Appendix A - Vocabulary
3 1/2-inch disk- A floppy disk originally developed by Sony Corporation and used as a secondary storage medium for personal computers. (The magnetic disk is enclosed in a hard plastic case.
Archie- An Internet file-search tool. Archie expects you know something fairly basic about the file, like its name. Archie tells you where to find that file.
Baud- A measure of a modem's speed. Specifically, the baud rate measures how many times in a second the modem's incoming/outgoing line can change states from 1 to 0 or back.
Bits Per Second (bps)- Another tool to measure speed at which a modem processes data.
Boot- To initiate an automatic routine that clears the memory, loads the operating system, and prepares the computer for use. The term boot is derived from the saying "pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps." Personal computers must do just that because random-access memory (RAM) does not retain program instructions when the power is shut off. Buried within the computer's read-only memory (ROM) circuits is an auto-start program that come into play when the power is switched on (a cold boot). Unlike RAM, program instructs the computer's disk drives to search for the computer's operating system. After a system crash occurs, you usually must reboot the computer. With most systems, you can perform a warm boot that restarts the system without the stress electronic components caused by switching the power off and on again. With IBM PC-compatible computers, you press Ctrl-Alt-Del keys to restart the system, although this method does not always unlock the system. Macintoshes have a restart button on the keyboard.
Browser- An Internet search tool, such as Mosaic or Lynx. Browser are distinguished from other search tools (like Archie) in that browsers enable you to search non-linearly, through hypertext links. There are two general categories of browser: graphical and text-based.
CD-ROM Disk Drive- A read only disk drive designed to access and read the data encoded on a compact disk and transfer this data to the computer.
CD-ROM- A read only optical storage technology that use compact disks. CD-ROM disks can store up to 650 of data, all of which can be made available interactively on the computer's display. CD-ROM currently is used to produce encyclopedias, dictionaries, and software libraries available to personal computer users. New compression techniques enable you to pack up to 250,000 text pages on one CD-ROM disk.
Central Processing Unit (CPU)- The computer's internal storage, processing, and control circuitry; including the arithmetic-logic unit (ALU), the control unit, and the primary storage unit.
Client- Broadly, any piece of hardware or software that receives some service or feature from another (called the "server"
Computer- A machine capable of following instructions to alter data in a desirable way and to perform at least some of these operations without human intervention. Computers represent and manipulate text, graphics, symbols and music, as well as numbers.
CSLIP- Compressed SLIP. Your hot new modem seems plenty fast relative to that pitiful old 2400-bps model you used to use, but wait until it starts to choke on the Internet's massive quantities of data. That's what CSLIP is for . It squashes things down so they are more easily swallowed (after unsquashing by you WinSock). The specific compression method is named after the person who developed it . Van Jacobson.
Data- Factual information you can use to generate calculations or to make decisions.
Domain Name System (DNS)- A scheme enabling computers on the Internet to translate their computer-friendly IP addresses into human-friendly strings of text (their "domain name, like my ISP's won " core. symnet.net") and back again. Not all Internet nodes have domain names; they do have IP addresses.
Hypertext - A form of electronic document with built-in links to other documents, themselves frequently hypertext, and so on. If are skipping in this glossary from the terms in one definition to their definitions in another, you are experiencing a rudimentary form of hypertext.
IP Address - The numerical, computer-friendly version of the electronic "address" of a computer on the Internet. (See DNS.) Your PC will always have one of these; depending on your ISP, either it will always be the same name (static addressing), or you will get a different one each time you log in. In the latter case the ISP's host and you WinSock will work it out on the fly- you don't need to remember the new one, or (yuck) reconfigure the WinSock over and over.
Landscape Orientation - The rotation of a page design to print text and/or graphics horizontally across the longer axis of the page.
Liquid Crystal Display Panel (LCD Panel) - A device which takes the image from the computer and displays it on a screen or wall.
Local Area Network (LAN) - The linkage of personal computer to other computers within a limited area by high performance cables so that users can exchange information, share expensive peripherals, and draw on the resources of a massive secondary storage unit called a file server. Local area networks offer the advantages of a distributed computing system in which computational power is distributed to users with sacrificing their ability to communicate. Ranging tremendously in ion size and complexity. LANs may link only a few person computers to expensive, shared peripheral, such as a laser printer. More complex systems use central computers (file servers) and enables users to communicate with each other via electronic mail to share multi-user programs and to access shared databases.
Lynx - A Web browser, text-based rather than graphical. Lynx "lives" on host machines where it can be accessed using plain-vanilla terminal emulation programs like Crosstalk and ProComm.
Maximum Segment Size (MSS) - A threshold which tells the Internet roughly how large a packet of data to deliver to you at one time.
Maximum Transmission Units (MTU) - Presumably the flip side of MRU.
Memory - The computer's primary storage, such as random-access memory or read only memory, as distinguished from its secondary storage such as disk drives. The computer's main memory is directly accessible to the central processing unit (CPU). To perform computations at high speeds, the computer's processing circuitry must be able to obtain information from the memory directly and quickly. Most applications programs (software) set aside a portion of RAM as temporary workspace for your data, enabling you to modify (rewrite) as needed until the data is ready for printing or storage on disk. Note: Save your work frequently. In the event of system failure or power interruption, you lose all work in RAM that you have not recorded (saved) on magnetic medium such as a disk.
Microsoft Works - An easy-to-use integrated program for Macintosh computers and IBM PC compatibles. Works offers a word processing module with a spelling checker, a spreadsheet with business charts, a flat-file database manager, a macro-recording utility, and a telecommunications utility. An object-oriented drawing program is available in the word processing and spreedsheet modules. Although each of its modules is no match for a full featured, stand-alone program (such as Word, Excel, or Foxpro) Works packs an amazing amount of functionality into one package. Each module includes the most frequently used features, omitting the complexity of advanced program functions. You also can move data around with ease within the program and the object-oriented drawing program makes it easier to print attractive looking output. Applications that can be challenging with full featured programs, such as printing form letters and mailing labels or including a chart in a business report, are easy to accomplish in works.
Mirror - Some FTP servers are so useful that they are nearly always overloaded with traffic. To get around this, they clone their contents to other designated sites, called mirrors.
Modem - A device that converts the digital signals generated by the computer's serial port to the modulated, analog signals required for transmission over a telephone line and likewise, transforms incoming analog signals to the digital equivalents. In personal computing, people frequently used modems to exchange programs and data with other computers and to access on-line information services, such as American Online, CompuServe, or as a pathway into the internet.
Monitor - The complete device that produces an on-screen display, including all necessary internal support circuitry. A monitor also is called a video display unit or cathode-ray tube (CRT)
Mosaic - A graphical Web browser. As with other such browsers, Mosaic's screen looks like a printed page, possibly including photographs and other graphics. Various areas of the page are designed as "hot spots" or hypertext links; when you click them with a mouse, some action is taken (usually the retrieval of another Mosaic page, sometimes a file or directory listing).
Mouse - An input device, equipped with one or more control buttons, that is housed in a palm-sized case and designed so that you can roll it about on the table, next to your keyboard. As the mouse moves, its circuits relay signals that correspondingly move a pointer on-screen. The simplest of all mouse functions is reposition the cursor: you point to the cursor's new location and click the mouse button. You also can use the mouse to choose commands from menu, select text for editing purposes, move objects and draw pictures on-screen. The mouse was developed by researchers to make computers easier to use. Instead of forcing users to m emirs long lists of keyboard commands, they reasoned displaying a menu or list of commands on-screen would be easier. The user then could point the cursor ( is the blinking line you see in your workspace and it shows where your words will go when you type) to the desired command and click the mouse button (double click just means that you click twice really fast). Mice are distinguished by the internal mechanism they use to generate their signal and by their means of connection with the computer. Two types of internal mechanisms are popular:
Mechanical mouse - This mouse has a rubber-coated ball on the underside of the case. As you move the mouse, the ball rotates and optical sensors detect the motion. You can use a mechanical mouse on virtually any surface, although a mouse pad made of special fabric usually gives the best results. Mechanical mice are prone to collect dirt within their internal mechanisms. If too much debris accumulates, the pointer may behave erratically. You usually can clean a mechanical mouse. Turn the mouse over and rotate the ball-retainer ring so that it pops out, freeing the ball. Clean the ball and the ball rollers with a cotton swab moistened in rubbing alcohol. Blow dust out of the ball chamber and reassemble the mouse.
Optical mouse - This mouse registers its position by detecting reflections from a light-emitting diode that directs a beam downward. You must have a special metal pad to reflect the beam properly and you cannot move the mouse beyond the pad.
Multimedia - A computer-based method of presenting information by employing more that one medium of communication and emphasizing interactivity.In general multimedia combines text, graphics, and sound.
Netmask - The network mask.
Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP) - How Usenet news getsf from here to there and back again.
Newsreader - A client which lets you easily partake (actively or passively) of the ebb and flow of Usenet discussions.
Node - A computer attached to the Internet, particularly one with its own IP address.
Packet - a bundle of data transmitted over a network, including information about where the data came from where it's headed, and other overhead baggage like error-detection aids.
ph - An Internet "phone book" client "Phone book" is meant literally. It returns a phone number, e-mail address, and sometimes other information. Very useful in some situations; for example, as a means of looking up a colleague in another department at your own or another college.
ping - Both the name of a client which tests the connection between two computers on the Internet describing and the verb describing what the ping client does. Ping sends from computer "A" a specially formatted string of data whose only purpose is to elicit a specially formatted reply from computer "B".
Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP) - A newer, more secure, and more easily configured technology than SLIP which accomplished, effectively, the same thing that SLIP does: it turns your modem-equipped computer into an Internet node.
POP - Varies with context. Sometimes, as in "My ISP has POPS throughout the world," it means "point of presence." When used to refer to e-mail clients such as Eudora and Pegasus, it stands for "Post Office Protocol" - the underlying rules for addressing (and interpreting the addressing of) mail messages. "POP3" is the current version, in this context.
Protocol - A set of formal rules, sometimes officially sanctioned, sometimes de facto, which refer to the rules by which computers share specific sorts of data across phone lines or other media.
Random-access memory (RAM) - The computer's primary working memory in which program instructions and data are stored so that they are accessible directly to the central processing unit (CPU). RAM is used by the computer to perform computations at high speeds by obtaining information from the memory directly and quickly.
Read Only Memory (ROM) - The portion of a computer's primary storage that does not lose its contents when you switch off the power and that contains essential system programs that neither you nor the computer can erase. A computer's startup instructions are provided by the ROM, which may contain only simple programs that tell the disk drive where to find and load the computer's operating system. But in today's environment most of the operating system is on ROM chips.
Serial Line Internet Protocol (SLIP) - The rules which underline the technology permitting your computer to become a point on the Internet, simply by using a high-speed modem and the correct software (WinSock, if your're using Windows). A de factor rather than a formal standard.
Server - The hardware or software which provides some serve or feature to client. You will see the term in contexts like "FTP server," "Web server," "gopher server," and so on.
Simple Mail-Transfer Protocol (SMTP) - One protocol for the Internet's circulation of electronic mail.
Software - System, utility, or application programs expressing in a computer readable language. Application programs are designed to help you perform tasks such as analyzing stock data, writing a report, or creating a presentation. System or utility programs help you control and maintain your computer.
Stack - As the name implies, a tower of discrete objects; in this context, the objects in question are software components. A TCP/IP stack consists of the underlying TCP/IP software, on top of which may be piled a WinSock login scripting software and an Windows user interface (i.e., Client).
Telnet - A tool to access one Internet computer from another in order to execute programs available on it but often nowhere else. You might telnet to a computer at a university, for example, in order to play a game.
Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) - One of the internet's most daunting acronyms, also one of its most important. Still do not worry worry about it. It's just the umbrella term for the formal set of low-level rules that Internet computers use for passing data back and forth among themselves.
Uniform Resource Locator (URL) - The address of something on the Internet, including information about the form it takes and how a computer on the Internet (such as your own) should go about acquiring it. Used by Web browser tools.
Veronica - An Internet search tool, Veronica takes the features of gophers one step further, by enabling you top search among some subset of gophers ( geographical or context based, including "All the Gophers in the World") without knowing the names of the gophers themselves. The name is short for "very easy rodent-oriented netwide index to computerized archives ". Note that the rodent in question is the gopher, not the mouse.
Web, The - Short for the "World Wide Web". See WWW.
Whois - A WinSock client program which look up information about a person located in an electronic index of all/many of the persons in an organization (such as a company, government agency, or university).
Wide-Area Information Service (WAIS) - When you search the Internet via Archie, (gopher, or Veronica, you're searching it by the name of the file in which the information is found, or by the name of the directory in which it is located. A WAIS search actually examines the contents of the documents.
WinSock - Short for "Windows socket". Software which enables your PC running windows to plug into the Internet using a dial-up connection.
Wide Area Network (WAN) - A computer network that uses high speed, long distance communications networks or satellites to connect computers over distances greater than the one or two miles traversed by local area networks.
Windowing Environment - An applications program interface (API ) that provides the features commonly associated with a graphical user interface (such as windows, pull-down menus, on-screen fonts, and scroll bars or scroll boxes) and that makes the features available to programmers of application packages.
World Wide Web (WWW) - The term for the sum of all the hypertext documents (obviously in the world) that are linked together via a special protocol (which is called, reasonably enough, the HyperText Transfer Protocol, or HTTP).
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