique ip address consists of 4 parts separated by dots, e.g. 156.141.425.2.
internet service provider (isp)
a company that sells internet connections via modem, cable or dsl.
java (i)
a programming language specifically designed for writing programs that can be safely downloaded to your computer from the internet and immediately run without fear of viruses or other harm to your computer or files.
java (ii)
see coffee.
javascript
a simple programming language used to create motion on web pages. it shares some characteristics with java but is independent.
keyword(s)
a word searched for in a search command. in order for your site to be found by searchers, it is important to have relevant keywords on your site. see also phrase.
link
the url imbedded in another document, so that if you click on the highlighted text or button referring to the link, you go to the corresponding web page.
link rot
the internet is dynamic, growing and changing literally by the second. link rot refers to links gradually becoming irrelevant or broken as time goes on, because the sites they link to disappear, change content, or move to new locations. you know how you click a link, expecting to go to a certain page, but instead get an error message (e.g., "not available")? that’s the result of link rot.
listserver
a discussion group that operates through email messages. see also newsgroup.
meta tags
see tagging.
newsgroup
a discussion group operated over the internet. see also listservers.
packet/packet jam
when you load a web page through the internet, the pieces of the page are sent in packets of information, which fit in between other messages, then are reassembled when they arrive at your end. now, these packets may be sent over different internet “paths”, and if any of these packets gets delayed, your page can’t be reassembled and displayed. this is called a packet jam.
pdf /.pdf
portable document format; a proprietary file format developed by adobe systems, used to capture almost any kind of document while maintaining the original format. viewing a pdf file requires acrobat reader, which is built into most browsers and can be downloaded free from adobe. creating a pdf, however, requires the purchase of the acrobat software.
phrase
more than one keyword, searched exactly as typed, all words required, in the order specified. the phrase is usually in quotation marks to signal the search engine to keep the words just like that (i.e. “yellow rubber ducks”). tech geeks call a phrase a character string because they think it sounds cool.
pirate/piracy
unless you put it there, nothing on the internet belongs to you ... and technically, unless you have permission to do so, downloading pictures, songs, movies, text, or what-have-you can be considered theft. there is an entire black market of reproducing and distributing illegal files over the internet.
plug-in
an application built into or added to a browser which enables the browser to do things it normally isn’t capable of, such as playing a movie. each new version of a browser will normally incorporate the most common “plug-ins” and therefore it’s usually a good idea to have the latest browser version.
protocol/internet protocol
a set of rules which is used by computers to communicate with each other across a network. see also tcp/ip.
relevancy ranking of search results
the most common method for determining the order in which search results are displayed. in other words, the browser uses its own unique algorithm to determine what it thinks you’re looking for, then sorts the results accordingly.
rss or rss feeds
short for really simple syndication, rss is basically a method -- primarily used by news sites and blogs -- to distribute (or syndicate) web-content. by subscribing to an rss feed, you’re alerted to new additions to the site since you last read it. in order to read rss feeds, you must use a feed reader which translates the code into an easily readable format.
script
in computer programming, a script is a program or set of instructions that is interpreted or carried out by a program, rather than by the computer processor. scripts are secondary programs which cannot work without the main program ... kind of like how a cd is useless without a cd player.
search
searching is usually the most efficient way to find information on a web site or on the internet as a whole ... although sometimes you can find things by browsing that you might miss otherwise because you might not think of the right term to search for.
server, web server
a computer that is a.) running specific software; b.) assigned an ip address; and c.) connected to the internet so that it can provide documents over the web. see also host.
server-side
something that operates on the server computer (the one providing the web page), as opposed to the client computer (which is the one you’re using). usually it is a program or command or procedure that creates dynamic pages, animation, or other interaction.
shtml, usually seen as .shtml
an file name extension that identifies secure web pages.
site or web-site
a site is a location for a bunch of related pages linked to from that site ... as opposed to a web page, which is a single entity. people often use the two phrases interchangeably, but strictly speaking, a web page is a specific url, whereas a website is a collection of one or more web pages.
spiders
computer robot programs, referred to sometimes as crawlers or knowbots that are used by search engines to roam (or “crawl”) websites and keep the search engine up to date. they obtain new pages, update known pages, and delete obsolete ones. their findings are then integrated into the search engine’s primary database. the web is so enormous that it can take six months or longer for spiders to cover it, by which point the first pages they crawled are often out of date. this is one of the primary causes of link rot.
ssl
secure sockets layer, a protocol for transmitting private documents via the internet. many web sites use the protocol to obtain confidential user information, such as credit card numbers. by convention, urls that require an ssl connection start with https: instead of http:.
tagging (i)
using computer coding to create labels on a website, by which the site can be found by search engines.
tagging (ii)
the process by which one becomes “it”.
tcp/ip
transmission control protocol/internet protocol. this is the set of standard protocols that defines the internet. to be truly on the internet, your computer must have tcp/ip software. see also ip address.
title (of a document)
the official title of a web page, as found in the programming code. this is what appears in the top bar of the window when you display a web page, and it is the title that appears in search engine results.
title tags
see tagging.
upload
to copy something from a secondary source to a primary one, such as copying a file from a disc to your computer. the opposite of download.
url
uniform resource locator. the unique address of any web document.
virus
a computer virus is a damaging, self-replicating program which can spread from one computer to another the same way the flu spreads through a school.
wiki
a word for technology that gathers in one place a number of web pages focused on a theme, project, or collaboration. wikis are generally used when users or group members are invited to develop, contribute, and update the content of the wiki. the most famous wiki is the wikipedia. wiki means quick in hawaiian.
xhtml
extensible hypertext markup language is a hybrid between html and xml that is more universally acceptable in web pages and search engines than xml.
xml
extensible markup language, is a set of rules for encoding documents electronically. xml’s design goals emphasize simplicity, generality, and usability over the internet. see xhtml.