A

abbreviation

Meaning: An abbreviation is a shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase, used to represent the whole. Abbreviations such as Dr. for Doctor and U.S. for United States, and lb. for pound are well known in the offline world. In the online world abbreviations, referred to as shorthand, along with acronyms and leetspeak have created a language of its own.

ABCD

Meaning: An pseudo-acronym coined after the ABC-Disney deal.

ABI - Binary

Meaning: A specification for a particular hardware platform and operating system, it defines the calls from the application to the operating system. Considered a step beyond an API (Application Program Interface), the ABI defines the API plus the machine language for a particular CPU. An ABI also ensures runtime compatibility by defining the machine language (or runtime) format.

above the fold

Meaning: The content on a Web page that is visible without scrolling. The content you see when you have to scroll down is referred to as below the fold. The area above the fold is considered the most desirable real estate on a Web page. This expression originally referred to the position of articles in a newspaper.

access

Meaning: To log on to the Internet, where you can browse information, view Web sites, retrieve data, and send or receive e-mail. The term "access" comes from the notion that you are accessing a computer system, known as a server, that enables you to connect to other computers and "get online." You can do this with a computer and a modem through a dial-up connection (via an ISP), or over a network (such as an office LAN). Access can also be used to describe the act of retrieving information. For example, "In order to access that file, you have to FTP into the server."

access control

Meaning: A way to protect confidential data on a computer (or a computer network) from unauthorized access. see also: access control list

access control list

Meaning: A list, maintained by the operating system, that specifies who gets permission to read or write files and directories and who gets permission to execute certain programs. It is up to the sysadmin to assign and control the levels of access. For example, a company may want to allow access to payroll records only to users within the human resources department.

access devices

Meaning: A new name for PCs, it refers to handheld devices and any computer component that can access a network.

access rights

Meaning: The level of access a user has to read or write computer documents or execute computer programs. see also: access control list

account

Meaning: When you sign up with an Internet Service Provider (ISP) and pay a monthly fee, you establish an "account" and receive an account name (or a username) as well as a password. This information allows you to access the Internet and your e-mail account when you dial the telephone number provided by the ISP. Account is a common term, and you can easily have more than one online account. For e-mail, you may have a local account and a Webmail account (such as Hotmail). For Net access, you may have a dial-up account you use at home and another account you use at school or work. see also: access number

ACM

Meaning: An international scientific and educational organization dedicated to advancing the art, science, engineering, and application of information technology (IT). The ACM serves both professional and public interests by fostering the open interchange of information and by promoting professional and ethical standards.

ACORN

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: acorn)

acquisition cost

Meaning: Advertising or promotional costs divided by the number of click-throughs. For example, if your company spends $30,000 to purchase 1 million impressions for on an online ad campaign, and the ad achieves a 0.5 percent click-through rate resulting in 5,000 visits to your Web site, your acquisition cost equals $6 per person.

Acrobat

Meaning: Created by Adobe, Acrobat is a software program that decodes, reads, and converts documents in a format called PDF (Portable Document Format). You use this program, for example, when prompted to download a PDF version of something on the Web. It is a revolutionary product in that it allows scalable graphics and type to be displayed and printed from any computer and from any platform (Macintosh, Windows, DOS, or Unix)-regardless of the fonts or software programs used to create the original document. It is freeware, so all you need to do in order to get the latest version of Acrobat, is download it from this definition on NetLingo.com.

acronym

Meaning: Derived from the first letters of a phrase, acronyms are meant to make the phrase easier to say and remember. With an acronym, the first letter of each word makes up a new word that is, in fact, pronounceable (for example, SNAFU is pronounced "sna-foo" and WOMBAT is pronounced "wahm-bat").

actionable

Meaning: Something a person can take action on, it comes from the legal sector but is now often used by marketers and consultants. For example, "After he analyzed our contact center, he recommended that we take these five actionable steps."

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

active

Meaning: A term that describes the objects currently displayed on your computer screen. For example, on a PC (personal computer), the active window is the one you are currently working in. In spreadsheet applications, the active cell is the highlighted cell in which data can be entered or modified. An active program is the program currently running. When you enter information, it usually applies only to the active document or Web page you happen to be viewing.

ActiveX

Meaning: A set of technologies created by Microsoft to enable interactive content on Web sites. With ActiveX, Web sites can be animated using multimedia effects, interactive objects, and sophisticated applications that create a user experience comparable to a high-quality CD-ROM. The same effects can be experienced with Java, Shockwave, Flash, and numerous other applets and programs-the difference is that ActiveX is an exclusive Microsoft product making use of ActiveX Controls. For more information about ActiveX, visit this definition on NetLingo.com.

ad banner

Meaning: An online advertisement on a Web page, it links to another Web site or buffer page or landing page.

ad blocking

Meaning: A phrase that refers to not displaying specified online ads. A publisher can request that his or her ad network block certain ad banners, usually because of the content (such as online porn) or because of the technology used to display them (such as pop-up ads or ads that contain Flash or Java).

ad click

Meaning: A click on an online ad, it takes a user to another Web site. If you see the term "ad clicks" it refers to the number of times a user clicks on an online ad.

ad click rate

Meaning: Sometimes referred to as click-through, the "ad click rate" is the percentage of ad views that resulted in an ad click.

ad exchange

Meaning: A company that brokers online advertising by bringing Web publishers and advertising buyers together on a Web site where they can participate in auctions for ad space. Set up in a Nasdaq-like exchange for the buying and selling of digital advertisements, an ad exchange is a marketplace where publishers and advertisers can find and execute advertising transactions (similar to what happens on a stock exchange).

ad overlay

Meaning: When Internet companies questioned the effectiveness of video pre-roll, mid-roll, and post-roll ads, they came up with a new advertising concept: the ad overlay. An "ad overlay" is when certain videos contain a small, semi-transparent overlay across the bottom of the screen, similar to what you often see during TV shows. The ads show up 15 seconds into the videos and only last for 10 seconds.

ad space

Meaning: The name for the space on a Web page that is reserved for online ads.

ad view

Meaning: A Web page with an online ad. Once a user has viewed the ad, he or she can click on it (ad click). There may be more than one ad on an "ad view". However, ad view (also known as impressions) can represent the number of times an ad banner is downloaded (and presumably seen) by users.

ADC

Meaning: An "Analog-to-Digital Converter" is a hardware device that converts information from analog to digital.

address

Meaning: A series of letters, numbers, and/or symbols by which you identify yourself and by which the Internet identifies you (actually, your computer). It is also a location where information is stored. Through the use of addresses, people can send e-mail, look at Web sites, and send or receive files and documents.

adminisphere

Meaning: Slang for the rarefied organizational layers beginning just above the rank-and-file. Decisions that fall from the "adminisphere" are often profoundly inappropriate or irrelevant to the problems they were designed to solve.

administrivia

Meaning: Refers to the administrative details that are found on a Web site. For example, the legal, copyright, liability, and licensing information. In the past, privacy issues were also categorized as "administrivia", however, with the increased awareness for security on Web sites, privacy is viewed as a more prominent topic.

ADSL

Meaning: A technology developed by Bell Labs to transmit compressed digital video and audio over regular (twisted pair) telephone lines with the use of special modems. It entails one high-speed, unidirectional data channel and one low-speed, bidirectional control channel (making it asynchronous). Basically, this means you can download faster than you can upload.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

advermation

Meaning: Online advertising presented so that it appears to be information to a user and not a marketing message.

advertainment

Meaning: A term to describe media that advertises a product or brand while entertaining. Advertisers can buy shows (five to eight minutes in broadband) for much less than the cost of a 30 second Super Bowl ad and acquire reach over broadband, wireless and video on demand (VOD).

advertorial

Meaning: An advertisement that resembles editorial content, usually relates to a product or service being promoted.

affiliate

Meaning: Used as an adjective, it describes a Web site, company, or marketing program that promotes products and/or services provided by a merchant in return for a commission. Affiliates aim to drive targeted traffic to a Web site, usually an e-commerce merchant, via a link or search utility on another Web site. Affiliate programs, thought of as a kind of "digital franchising," pay affiliates a commission on the sales they generate at the merchant site (usually 5-25%), while providing an extra service to visitors on the affiliate site (such as the option to buy books or music). Pioneered by Amazon.com, which had more than 500,000 participating Web sites within the first year of launching their affiliate marketing program, there are now thousands of affiliate companies.

affiliate link

Meaning: A link to another Web site, that usually offers some product or service for sale. Once the link is clicked, it will have the possibility to generate some revenue for that Web site. Revenue is based on certain criteria, for example, if an actual sale is generated from the use of the "affiliate link".

affiliate marketing

Meaning: A revenue sharing arrangement between online advertisers or e-commerce merchants and online publishers or Web site owners, whereby payment is based on performance measures, such as the number of sales, clicks, or registrations that the affiliate refers. In other words, two companies agree to link to one another; if someone clicks from site A to buy something at site B, site A gets a commission on the sale. Affiliate marketing is a marketing channel used to generate leads or sales, whereas affiliate software provides the tracking and reporting of these commission-based activities (the sales, clicks, or registrations). Amazon.com pioneered affiliate marketing by getting as many other Web sites as possible to join its affiliate network and sell its products, thereby greatly extending its marketing reach.

affiliate tracking

Meaning: To sign-up new affiliates and track affiliate-referred traffic on a website, a merchant requires a software solution that will do the following, among other things:

affinity analysis

Meaning: A data mining technique that seeks to reveal undiscovered affinities and associations (such as, for example, between the purchase of canned fruit filling and pie shells). Specific tools used for affinity grouping include standard statistics, memory-based reasoning, link analysis, and special-purpose market basket analysis tools. 

aftcasting

Meaning: Originally used in meteorology, it is an attempt to re-create a historical weather pattern with a computer simulation. The initial conditions of the actual storm are entered into the computer, and the results are then compared with what actually happened.

aggregate data

Meaning: Data that is the result of applying a process, such as combining data elements. It can also refer to data that is taken collectively or in summary form. Summary data, on the other hand, is aggregated according to specific criteria. For example, individual daily sales may be aggregated to weekly totals, or averaged to a single per/day number rather than maintaining all of the individual data elements. 

aggregation or aggregate

Meaning: The service of pulling together specific kinds of information on behalf of a business or consumer. For example, an online financial services aggregator enables a user to see all of his or her financial balances and activities (including loans, investments, banking, and insurance) on one Web site-even though the accounts may be held in many firms.

aggregator

Meaning: An aggregator is software or a hosted application that collects RSS feeds from various sources and displays it in a single consolidated view, either in a window on your desktop or in a Web browser. Its purpose is to syndicate Web content such as news headlines, blogs, podcasts, and vlogs in a single location for easy viewing.

agreeance

Meaning: This term is a spin off of "agreement". It was created because it sounds more important and official, and now is a common word used in the industry and corporate world.

AI

Meaning: "AI" traditionally stands for artificial intelligence.

AIF or .aif

Meaning: One of the many Macintosh sound file formats. On the Net, you may come across the option to listen to a sound clip. The file that is downloaded to your computer when "clicked on" might be in the AIF format (if the sound file was originally captured on a Macintosh). Your helper applications or browser plugins need to be configured to know how to process and play this file for you. If you have questions on how to set your configuration, call the tech support people at the related software or hardware companies and they will walk you through the set-up process ;-)

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

air

Meaning: Slang for wireless.

AirCard

Meaning: A device that plugs into a laptop computer, typically through a USB connection or PC Card slot that uses a cell phone signal to provide high-speed Internet access. The devices allow users to have Internet access without relying on Wi-Fi hot spots. They are sold by cell phone companies, and they require a monthly service plan. "AirCard" is a registered trademark of Sierra Wireless.

AIX

Meaning: The IBM flavor for Unix.

Ajax

Meaning: (also seen as: AJAX)

algorithm

Meaning: A set of mathematical rules that search engines use to rank the search results once a user has entered in a keyword (or keywords) when performing an online search. In other words, it is a method of ranking the Web site listings contained within its index.

algorithm-based software

Meaning: A data mining software program that performs statistical mining of customer data to generate a predictive model of site behavior. It also refers to the programming used in voice recognition software.

aliasing and anti-aliasing

Meaning: Aliasing is a Web design term used to describe the undesirable distortion of visual elements on a computer screen. These peculiarities take many forms, such as the appearance of jagged or stair-stepped edges along what is supposed to be a smooth, curvy surface (like an O or S) or diagonal lines on the screen (also known as "the jaggies"). Anti-aliasing is a software technique used in imaging systems (such as Photoshop) to make these curved edges or diagonal lines look smooth and continuous.

AliWeb

Meaning: A search directory for locating WWW documents that is provided by NEXOR, a UK based service provider. AliWeb does not use a spider, instead, it relies on forms that Web authors themselves submit to the AliWeb database thus making it a directory, not a search engine (similar to Yahoo!).

all your base are belong to us

Meaning: An incoherent line from a Japanese video game called Zero Wing by Sega Genesis, it became a geek hipster gaming joke that eventually turned mainstream because of the laughably bad Japanese-to-English translation.

all-channel

Meaning: A business term used to describe sales on all of the channels a company has to sell its products. These channels may include distributors, resellers, retailers, telemarketers, catalogs, direct mail, a direct sales force, e-mail, and the Web.

allocation

Meaning: In the venture capital world, allocation refers to the amount of securities assigned to an investor, broker, or underwriter in an offering. An allocation can be equal to or less than the amount indicated by the investor during the subscription process depending on market demand for the securities.

almost online

Meaning: A nickname for AOL.

alpha

Meaning: A word referring to the first of two pre-release phases of a commercial software or hardware product. Alpha is the release prior to the beta test or beta version.

alpha pup

Meaning: Refers to the coolest kid on the block, it is a term used by market researchers to describe the ideal market. For example, "If the alpha pups like it, we can roll out nationwide." An "alpha geek" refers to the most technologically savvy dude in the company.

alphanumeric

Meaning: A set of characters that contains both letters (alpha) and numbers (numeric). Often used in cryptic passwords, alphanumeric codes can also consist of punctuation and symbols found on a standard keyboard. For example, "Ax23!*jP5" represents an alphanumeric cryptic password.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

alt tag

Meaning: An HTML tag that provides alternative text when Web pages are displayed without images. This text is helpful for the visually impaired or those who choose not to download images on Web pages in order to increase their surfing speed. With some browsers, this text appears when you put your mouse over an image and leave it there. It is not necessary for Web designers to put any text there, but if they include terms specific to the Web site, some of the search engines may list the site higher in their results.

alt text

Meaning: The text you sometimes see before an image appears on a Web page (or before an image is fully loaded). With some Web browsers, it is the text that appears when you put your mouse on top of an image or a picture. Basically, it is a word or phrase in the HTML code that describes the image or says something like, "Visit our sponsor."

AltaVista

Meaning: Believe it or not, Google is not the only search engine ;-) However, AltaVista was consider the leading search site until Google came along. AltaVista is search engine that indexes Web sites, newsgroups, and a variety of other postings using a hybrid search model. A quick read through its Advanced Search section provides easy tips on how to use keywords to narrow down your results. Known as "The Search Company," the AltaVista Company also provides high-powered search software to intranet, e-commerce, and enterprise companies around the world. To perform a search on the Internet with AltaVista, click on the link below.

Altoids

Meaning: The breath mint of choice for programmers who tend to consume enormous amounts of coffee, cigarettes, and pizza while working on three A.M. code.

always-on

Meaning: An Internet connection, such as a satellite connection or DSL, that can "always" provide immediate and continuous access to the Net.

america offline

Meaning: A nickname for the famous content provider AOL, which seemed to many users, especially in the early days of connectivity, to be offline more than it was online.

anacronym

Meaning: The name for an acronym so old that no one knows what it stands for anymore. Common examples include NKVD and SPQR.

analog

Meaning: In the most general sense, think of analog as the opposite of digital. It came first, for example, music recorded on cassette tapes or computer documents saved on floppy disks are magnetic in nature and therefore analog.

anchor

Meaning: In HTML, anchors mark the start and end of hypertext links. For example, consider this HTML code: <netlingo.com>. The first tag, <>, marks the start of the anchor, while the last tag, <>, marks the close of the anchor. The text in the middle, netlingo.com, is what shows as an underlined link when viewed by a Web browser.

angels

Meaning: A term that describes independently wealthy individuals who invest money into businesses, including Internet-related start-ups. As opposed to a venture capital firm, business angels invest their own money as individuals. Angel investments tend to be less than $1 million per venture, but still count as seed money to help ideas and new businesses "get out of the gate."

angry garden salad

Meaning: Slang for a poorly designed Web site GUI with incorrect code behind it (so that if you click on one thing it launches another).

animation

Meaning: Creating the appearance of movement with drawn objects, as in cartoons. Animation gives life to Web sites by displaying a variety of moving objects in your browser screen: images, words, and pictures, to name a few (although having too many animated images can be annoying). There are certain software programs that allow Web developers to create animated images, commonly known as animated GIFs.

animersive

Meaning: The nickname for an entertainment portal that offers every kind of Internet functionality conceivable in a poorly designed mess.

annotations

Meaning: Notes that you can add to documents. These notes are stored on your local disk (hard drive) and are available each time you access a document. This feature is found in some Web browsers as well.

anomaly

Meaning: A weird and unexplainable cause or effect; also known as a computer bug. Hard-to-figure-out programming or other computer-related problems are called anomalies.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

anonymize

Meaning: To make anonymous. This is one of many nouns that have been assembled with "ize" and consequently converted into a verb.

anonymous FTP

Meaning: An option in File Transfer Protocol (FTP) that allows you to connect to an FTP site, search through available files, and download any file, document, or program without having to establish an account (a username and password) on the system where the material resides. Most FTP servers allow a limited amount of anonymous FTP users to login at the same time and access only designated files.

anonymous posting

Meaning: A message posted to a newsgroup that does not identify the person who sent it.

ant farm

Meaning: Huge multiscreen theater complexes with glass façades, often found near American malls. Also called gigaplexes.

anti-

Meaning: It means opposite, or opposed to, or counteracting. In the world of technology, you may hear about anti-virus programs, or anti-adware programs, or anti-spyware programs...these are all software programs designed to counteract the damaging effects of viruses, adware or spyware. Visit these defintions to get information about anti- programs you need to download and run regularly.

anti-social networking

Meaning: Like a social networking site, an anti-social networking site is a an online community of people however these sites exist for the sole purpose of specifying why certain people are your enemies and to see who considers you an adversary. Just as you might classify "friends" on Facebook, these kinds of sites let you build personal lists of "enemies."

anticipointment

Meaning: Slang for the feeling you get when a product or event does not live up to its own hype. For example, "Windows Me was said to be a huge anticipointment for users who upgraded from 2000."

anus envy

Meaning: Slang for the practice by fans of The Jerky Boys, Howard Stern, Rush Limbaugh, and others of trying to emulate - or outdo - their idols.

AOL Mobile Communicator

Meaning: Similar to Blackberry, it lets AOL users send and receive e-mail and instant messages over a public, two-way wireless network via a small handheld device.

AOL winsock

Meaning: An add-on to "America Online for Windows," it allows you to run Internet apps that normally require a direct Internet connection to work. Technically, it allows an AOL connection to communicate with other systems using the IP protocol, the background language of the Internet. It is customized to work only with AOL and will not work with another Internet Service Provider (ISP).

apollo syndrome

Meaning: Slang for the covert act of delaying progress on a project as long as possible in order to avoid its ultimate termination.

Apple

Meaning: Makers of the Macintosh line of computers and the Macintosh operating system. Apple was founded in 1976 by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, and is one of the most innovative personal computer companies. Creators of "the computer that changed everything," they also manufactured one of the first microcomputers, as well as the earlier Apple I, Apple II, and Lisa computers. These user-friendly, desktop computers made use of a mouse and a visually-oriented GUI (graphical user interface) that made them more appealing to the average computer user than the text-based DOS operating system. Here is where the term drag-and-drop came from: instead of having to type in lines of commands at the C prompt, all you had to do was use your mouse to open and close files and to move them around.

Apple key

Meaning: The Command key on Macintosh computer keyboards, it is adorned with both the Apple logo and an icon with four looped corners. On all but the oldest Apple computers, the Apple key serves as the Command/Control key for PC users.

applet

Meaning: A small program or application, usually written in Java, that runs on a Web browser and powers many of the fancier features (such as animation or computation). It downloads quickly and can be used by any computer equipped with a Java- or ActiveX-enabled browser. Applets are found both online and offline (for example, the calculator on Windows 95 is an applet).

application

Meaning: Used interchangeably with program and software, this is a general term for a program that performs specific tasks, such as word processing, database management, e-mail sending or retrieval, or Web browsing. Unlike system software, which maintains and organizes the computer system (such as the operating system), an app is an end-user program.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

April 14, 2000

Meaning: The day the Nasdaq crashed, which incidentally, was on the anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.

apyware

Meaning: Derived from the word spyware, "apyware" is an intentional typo used to describe anti-spyware. The reason why it is intentional is because many people type the "a" instead of the "s" when searching for "spyware" and when they do, site owners who have included "apyware" in the meta tag will appear in the search results. Many anti-spyware product reviews in blogs and forums are  tagged with the term "apyware" in order that these Web pages will also appear in organic search results.

arc word

Meaning: A recurring term in a television series (such as Dr. Who) spoken by various characters in seemingly unrelated circumstances. Like easter eggs in videogames, arc words matter only to devoted fans; casual viewers rarely notice them.

architecture police

Meaning: An individual or group within a company that makes sure software and hardware development follows established corporate guidelines. The "architecture police" also rein in excessively creative development efforts in conservative organizations.

archive

Meaning: As a noun, an "archive" is the place on an Internet host where files are stored. It is also a file that contains a number of compressed files. As a verb, "archive" means to compress a number of files into one file for storage and transmittal (a process called "archiving").

archive site

Meaning: A computer dedicated to the storage of files. Usually organized by subject, an archive site can be accessed through anonymous FTP or e-mail. Most files stored at archive sites are compressed and need to be extracted (unzipped) before use.

ARPA

Meaning: Originally called DARPA, this is the agency within the U.S. Department of Defense that developed the Internet. Sometimes referred to as ARPANet.

ARPANet

Meaning: The precursor to the Internet, it was a network developed in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s by the U.S. Department of Defense. As an experiment in wide area networking (WAN), ARPANet was developed with the goal of being robust enough to survive a nuclear war. Part of the experiment was to study how distributed, noncentralized networks work.

arrow shooters

Meaning: Slang for the visionaries in an organization who come up with ideas and trace their far-reaching trajectories.

article

Meaning: A message or posting to a newsgroup. Some newsreader programs can filter out old articles you may have already read.

artifact

Meaning: Documentation that provides such items as guidelines, requirements, design, and test plans of a software application.

artificial intelligence

Meaning: Computer hardware and software packages that try to emulate human intelligence, using reasoning and learning to solve problems. The concept of artificial intelligence appears to have been conceived in 1950 by Alan Turing, who used the term "computer intelligence." The concept was renamed "artificial intelligence" in 1955 by John McCarthy. One of the earliest and most successful applications was a computer program that could play chess, and in 1990, a computer named Mephisto surprised the world by checkmating Grand Master Anatoly Karpov.

artificial life

Meaning: From the field of artificial intelligence, "artificial life" is the modeling of complex, lifelike behaviors in computer programs. Artificial life forms can supposedly evolve and produce behaviors not contained within the rules set by the programmers.

ascending order

Meaning: To arrange information from lowest to highest.

ASCII bashing

Meaning: To tinker around with the format of information in a text file (not with the information itself), to rearrange the layout of the page.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

ASCII-armored

Meaning: This is a feature of Pretty Good Privacy (PGP), which "encases" an encrypted message in ASCII to allow it to be e-mailed as a regular message.

ASP

Meaning: Companies that offer access over the Internet to application programs and related services that would otherwise have to be located in personal or enterprise computers. ASPs enable small to mid-sized companies to enjoy the benefits of sophisticated software that could be difficult to manage in-house. ASPs can achieve much greater economies of scale and can make more efficient use of human resources in a tight labor market than can individual enterprises.

aspect-oriented programming

Meaning: An idea that has been around for many years (and called many names), it is a technique that allows software writers to make the same kinds of shortcuts (called "crosscutting concerns") that are made in the real world. For instance, instead of having to write a rule like "when this happens, then do this" throughout many areas of the application, a programmer can write it in one place. Championed by Gregor Kiczales at Xerox PARC, the goal is to let programmers work more quickly and at a higher design level.

asset-backward

Meaning: A play on the phrases "ass-backwards" and "a backwards-ass way of doing things," this term is generally used to describe execs in the industry who become focused on generating personal wealth rather than on providing a valuable service or product.

assmosis

Meaning: The process by which some people seem to absorb success and advancement by kissing up to the boss rather than working hard.

astroturf campaign

Meaning: A fake grass-roots political campaign. Posited in RISKS Digest as a potential future problem in net-based "issue" campaigning, in which massive phony mailings are easier than ever.

asynchronous learning

Meaning: The name for a self-paced course taken via the Net or CD-ROM.

at home or @HOME Network

Meaning: A broadband system designed and developed for delivering high-speed information and Internet services using cable television lines. @Home uses advanced network technology to enable connections that are hundreds of times faster than possible with traditional telephone modems.

Atom

Meaning: Atom is an alternate XML format for easily sharing content, much like RSS Really Simple Syndication (format). Blogs on http://www.blogger.com/ for example, publish Atom feeds. Atom and RSS have very similar uses; the motivation behind Atom sprang from a desire to add improvements to the RSS specification. Apparently the keeper of the RSS specification froze the spec (declaring that RSS 2.0 would be the last version)and so the authors of Atom felt that a new format was necessary.

attachment

Meaning: A file (or group of files) that is included (or "attached") with an e-mail message. You can attach files through almost any popular e-mail program, such as Eudora or Outlook Express. Usually, this is accomplished by simply clicking the "attach file" button and then browsing through your computer system to find and select the desired file or image. Be careful with attachments, however, as they stay on your computer unless you go into your attachments folder and delete them. The best thing to do if you want to save an attachment is to open it, do a "save as," and put it in a folder on your computer. That way, you can routinely go into your attachments folder and delete them all without worrying about losing one you want. Never open any attachment you receive from someone you do not know; it may contain a virus.

attention currency

Meaning: A type of an online incentive to encourage users to take action on a Web site, in exchange for the ability to purchase items. For example, in January 2008, Gaia Online recorded the highest average visit time amoung websites within the social networking category. One driver of the time being spent on this site is "Gaia Gold Pieces" - virtual currency earned through interaction with the website such as posting in forums or playing games. Users can then use the pieces to purchase items for their characters. These types of currencies have been popular with virtual worlds like Second Life and Club Penguin which provide rewards and recognition for usage.

attenuation

Meaning: The reduction in strength of an analog or digital signal in fiber-optic cables. For instance, attenuation occurs as a result of absorption, reflection, diffusion, or scattering of transmitted light. In fiber-optic cables, it is measured in decibels per foot.

attribute

Meaning: A trait, characteristic, or property of an entity. In the computing world, it generally refers to a column name or field in a database.

AU or .au

Meaning: A Unix sound file format. On the Net, you may come across the option to hear a sound clip. The file that is downloaded to your computer when "clicked on" might be in the AU format (if the sound file was originally captured on a Unix system or converted from another platform). Your helper applications or browser plugins need to be configured to know what to do with this type of file.

audio

Meaning: Of or relating to audible sound, that which you hear (as opposed to video). The sound humans hear, BTW, is normally in the 15 to 20,000 Hz range.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

audio helper

Meaning: A program designed to playback sounds (or audio clips) downloaded from the Web. To use an audio helper (and many other programs, for that matter), you must configure your browser to launch it once the download is complete. The audio helper should then appear on your screen so you can begin playing the file.

audio mining

Meaning: Refers to using speech recognition technology that pulls data from recordings.

audiocast

Meaning: Another name for a live audio and video broadcast.

authentication

Meaning: The step, such as comparing user identification and password to a customer file, of determining the identity of the requesting client. Basically it is a security measure or "technique" by which access to Internet or intranet resources requires the user to enter a username and password. Client/server networks (such as Windows NT) and some Web sites require your identity to be authenticated before you can access any files. Authentication ensures that the person at the other end of a digital connection is the approved user.

author

Meaning: Used as a verb, the term "author" means to create or publish a script, program, or document. Generally, this is done with an authoring or scripting language, such as C, C++, HTML, or Java. Whatever programming language you choose, a wide variety of authoring tools are available for download or purchase to assist you.

authortisement

Meaning: Slang for the name of a book, pamphlet, or seminar written by a person who did it just to get hired as a consultant in that field.

autobot

Meaning: A free, automated tool that checks your POP mail server for new mail, downloads the waiting e-mail, sets your system clock, and executes timed Telnet sessions.

autoresponder

Meaning: Best thought of as an automatic e-mail response, it is a bot that has become an essential Internet tool for netcentric businesses. An autoresponder sends "canned" e-mail messages instantly to people who request information. It can be as simple as sending one message to anyone who writes to a specific e-mail address, or it can be as sophisticated as offering fifty different response messages, each one sent based on the text of the received e-mail message.

avatar

Meaning: A digital "actor" or icon that represents who you are and where you are in the virtual world. 3-D chat rooms and VRML worlds are examples of places where you would use an avatar to navigate your surroundings and communicate with other users. The avatar can be whatever you want, including a cartoon, an animal, or any graphical element. Just be aware that this image represents you!

AVI

Meaning: A Windows audio/video (multimedia) file, it is a common format you will find on the Internet for developing and viewing small movies and videos. These files are usually pretty large and would require a connection of 28.8 or better to download in any kind of reasonable time. A 20 second movie clip in AVI format could be as large as 3MB and could take about 15 minutes to download to your computer. Other types of video files found online include MOV, MPEG, and ASF.

---

B

-- Select A Phrase -- B ChannelB&FB/CB2AB2B2CB2CB2DB2Gback endback fortyback slashback-hackback-sourcingbackbonebackdoorbackgroundingbackplanebackronymBAKbalkanizedbambibandwidthbandwidth hogbandwidth huggerbang the GUIbanner blindnessBARBbarbie birdbarn raisingBarney pagebarneywarebaron companybarterbasement area networkbatchbatmobilingbaudBauhausBayesian filterbazaar-style developmentBBEditbear pawbeehivebeepilepsybegathonbehind-the-screensbellheadbelly-buttonbelow the foldBelow ZerosbenchmarkBerlin firewallBerners-Lee, Timbest practicesbeta babybeta bugsbetamaxedbeyond-the-bannerBFTBHIMBGOBIBI5big bangingbig box storebig ironbig roombimpbinarybinary numbersbinary star configurationBINDBinHexbiobreakbiotechbiotsbipolar belief systembitbit flipbit-spitbitlossbitmapBITNETbitnikbitrakingbitslagbitstreamblack box modelBlackBerryBlackBerry prayerBlackBuriedblackholingblamestormingblandingblathererbleeding edgeblended networkingblendoblockblogbloggerblogospherebloodwareBluetoothBMP or .bmpboat anchorbodybogusBonnieBOOFbootbooth bunnybotbotnetbottom-liningbounceboxbozo filterbpsbrain drainbrain stainbrandalismbrandstormingbreadcrumbbricks-and-clicksbridge financingbroadcastbroadcast stormbroken pipebrownoutbrowsebrowse boxbrowserbrowser skinsbrowser supportbrowser-safe colorsbucket brigadebufferbugbuild it and they will comebulletbunny suitburn rateburning the candle at both endsburning the midnight oilbusbusiness needbusy signalingbuttonbuzzword specialistbuzzword-compliantby the drinkbypassbytebytecode

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

B Channel

Meaning: A wire used in ISDN service that can carry up to 64 Kbps of data when operating at full capacity. It is a clear channel "pipe" that carries voice, data, or video over ISDN. The Basic Rate Interface (BRI) service offered to home users has two B channels.

B&F

Meaning: (also seen as: BNF)

B/C

Meaning: (also seen as BC)

B2A

Meaning: An acronym created to make fun of all the business acronyms being developed.

B2B2C

Meaning: An acronym that describes business-to-business-to-consumer relationships.

B2C

Meaning: An acronym that describes the thousands of e-commerce Web sites which sell products directly to the public (the consumer market). B2C is different from the B2B sector, and this distinction is important when comparing Web sites. Each approach has its own business model, strategy, execution, and fulfillment. NetLingo.com has a B2C component that includes selling books (including NetLingo: The Internet Dictionary) and smiley merchandise :^)

B2D

Meaning: An acronym that describes online communications and transactions conducted between a business and the members of its distribution channel (such as resellers, distributors, agents, and retailers).

B2G

Meaning: An acronym that describes business-to-government relationships. With the government being the largest employer in the U.S., B2G is expected to become big business.

back end

Meaning: The portion of a program that accomplishes the processing tasks the program is designed to perform. In a LAN with client/server architecture, the back end app may be stored on the file server while the front end programs handle the user interface on each workstation. "Back end" also refers to behind-the-screens technology, which administers tasks or processes (such as database inventory management) while allowing users to easily add or delete information via a simple front end interface.

back forty

Meaning: Slang for a low-priority project. For example, "Have her put the Web site overhaul on the back forty so she can work on the CD-ROM upgrade this month."

back slash

Meaning: The back slash is the name of the "" character on the computer keyboard. It is commonly located below the "|" mark on the same key. Back slashes are primarily used to represent a path, such as "c:Windows".

back-hack

Meaning: The reverse process of finding out who is hacking into a system. Attacks can usually be traced back to a computer or pieced together from "electronic bread crumbs" unknowingly left behind by a cracker.

back-sourcing

Meaning: When companies that out-source work flow receive poor quality of work, service or cost effectiveness, they will bring the job back in-house, or "back-source".

backbone

Meaning: The Internet high-speed data highway, it serves as a major access point to which other networks connect.

backdoor

Meaning: A secret way to access an application (or computer system). Usually built-in by a programmer, it is also referred to as a "trapdoor." One example of accessing a Web site via a backdoor is to type in its IP address instead of its domain name.

backgrounding

Meaning: The practice of not giving someone your full attention while multitasking. Occurs frequently during phone conversations when one party is reading email or surfing the Net. Dead giveaways: quiet typing, modem dialing.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

backplane

Meaning: A circuit board containing sockets into which other circuit boards can be plugged. In the context of PCs, it is the large circuit board with sockets for expansion cards. Active backplanes contain, in addition to the sockets, logic circuitry that performs computing functions. Passive backplanes, in contrast, contain almost no computing circuitry. Traditionally, most PCs have used active backplanes; in fact, the motherboard and the backplane have become synonymous. Recently, though, there has been a move toward passive backplanes, with the active components, such as the CPU, inserted on an additional card. Passive backplanes make it easier to repair or upgrade the components.

backronym

Meaning: A "backronym" (or bacronym) is a phrase that is constructed "after the fact" from a previously existing initialism or acronym. The term is sometimes used to refer to the initialism or acronym itself but usually, it is a "replacement" backronym, the abbreviation already having an associated phrase. When the backronym phrase becomes more popular than the original, the word becomes an "anacronym."

BAK

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: back)

balkanized

Meaning: A term used to describe the division of the Internet and its portrayal as having a tiered access system. There are numerous ways to gain access to the Internet, depending on how much you want to spend, and the speed of connection you desire. For example, there is dial-up, DSL, satellite, Wi-Fi, and cable. In other words, "balkanized" refers to the circumstance where the cost you can afford is equal to the quality of service you will receive, and there is a great range (or tier) of services available.

bambi

Meaning: Slang for what game- and talk-show staffers call someone who freezes in front of the camera (like a deer caught in headlights).

bandwidth

Meaning: The technical definition of "bandwidth" involves the difference between two frequencies and the amount of information that can flow through a channel, as expressed in cycles per second (hertz). It also refers to the range of frequencies (not the speed), or the measured amount of information, that can be transmitted over a connection: the higher the frequency, the higher the bandwidth and the greater the capacity of a channel to carry information. For a digital channel, bandwidth is defined in bits per second (bps). For an analog channel, it is dependent on the type and method of modulation used to encode the data. Broadcast TV channels, for example, all have the same bandwidth, by FCC rule.

bandwidth hog

Meaning: Slang for a large file or graphic that seemingly takes forever to download. This can also refer to a person who seemingly spends all of his or her time online ;-)

bandwidth hugger

Meaning: A term that describes someone who fights spam. It is a play on the words "tree hugger," which refers to a person who climbs a tree to protest its cutting down, a "bandwidth hugger" sets his or her computer to not yield any system capacity (a.k.a. bandwidth) to junk e-mail.

bang the GUI

Meaning: To consistently interface with a program in order to get to know its features and limitations; to type incessantly in order to teach oneself a new program.

banner blindness

Meaning: The tendency of online users to ignore ad banners, even when they may contain information the users are actively looking for.

BARB

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: barb)

barbie bird

Meaning: Slang for a direct airline flight between San Jose or San Francisco (Silicon Valley) and Los Angeles (Siliwood). It refers to the unusually large number of attractive women who shuttle to and from trade shows or publicity shoots. (Or perhaps they happen to be high-tech grrls who are both smart and attractive, imagine that ;-)

barn raising

Meaning: Solving a difficult problem by pulling staff and resources from all corners of the company to come up with a solution. You may hear, "We need to do some barn raising in order to solve this dilemma."

Barney page

Meaning: Slang for a Web page designed to capitalize on a current trend. For example, "Have you seen the new O.J. Simpson Barney page?"

barneyware

Meaning: Slang for anything that has little or no substance. For example, "That joint press release by those two companies was pure barneyware. It said nothing new; they just did it to generate media attention."

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

baron company

Meaning: A high-tech company located in a rural place. The name comes from the term "baron," a medieval person regarded as having great power in a specified field.

barter

Meaning: To exchange goods or services directly without the use of money. Online, ad banners, content, and links are often bartered.

basement area network

Meaning: A small local-area network installed in a home to link several household PCs.

batch

Meaning: A method of organizing several files into a single group for transmitting or printing. This serves to increase the efficiency of the data transmission.

batmobiling

Meaning: Slang for putting up an emotional shield just as a relationship enters that intimate, vulnerable stage. It refers to the retractable armor covering the Batmobile.

baud

Meaning: In common usage, the "baud rate" of a modem is how many bits it can send or receive per second. Technically, baud is the number of times per second that the carrier signal shifts value. A 1200 bit-per-second modem actually runs at 300 baud, because it moves 4 bits per baud (4 x 300 = 1200 bits per second). Using baud is no longer fashionable, however, having been replaced by the more direct "bits per second" (bps).

Bauhaus

Meaning: One of the most influential schools of design (founded in 1919, in Germany), it is included in NetLingo because its basic tenet has greatly influenced the design of technology: Form follows function.

Bayesian filter

Meaning: A Bayesian filter is a program that uses Bayesian logic (also called Bayesian analysis) to evaluate the header and content of an incoming e-mail message and determine the probability that it constitutes spam. Bayesian logic is an extension of the work of the 18th-century English mathematician Thomas Bayes.

bazaar-style development

Meaning: Type of software development exemplified by the Linux OS and articulated by Eric Raymond in his paper "The Cathedral and the Bazaar." A bazaar approach involves "releasing early and often, delegating everything you can, and being open to the point of promiscuity". This strategy differs from the dominant cathedral model of software carefully crafted "by individual wizards or small bands of mages working in splendid isolation."

BBEdit

Meaning: A high-performance HTML and text editor for the Macintosh, it is designed and crafted for editing, searching, transforming, and manipulating text.

bear paw

Meaning: The vulcan nerve pinch for SGI computers, this is the five-key keyboard combination that resets the graphics subsystem and the window manager. The term implies that you have to stretch your hand as big as a bear paw to push all the keys at the same time.

beehive

Meaning: Business slang for a state of termporary paralysis caused by the aimless swarming of critical business elements. This state is considered prevalent amongst "e-have-nots" who are trying to respond to their "e-enabled" competition.

beepilepsy

Meaning: The brief seizure people sometimes suffer when their beepers go off, especially in vibrator mode. Characterized by physical spasms, goofy facial expressions, and stopping speech in mid-sentence.

begathon

Meaning: Slang for a TV, radio, or online fund-raiser for a charity, religious organization, or PBS station that employs every known form of guilt, sweet-talking, and outright begging to get people to donate money.

behind-the-screens

Meaning: A play on the phrase "behind the scenes," it refers to programs that automatically run on your computer without need for your initiation or intervention. For example, when you launch a program, it does a variety of things to get the program up and running; those are behind-the-screens activities.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

bellhead

Meaning: A nickname for a telecommunication professional.

belly-button

Meaning: The online world counts eyeballs. The insurance and managed care industries count "belly-buttons". One belly-button is the equivalent of one person. "That insurance policy covers five belly buttons."

below the fold

Meaning: The content you see once you scroll to the middle or bottom of a Web page. The content at the top of a Web page is located above the fold, which is more desirable real estate than below the fold. This expression originally referred to the position of articles in a newspaper.

Below Zeros

Meaning: A marketing term that refers to customers who cost more to serve than they return in value. For example, a customer car shopping wastes the time of a sales representative by test driving the car, working numbers with the sales manager, only to leave the dealership with the car they came in.

benchmark

Meaning: A standard measurement used to test the performance of different brands of hardware or different versions of software.

Berlin firewall

Meaning: Slang for an Internet gateway that allows only the most basic port operations (mail, Web, limited news). Usually run by retentive sysadmins who hate the idea of anybody actually Telnetting anywhere.

Berners-Lee, Tim

Meaning: In December of 1990, Tim Berners-Lee, a CERN computer scientist, finished writing the browser. With this, he unshackled the Internet from its static, text-only realm and sent it off to a rich world of graphics and sound. The World Wide Web was created. The "Web" as it is affectionately called, was originally conceived and developed for large, high-energy physics collaborations that have a demand for instantaneous information-sharing between physicists in different universities and institutes all over the world.

best practices

Meaning: A business management term for optimal tactics and strategies. Best practices do not guarantee success; rather, they describe those tactics and strategies used in successful companies.

beta baby

Meaning: Slang for a child born to a high-tech professional after 1995.

beta bugs

Meaning: The problems, errors, glitches, or anomalies identified during the pre-release phase of a commercial computer product. Beta bugs usually pertain to software (such as an operating system or Web server application), but this term is also used to refer to hardware.

betamaxed

Meaning: Slang for what happens when the "best" technology loses out to a lesser technology that is more well-known in the marketplace. This term refers to the VCR wars, when VHS became the standard over the "superior" Betamax format. (A growing number of users feel this process has since been perfected by Microsoft.)

beyond-the-banner

Meaning: An online ad that goes "beyond" the standard size of an ad banner, such as an interstitial or a pop-up ad. This term is also used to describe a marketing campaign or online sponsorship.

BFT

Meaning: A method of transferring files using fax modems as an extension to the fax protocol.

BHIMBGO

Meaning: (pronouced: bee-him-go)

BI

Meaning: Commonly seen as "BI vendors" or "BI software", it refers to products, services, skills, technologies, applications and best practices used to help a business acquire a better understanding of its commercial context; it also refers to the collected information itself.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

BI5

Meaning: As in "Back In 5 minutes." You will also see BI10 (Back In 10 minutes), BI15 (Back in 15 minutes), etc., and sometimes this expression is written as BIfive, BIten, etc.

big banging

Meaning: Slang for the attempt to create one product that possesses the features of two or more products. For example: "Ever since the merger, the engineers have been big banging the two software products to try and come up with a single release."

big box store

Meaning: A name for the many national franchise stores in American strip malls and on highway exits that, for the most part, all look alike and carry similar products. They are held largely responsible for the demise of the sole proprietorship.

big iron

Meaning: Slang for a mainframe, it is also a play on "big brass," referring to mainframe management.

big room

Meaning: Slang for the real world. You know, that space you enter when you leave your home or office.

bimp

Meaning: A slang term that refers to a bitmap image file. Commonly used amongst graphic artists, gamers and 3D modelers.

binary

Meaning: Any downloadable file that contains more than simply human-readable, ASCII text. Typically, it refers to a program available for download, but it can also refer to pictures, sounds, or movies, among other things. Most newsgroups have subgroups specifically for binaries; a posting in comp.sys.mac.comm might announce that a program is available for download, but the binary (the file itself) would be found in comp.sys.mac.comm.binaries. Newsgroups, such as alt.pictures.binaries, contain files for download (in this case, pictures). You will need a newsreader to download and decode binary files.

binary numbers

Meaning: A numbering system with a base (radix) of 2, it is unlike the numbering systems most of us use, which have bases of 10 (decimal numbers), 12 (measurement in feet and inches), and 60 (time). Binary numbers are preferred for computers, for precision and economy. Building an electronic circuit that can detect the difference between two states (high current and low current, or 0 and 1) is easier and less expensive than building circuits that detect the difference among 10 states (0 through 9).

binary star configuration

Meaning: Any grouping of two things that are apparently inseparable, for whatever reason. "Bike messengers and tattoos: totally bi star!"

BIND

Meaning: A name server for the BSD operating system; a network service that enables clients to name resources or objects and share this information with other objects in the network. Put simply, it is a distributed database system for objects in a computer network. BIND is fully integrated into BSD network programs for use in storing and retrieving host names and DNS address. The system administrator can configure the system to use BIND as a replacement for the older host table lookup; the default configuration for BSD uses BIND.

BinHex

Meaning: A method for converting non-text files (non-ASCII) into ASCII. This is needed because some e-mail programs, for example, can only handle ASCII.

biobreak

Meaning: An office friendly way of saying that one needs to take a bathroom break.

biotech

Meaning: A technology based on biology, especially when used in agriculture, food science, and medicine. Pre-1970, the term was primarily used in the food processing and agriculture industries, but it has since expanded to refer to genetic engineering, artificial selection, and hybridization.

biots

Meaning: Mobile artificial agents that can sense a simulated environment, interact (signal, mate, find food) with other biots, and learn and evolve over time. Fresh from BioLand, at the University of California, Los Angeles, an experiment to develop distributed forms of intelligence using massively parallel computing.

bipolar belief system

Meaning: The coexistence of two popular attitudes toward the Internet: either the Net changes everything or the Net changes nothing.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

bit

Meaning: The basic unit of information in a binary numbering system, it takes 8 bits to make up a byte. For the most part, bits are used to describe transmission speeds, whereas bytes generally refer to storage capacity. It works like this: The electronic circuitry in computers detects the difference between two states (high current and low current) and represents these two states as one of two numbers, 1 or 0. These basic high/low, either/or, yes/no units of information are called bits. The word bit derives from the phrase "binary digit."

bit flip

Meaning: A 180-degree personality change. "Jim did a major bit flip and became a born-again Christian."

bit-spit

Meaning: Any form of digital correspondence (text, bit-mapped images, fax transmissions) or the act of sending same. "Did you bit-spit that file to Jane yet?"

bitloss

Meaning: The loss of data from a transmission, it can also refer to the loss of information in general.

bitmap

Meaning: Any picture you see on a Web page is a bitmap. Bitmaps come in many file formats, such as GIF, JPG, TIF, BMP, PCT, PCX, and DIB (Device Independent Bitmap). They can be read and edited by paint programs and image editors such as Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro. As its name suggests, a bitmap is a map of dots or pixels. If you zoom in or try to scale up a bitmap, it will look blocky.

BITNET

Meaning: A network created by Ira Fuchs in 1981 to connect IBM computer centers around the world.

bitnik

Meaning: One who uses a coin-operated computer terminal installed in a coffee house to log into cyberspace.

bitraking

Meaning: A new form of Net-based investigative journalism. Becoming very popular as journalists from major magazines and dailies troll the Net fishing for breaking stories.

bitslag

Meaning: All the useless rubble on the net one has to plow through to get to the rich information ore.

bitstream

Meaning: The flow of data over a network connection.

black box model

Meaning: A development technique whereby the internal workings of a model are not known. For example, in a black box software design, the user only knows the inputs and what the expected outcomes should be, not how the software arrives at those outputs.

BlackBerry

Meaning: A leading wireless e-mail solution, it is a totally integrated package that includes software, airtime, and a choice of wireless handheld devices. It provides easy access to e-mail wherever you happen to be. Perfect for road warriors.

BlackBerry prayer

Meaning: The posture one takes when using a BlackBerry PDA.

BlackBuried

Meaning: Slang for being inundated and exhausted trying to be on top of all your email 24/7 with your handheld mobile device.

blackholing

Meaning: When an ISP or other online service automatically deletes all e-mail coming from a certain domain without delivering it. For example, "Sites have been blackholing all Well email, legitimate or not, because of the quantity of Well-relayed spam deluging their servers."

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

blamestorming

Meaning: A term used in the modern workplace to describe "sitting around in a group discussing why a deadline was missed or a project failed and who is responsible."

blanding

Meaning: A branding plan that eliminates any uniqueness in a corporate identity, leaving the end result looking, well, bland.

blatherer

Meaning: A user who takes three screens to say something where three sentences would suffice; someone who types on and on when writing a newsgroup posting or conversing in a chat room.

bleeding edge

Meaning: A play on the phrase "leading edge," this term describes certain kinds of technology (and the people and companies who create it) that are so far advanced, there is no real, practical application for them yet.

blended networking

Meaning: A form of social networking that combines life both offline and online. The latest trend for social networks on the Internet is becoming more focused on areas of interest such as art, sports, collecting, cars, animals, etc.

blendo

Meaning: The combining of different media from a variety of sources (type, computer graphics, scanned images, animation, video). Similar to multimedia, but more often used to describe a collage or kitchen-sink approach. Can also refer to static images that have these combined elements.

block

Meaning: To prevent computer access to a particular Web site or Web page. For example, parents may attempt to "block" access to online gambling and online porn Web sites.

blog

Meaning: A Web site (or section of a Web site) where users can post a chronological, up-to-date e-journal entry of their thoughts. Each post usually contains a Web link. Basically, it is an open forum communication tool that, depending on the Web site, is either very individualistic or performs a crucial function for an organization or company. There are three basic varieties of blogs: those that post links to other sources, those that compile news and articles, and those that provide a forum for opinions and commentary.

blogger

Meaning: One who blogs, it can refer to a musicblogger, an audioblogger, an MP3blogger, etc.

blogosphere

Meaning: The shared intellectual space inhabited by bloggers (people who blog). It is actually more than the space, it is the community of bloggers itself and their collective voice. Blogs are increasing in popularity as a way for people to self-publish their insights on the Web and because of the free nature of this expression, they are transforming the way people and journalists work together to report, filter and break the news. One example of its usage is, "Reaction was swift in the blogosphere."

bloodware

Meaning: A form of shareware in which the author requests that in lieu of sending him or her money, you donate blood to the Red Cross.

Bluetooth

Meaning: An open technology specification for short-range radio links between mobile PCs, "smart" devices, and other portable machines. It is a networking technology that enables data to easily transfer from one device to another, and unlike infrared (which requires a clear line of sight to operate properly), Bluetooth operates over a 2.4 gigahertz radio frequency that allows communications through obstacles over distances of 30 feet. This means, for example, that if this technology is combined with MP3, your audio could follow you from your living room to your car to your office. The same data (your preferred songs) could get transferred to different devices (your home stereo, your car radio, and your office audio system). You could also use your phone to create a wireless Internet connection for your laptop.

BMP or .bmp

Meaning: A Microsoft Windows image format, it stands for bitmap. The images you see when Windows starts up and closes, and the wallpaper that adorns your desktop, are all in BMP format.

boat anchor

Meaning: Slang for computer hardware that is so obsolete, it no longer serves any purpose.

body

Meaning: Body can mean one of several things. For example, it is the part of an e-mail message that contains the actual message itself (without the address and server information). In HTML, a "body tag" designates the section of a Web page that contains the text and graphics you see in a browser window. Generally, "body" refers to the content within a document, as in, the "body of text."

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

bogus

Meaning: Something that is stupid, wrong, or just plain dumb.

Bonnie

Meaning: "Bonnie" is a benchmark that runs a series of tests to measure the performance of Unix file system operations.

BOOF

Meaning: An extension to the IBM system/360 architecture that permits references to data objects.

boot

Meaning: As a verb, it means to start a computer or turn it on. You will also hear the term "boot up," which means the same thing, as in, "Are you booted up?" A "reboot" is the process of shutting down a computer and then restarting it. Rebooting tends to clear out bugs that can hamper smooth computing.

booth bunny

Meaning: A disparaging name for the many attractive women who are hired to "man" industry trade show booths. Booth bunnies do not actually work for high-tech companies and usually have little or no knowledge about technology.

bot

Meaning: A bot is a program that runs on a computer 24/7, automating mundane tasks for the owner, even if the owner is not logged in. Bots are used on the Internet in a variety of ways, most popularly in IRCs (Internet Relay Chat) and in search engines.

botnet

Meaning: A "botnet" is a network of computers that are infected with malware and then used to send spam and shut down Web sites (DDoS).

bottom-lining

Meaning: Slang for the selection of affluent communities for trial and early deployment of new, interactive services.

bounce

Meaning: When an e-mail message cannot get to its recipient for some reason, it is returned or bounced to the sender, with an error message informing the user that it was not sent. This is also known as "bouncing back." You may hear someone say, "I tried to send you an e-mail message but it got bounced back." If this happens to you, check the e-mail address and contact tech support at your ISP.

box

Meaning: A nickname for a computer.

bozo filter

Meaning: A software program that filters e-mail messages and newsgroup postings from individuals who are on your bozo list. In Usenet, a kill file performs the same function.

bps

Meaning: A measurement of data transmission speed over a communications medium. Not to be confused with baud.

brain drain

Meaning: The loss of human resources, especially of knowledge workers. For example, when someone leaves a third-world country, moves to America for training and education, but then does not move back to his or her home country to share the knowledge, the country suffers a brain drain. This can also happen within a company.

brain stain

Meaning: An expression for the inept, often irrelevant comments left by supervisors on copies of memos and other documents. For example, "That spec sheet was ready to distribute till Sanders left his brain stains all over it."

brandalism

Meaning: The defacing schools, libraries, and other public spaces with advertisements, logos, or corporate slogans.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

brandstorming

Meaning: Slang for the process of brainstorming in order to create a new branding strategy.

breadcrumb

Meaning: The nickname for a top navigation menu that uses a string of section names to identify where you are. For example, when searching for cell phone product reviews on CNET.com, you will see the following "breadcrumbs" just beneath the top level navigation: > Home > Reviews > Cell Phones and Accessories > All Cell Phones

bricks-and-clicks

Meaning: Another name for click-and-mortar.

bridge financing

Meaning: A limited amount of equity, or short-term debt financing, typically raised within 6-18 months of an anticipated public offering (IPO) or private placement meant to "bridge" a start-up company to the next round of financing. 

broadcast

Meaning: Commonly used to describe the ability to send the same e-mail message simultaneously to multiple recipients. The term "broadcasting" is also used to describe a live event on the Internet that is streamed in real time to millions of computers.

broadcast storm

Meaning: Another name for a network meltdown, it actually precedes a network meltdown. see also: DoS, flooding

broken pipe

Meaning: This term is usually seen in an error message in programs such as Netscape to let the user know that the stream of information he or she was downloading has been forcibly cut. This can occur for several reasons, most commonly because you are on a very crowded network or your access provider (ISP) is experiencing heavy traffic.

brownout

Meaning: Network slowdowns that occur as more and more people access the Net with higher speed connections and more requests for capacity-hogging mulitmedia files.

browse

Meaning: The process of moving through a Web site or "surfing the Net," using a World Wide Web browser and clicking on a variety of hyperlinks. Derived from the notion of "browsing" through a store, the term implies you are "just looking," but in fact, you are interacting: You must point-and-click to get to the next Web page.

browse box

Meaning: Another name for a drop-down menu.

browser

Meaning: A program used to view, download, upload, surf, or otherwise access documents (for example, Web pages) on the Internet. Internet Explorer and Firefox are well-known Web browsers, just like Netscape used to be, that enable you to view and interact with Web sites.

browser skins

Meaning: Refers to images that you can add to the background area of a Web browser, to decorate the otherwise gray area surrounding the URL box, the back button, and other elements. Using browser skins is like getting personalized checks for your checkbook. You can choose almost anything from flower motifs to landscapes to sports images to cartoons.

browser support

Meaning: The ability of a browser to recognize and interpret certain codes in HTML or other languages. For example, Netscape Navigator 1.0 did not have the ability to render a page layout in frames. This feature did not come along until version 2.0; therefore, Navigator 1.0 did not "support" frames.

browser-safe colors

Meaning: Only 216 colors in the common 256 color display palette appear exactly the same on both Mac and PC systems. These browser-safe colors should be used for Web graphics and colorful elements to look consistent on both platforms. For a sampling of browser-safe colors, check out the "Color Swatch Reference Guide" or the "Web Design Coloring Book" on NetLingo.com.

bucket brigade

Meaning: An attack against a public key exchange in which the attacker substitutes a modified public key for the requested public key.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

buffer

Meaning: Technically it is an area of memory on your computer that is reserved to temporarily store output or input data. A "buffer" will hold data that is being transferred from a high-speed device to a low-speed device until the transaction is complete. A common use of buffers is to hold the data sent to a printer as the printer accepts the information at its own pace.

bug

Meaning: A programming error that causes a software application or computer system to perform erratically, produce incorrect results, or crash altogether.

build it and they will come

Meaning: A phrase used in the industry for a misguided business model tested by many dot-coms. For example, some thought that by creating a pet store Web site, people would naturally go there to buy pet food.

bullet

Meaning: Originally, it referred to a circle or dot that separated items in a list (see below for a sample). Now, bullets can also be squares, triangles, pointing fingers, or any graphical character used to set off items in a list.

bunny suit

Meaning: The name of the space-looking outfit on display at the Intel booth often seen at trade shows and in advertising.

burn rate

Meaning: In general terms, it is the rate at which a company expends cash over a certain period, usually a month. Specifically it is the pace at which a start-up spends its VC money while waiting to turn a profit. For example, IPOs are fueled by financial projections, and analysts like to bet on companies that promise to show profit long before they burn out.

burning the candle at both ends

Meaning: A phrase for working too hard or doing too many things at once, which can lead to stress and health problems.

burning the midnight oil

Meaning: To stay up very late at night working on a project. For example, "We had an impromptu NetLingo.com marathon last night and worked for hours, burning the midnight oil."

bus

Meaning: A term for the electrical pathways inside a computer, along which signals are sent from one part to another. For example, there is a data bus, an address bus, a control bus, and an expansion bus. There are also external busses, where you can attach peripherals or additional devices. These buses include parallel and serial ports, PCI slots, and SCSI ports. A backbone is a network bus that connects all computers into a single network.

business need

Meaning: A generic term used to depict the certain needs of an organization. The term is typically used by upper management to explain, or sometimes defend, a business decision.

busy signaling

Meaning: Office slang for rapid hand movements indicating that what the person on the phone is saying is more important than whatever your coworkers are trying say.

button

Meaning: A graphic that a user can "click on" to do something, such as download a program or go to another Web page. Traditionally, in GUIs, a button is a dialogue box option used to execute a command (such as the "OK" button or "Cancel" button).

buzzword specialist

Meaning: One who impresses management or customers with an amazing use of industry buzzwords but has no real working knowledge of technology.

buzzword-compliant

Meaning: When a product is said by its maker to work with all the standards and tech trends du jour.

by the drink

Meaning: A phrase used in the industry to describe the sale of content by the individual piece. (This term is derived from the manner in which most bars dispense alcohol.)

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

bypass

Meaning: A flaw in a security device that allows messages to go around the security mechanisms. "Crypto bypass" refers to flaws that allow plain text to leak out.

byte

Meaning: The fundamental data unit of personal computers, a byte is eight contiguous bits. The byte is also the basic unit of measurement for computer storage, storing the equivalent of one character. Computer architecture is based mostly on binary numbers, so bytes are counted in powers of two (which is why some people prefer to call groups of eight bits "octets"). The terms kilo (in kilobyte, abbreviated as K) and mega (in megabyte, abbreviated as M) are used to count bytes (even though they are misleading, since they derive from a decimal base of 10 numbers).

bytecode

Meaning: A special, streamlined format of code unique to Java programs. Bytecode is translated source code. A bytecode is a program that contains instructions that must be interpreted. Users need JVM to interpret and execute bytecode.

---

C

-- Select A Phrase -- C shellcached outcamel casecampuscancelable with no short ratecancelbotcancelmoosecanoncappuccino cowboycapsizingcaptive start-upcar navigation systemcardcareer-limiting movecarewareCarpal Tunnel Syndrome (CTS)carpet bombcarriercascadecascading style sheets (CSS)CBICBOCBT (Computer Based Training)CDCD-ROMCDNCDPD (Cellular Digital Packet Data)cell matescell phoneCEMCEOCEO-speakcertified used carCFOCGI Joecha-chingchainsaw consultantschamber artchannelchannel conflictchannel encryptionCHAPchapter 11charactercharliechatflycheapernetcheckboxChernobyl packetchicken-bonerChief Community StrategistChief Internet EvangelistchipchipheadchortalChromechumchurnchurningCIACCIOcircle backcircling the drainCiscocity acronymsCIXcleancleansed datacleantechclear-text passwordClearTypeclickclick hereclick-and-mortarclick-and-shipclick-through farmersclicklyclicks-and-chicksclicks-for-chicksclientclient-sideclient/serverclimate canaryclinkclipclippycloakingcloudclue-by-fourclunkyclusteringCMOCMYKco-locationco-workingcoaxial cablecockroachcodenappingCodePiecodifycoin-operated employeeCold Fusioncold peacecold transfercollaborativecollaborative filteringcollaborative projectcollaboratorycollapsible corporationsCOM portCOMDEXcommand linecommand line weeniecommerce servercommon stockcommunications softwarecompatible or compatibilitycompetitive salarycompilercomplimentary quote rulecompressioncomputercomputer illiteratecomputer literatecomputer sciencecomputer simulationComputer Vision Syndrome (CVS)computer wizconcatenated speechconfigureconnect timeconnectivityconsconsumer profilingcontact centercontentcontent conundrumcontent providercontent sponsorshipcontentologycontext sensitive menuContextual Commercecontextual-based advertisingconverged networkconvergenceconvergent programmingconversion rateCOOcoopetitioncopyleftcordcorporate kabukiCoSNcounter-experiencecoursewarecourtesy callCPACPCCPMCPOCPUcrackableCRAFTcrashcrash dummiescrash test dummiesCRCcreeping featurismcritical differentiatorscritical masscrogcross postcross-channel marketingcross-roastingcrowdsourcingcryppieCSPCSSCTIACTO in businessCtrlcube farmcuddletechcumdexcurbstoningcurrycursorcustomer acquisition costcustomer experience teamcustomer facingCustomer Information Control System (CICS)Customer Interaction Center (CIC)customer-centriccustomizecut-and-paste attackCVScyber noircyber sittersCyberAngelscyberbullyingcybercadcybercafecyberchondriacscyberfraudcyberludditescyberneticscybernoircyberporkcyberpunkcybersexismcyberslangcybersquattingcyberstalkercyberterrorismcybertouristCybrarian

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

C shell

Meaning: An interface for users whose Internet Service Provider (ISP) only offers character-based, command line access to a Unix system (hence the term "shell account").

cached out

Meaning: Slang for extremely tired, as in, "wiped out."

camel case

Meaning: The practice of joining words or phrases without spaces and capitalizing the words within the compound, for example: NetLingo, CamelCase, iMac. The name comes from the uppercase "bumps" in the middle of the compound word, suggestive of the humps of a camel.

campus

Meaning: No longer just referring to college campuses, "campus" is now used by many large corporations to make their facilities sound less like workplaces and more like places where you can live.

cancelable with no short rate

Meaning: A business clause in a contract, stating that an advertiser can cancel a campaign at any time, and be refunded for the unused portion, without a penalty.

cancelbot

Meaning: A program that continually runs on an Internet server, automatically looking for and deleting any Usenet postings from certain people or on subjects the system administrator deems inappropriate. Cancelbots are primarily used on news servers to filter out incoming spam from notorious e-mail addresses.

cancelmoose

Meaning: An individual who wages a war against spamming.

canon

Meaning: An official, authoritative source of information on a particular subject, such that no one would think of questioning. For example, "According to canon, Ed Bennett really did dance on the tables at a cybersuds."

cappuccino cowboy

Meaning: A nickname for a person who just has to have a Starbucks coffee or other type of roadie on the way to work. It refers to men and women (cappuccino cowgirls) who live in the suburbs and commute to the city each day to work in the industry.

capsizing

Meaning: Downsizing gone awry, it is the process whereby a company repeatedly reduces its labor force but not the work that needs to get done. Eventually, the company implodes or "goes under."

captive start-up

Meaning: When new enterprises are developed within a corporation by a corporate executive, they are considered captive start-ups.

car navigation system

Meaning: A small computer that communicates with a GPS to help drivers choose the best route to a destination, it is usually mounted on the dashboard of an automobile for easier viewing.

card

Meaning: A circuit board that plugs into an expansion slot in a computer, giving the computer additional capabilities. Popular cards include: internal modem cards, memory expansion boards, sound boards, and video adapters.

career-limiting move

Meaning: Used among microserfs to describe an ill-advised activity. Trashing your boss while he or she is within earshot is a serious CLM.

careware

Meaning: A form of shareware in which the author requests that you donate the fee to a designated charity.

Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (CTS)

Meaning: A health problem that affects the hand and wrist, this condition (or syndrome) has become the focus of much attention due to suggestions that it may be linked to activities that require repetitive use of the hands, such as typing. Actually there are many people who develop this condition regardless of the type of work they do.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

carpet bomb

Meaning: A message that goes to each and every subscriber of a particular network (whether they want it or not).

carrier

Meaning: Another name for a phone connection. When you see the CD light flash on an external modem, for example, you know the modem is receiving a carrier detect (CD) signal from another computer.

cascade

Meaning: A series of reply posts to a message on Usenet. This term also refers to the arrangement of active windows on your computer screen so that each is organized in front of the other with a portion of the title bar appearing at the top.

cascading style sheets (CSS)

Meaning: A format used to separate style from structure on Web pages, it is a feature of HTML that gives both Web developers and users more control over how Web pages are displayed. With CSS, designers create style sheets that define how different elements, such as headers and links, will appear. These style sheets can then be applied to any page or all pages on a particular Web site, which makes coding much easier. The term "cascading" derives from the fact that multiple style sheets can be applied to the same Web page. CSS was developed by the W3C; however, this specification continues to evolve and is not fully supported by all Web browsers.

CBI

Meaning: A Web-based knowledge management system that gathers and organizes text and numeric data from a wide variety of sources (including data warehouses, e-mail, and the Web). Users can locate, present, share, and update the information. CBI systems capture information that would otherwise be lost when employees leave a company. For example, CBI can also recapture the context in which past decisions were made, thereby speeding up the decision-making process.

CBO

Meaning: An acronym used as a business title in the industry.

CBT (Computer Based Training)

Meaning: A form of education in which the student learns by executing special training programs on a computer (primarily via CD-ROM or a bunch of floppies). Unlike Web-based training programs, CBT does not require an Internet connection. CBT is especially effective for training people to use computer applications, because it can be integrated within a tutorial so that students actually use an application as they study it.

CD

Meaning: An optical storage medium for music or data, it was developed primarily for audio use by Sony in 1982.

CD-ROM

Meaning: An optical storage technology that stores and plays back data. "Read only" means the information on the disc may be capable of being displayed or used but not deleted. CD-ROMs are commonly used for encyclopedias, dictionaries, and software libraries, and they are also used for multimedia applications. One CD-ROM can hold around 650 megabytes, or the equivalent of 700 floppy disks.

CDN

Meaning: A service provider that has created its own worldwide network (or portfolio) of Web sites. It distributes Web site content to customers. Primarily for streaming content, a CDN has the bandwidth capabilities to deliver rich media in a clear, non-jerky manner. It is also a logical solution for delivering streaming content to a large, geographically dispersed audience. Costly and complex, a CDN requires content access point (CAP) architecture that integrates content distribution, storing, caching, streaming, searching, verification, and sorting capabilities.

CDPD (Cellular Digital Packet Data)

Meaning: A packet data protocol standard for sending wireless data, it was developed for use on cellular phone frequencies. It transmits data in packets on unused cellular channels (in the 800MHz to 900 MHz range). This technology offers transfer rates of up to 19.2 Kbps, quicker call set-up, and better error correction than modems on an analog cellular channel. Too confusing? Basically, CDPD is a way to send and receive information over wireless devices.

cell mates

Meaning: Slang for the people you have programmed on your cell phone to be automatically dialed with the press of a button.

cell phone

Meaning: A mobile telephone that uses wireless technology, it is considered indispensable for road warriors, modern mothers, teenagers, and those who work in the industry. Also known as a handy (short for handheld), many cell phones are now capable of receiving text-based messages (such as e-mail or SMS) in addition to incoming calls. A friend may say to you, "Call me on my cell." Note: A pager is not the same as a cell phone ;-)

CEM

Meaning: Companies that build the parts inside PCs, networks, and printers, for example.

CEO

Meaning: An acronym used as a business title in the industry.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

CEO-speak

Meaning: This is the language of corporate leadership. "CEO-speak" explores the metaphors and persuasive strategies used by leaders of the corporate world, for example "The current downturn reached sufficient strength this quarter that we could not power up against it," and "We are an issues-focused firm with high-end engagements across the board and we want to be the market leader in the industries we serve."

certified used car

Meaning: When you buy a "certified used car" you are being guaranteed by the dealership that the car you are about to purchase has already been thoroughly inspected by a mechanic. Any mechanical problems that the car had or is soon to have, has been repaired.

CFO

Meaning: An acronym used as a business title in the industry.

CGI Joe

Meaning: A hardcore CGI-script programmer with all the social skills and charisma of a plastic action figure.

cha-ching

Meaning: The sound of money going into your bank account when you are not actively making a sale. It implies that you are earning passive income. For example, "Last week, I was on vacation, and my ad banners generated $500 without me having to do a thing. Cha-ching!"

chainsaw consultants

Meaning: Slang for outside experts who are brought in to reduce the employee head-count (leaving the top brass with clean hands).

chamber art

Meaning: Term coined by electronic music composer Morton Subotnick (creator of the CD-ROM art piece All My Hummingbirds Have Alibis) to refer to the intimate, one-on-one relationship that an artist can have with a viewer/ listener through computer-based art.

channel

Meaning: Primarily thought of as the path or data line that carries information between two computers (or communication devices). It can be a physical pathway, such as coaxial cable; in wireless communications, it can refer to a specific carrier frequency. It is also thought of as a high-speed pathway (for example, fiber-optic) between a mainframe (or other high-end computer) and the control units of peripheral devices. For example, a 10 channel computer can transmit 10 separate streams of data to and from the CPU simultaneously. Additionally, a channel refers to a virtual area where IRC users communicate in real time. There are thousands of these channels located on the Internet.

channel conflict

Meaning: Refers to the situation in which a producer or manufacturer bypasses its normal distribution channel (which may include resellers, distributors, agents, and retailers) to sell directly to consumers, often on the Web.

channel encryption

Meaning: A security layer that resides between the application and the transport layers, the most common forms are SSL and HTTPS.

CHAP

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: chap)

chapter 11

Meaning: A filing in which a business receives bankruptcy protection from its creditors.

character

Meaning: Any single letter, number, or symbol that you can type, such as Q or 8 or @ or forward slash (/) or back slash ().

charlie

Meaning: Slang for a venture capitalist, it is derived from the term American soldiers used for the Viet Cong (VC) during the Vietnam War.

chatfly

Meaning: A user who hangs out in chat rooms and chats up a storm with anyone who will respond, just to spend more time online. A chatfly is also someone who is constantly texting or IMing due to a need to be in constant contact via digital communication.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

cheapernet

Meaning: Thin wire Ethernet.

checkbox

Meaning: A square box a user can click on in order to interact with material on a Web page. Commonly seen when filling out an online form, the box is clicked to make the checkmark appear or disappear. Unlike radio buttons, more than one check box can be chosen.

Chernobyl packet

Meaning: The name for a network packet that induces a broadcast storm or a network meltdown. Named in memory of the April 1986 nuclear accident at Chernobyl, in Ukraine.

chicken-boner

Meaning: A derogatory name for a spammer. It is said that while spammers see themselves as cyber entrepreneurs, they are really just beer-drinking, chicken-bone-chewing lowlifes.

Chief Community Strategist

Meaning: Some companies have created a position to develop and manage all aspects of building a sense of community online. A Chief Community Strategist is equal parts policy maker, minister of culture, ombudsman, and operations manager.

Chief Internet Evangelist

Meaning: Vinton Cerf, "founding father" of internet, was given this title for his job at Google.

chip

Meaning: The incredibly complex yet tiny modules that store computer memory or provide logic circuitry for microprocessors. Perhaps the best known chips are the Pentium microprocessors from Intel. The PowerPC microprocessor, developed by Apple, Motorola, and IBM, is used in Macintosh personal computers and some workstations. AMD and Cyrix also make popular microprocessor chips. There are quite a few manufacturers of memory chips. Many special-purpose chips, known as application-specific integrated circuits, are being made today for automobiles, home appliances, telephones, and other devices.

chiphead

Meaning: Another name for an old-time computer science engineer. see also: gearhead, modemhead, Net head, Web head.

chortal

Meaning: Known primarily as a Chinese portal, the largest "chortal" is Sina, created by CEO Wang Zhidong.

Chrome

Meaning: A browser created by Google, it is a program used to view, download, upload, surf, or otherwise access documents (for example, Web pages) on the Internet. According to Google, Chrome is a browser that combines a minimal design with sophisticated technology to make interacting with the Web faster, safer, and easier.

chum

Meaning: A section of computer code that is forever being rewritten or changed. Also can describe text documents. Writings produced by committee are rife with churn.

churn

Meaning: Another word for turnover. For example, "It is said that about forty percent of U.S. job growth is in IT and that those in the industry change jobs on average every eighteen months, amounting to an increasingly high churn rate, compared with past decades." This term also means to produce something at a fast pace but with mediocre results, as in, "Some of those incubators thought that just by pooling office space and resources, they could churn out McStartups by the dozens. Boy, were they wrong."

churning

Meaning: Office slang for the constant moving, reorganizing, and purging of office documents to keep the critical information from being swallowed up by less important material. It also refers to employee turnover; see churn.

CIAC

Meaning: An organization established by the U.S. Department of Energy to track and report on events and situations relevant to computer security.

CIO

Meaning: An acronym used as a business title in the industry.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

circle back

Meaning: Connecting with folks on a business issue and letting things happen, then going back to them after a few days or after things evolve. For example, "I will circle back with you in a few days on that compensation memo."

circling the drain

Meaning: Medical slang for a patient near death who refuses to give up the ghost. In office speak, this expression is generally used to describe projects that have no more life in them but refuse to die. For example, "That disk conversion project has been circling the drain for years."

Cisco

Meaning: The worldwide leader in networking for the Internet, Cisco was founded in 1984 by a group of computer scientists from Stanford University. Since then, the company has been prominent in advancing the development of IP, the basic language for communicating over the Internet (and in private networks). Cisco creates a range of products and technologies, including advanced routing and switching, voice and video over IP, optical networking, wireless, storage networking, security, broadband, and content networking. Led by CEO John Chambers, Cisco is also recognized as an innovator in how business is conducted; the company has been a pioneer in using the Internet to provide customer support, sell products, offer training, and manage finances, and now they assist other business leaders in transforming their companies into e-businesses. To bolster education around the world, the company has founded Cisco Academies in 128 countries, dedicated to teaching people to design, build, and maintain computer networks. Perhaps the most amazing thing about Cisco is that virtually all messages or transactions passing over the Internet are carried quickly and securely through Cisco equipment.

city acronyms

Meaning: Acronyms for certain neighborhoods or urban areas, such as:

CIX

Meaning: A nonprofit trade association of Public Data Internetwork service providers promoting and encouraging the development of the public data communications internetworking services industry in both national and international markets.

clean

Meaning: Refers to bug-free code.

cleansed data

Meaning: Data that has been filtered of errors, duplications, and other information not necessarily useful to applications.

cleantech

Meaning: A term that describes a diverse range of products, services, and processes that harness renewable materials and energy sources, dramatically reduce the use of natural resources, and cut or eliminate emissions and wastes.

clear-text password

Meaning: The plain text version of an encrypted password.

ClearType

Meaning: A software font technology that, according to Microsoft, dramatically improves font display resolution (by about 300 percent) and marks a breakthrough in screen readability.

click

Meaning: The sound your mouse makes when you press down its button, a click is also the action of pressing and releasing the mouse button, usually to select or activate something. (Consider yourself beyond debbie status when you keep your mouse on the mouse pad rather than pointing it at the computer screen like a remote control!)

click here

Meaning: A common phrase on the World Wide Web, used to encourage a user to click on hypertext or a clickable graphic (such as an ad banner) that links to another Web page.

click-and-mortar

Meaning: With reference to a traditional brick-and-mortar, big box store that exists in the real world, this play on words represents a traditional company that has succeeded in integrating the Internet into its existing channels. Click-and-mortar stores generally target consumers (B2C). For example, Gateway lets potential buyers try out its computers at their local Gateway Country Store, but customers must make their purchases online. There are also several conventional retailers (known online as etailers) with e-commerce sites that allow consumers to return online purchases at the physical stores.

click-and-ship

Meaning: A sales operation whereby customers order products online from a company and the product is shipped directly to the customer. This kind of fulfillment process eliminates the middleman or the need for extensive distribution channels. For example, when you order a book from Amazon.com (like Netlingo - the book) or a computer from Dell, you click and they ship.

click-through farmers

Meaning: Porn purveyors who operate free sample sites designed to funnel traffic to pay commercial adult sites and get paid a few cents for each click-through.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

clickly

Meaning: Slang for clicking quickly.

clicks-and-chicks

Meaning: Slang for Web sites that try to use female-focused content to drive e-commerce sales.

clicks-for-chicks

Meaning: Refers to adult content Web sites.

client

Meaning: The name for a computer that can request information, such as a Web page, from a server. It also performs tasks independently by using its own applications and programs. Your desktop computer or laptop is a client when it is remotely connected to a host. The software that makes this connection possible is a client, as is the browser used by a visitor to a Web site.

client-side

Meaning: A technology or program that runs on your desktop computer (as opposed to running on a server).

client/server

Meaning: A relationship in which one computer program (the client) requests information from another computer program (the server), whereby the server responds in fulfilling the request. In terms of "client/server architecture," it is the design model for applications running on a network. The bulk of the back end processing, such as performing a physical search of a database, takes place on a server. The front end processing, which involves communicating with the user, is handled by smaller programs distributed to client workstations. In terms of a "client/server network," LAN resources are allocated so that computing power is distributed among the computers in the network, but some shared resources are centralized in a file server. With the advent of powerful individual workstations, most computers can act as both client and server in different situations; this is often described as "n-tier computing," where "n" refers to the multiple levels of clients and servers that exist. For security reasons, the client/server model requires user authentication.

climate canary

Meaning: Slang for an organism or species whose poor health or declining numbers hint at a larger environmental catastrophe on the horizon.

clink

Meaning: Refers to a user clicking on a Web link.

clip

Meaning: A media file within a presentation or Web page (such as part of a movie or song).

clippy

Meaning: The annoying little help assistant in Windows software, resembling a paper clip with eyes.

cloaking

Meaning: A term used in reference to disabling SSID (Security Set Identifier) broadcasting. Giving you wireless network a unique SSID is good practice.

cloud

Meaning: A term for the unpredictable part of a network that data travels through on its way to its final destination. In a packet-switched network, the physical path on which the data packet travels can vary from one packet to the next. In a circuit-switched network, the specific circuit can vary from one connection to the next.

clue-by-four

Meaning: Netcom needs to be hit with a "clue-by-four" for its lack of an anti-spam policy.

clunky

Meaning: A term used to describe something slow or outdated, as in, "That dinosaur browser sure is clunky." It implies you can hear the machinery hobbling about trying to process your commands.

clustering

Meaning: In search engine results, it is to restrict the number of listings per Web site to only one or two links.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

CMO

Meaning: An acronym used as a business title in the industry.

CMYK

Meaning: The four basic design inks used to create a full spectrum of color on a printed page.

co-location

Meaning: A server located at a dedicated facility designed with special resources, such as a secure cage, regulated power, a dedicated Internet connection, online security, and online technical support. Co-location facilities offer customers a secure place to physically house their hardware and equipment (as opposed to keeping it in their offices or warehouse, where the potential for fire, theft, or vandalism is much greater). This term also refers to a "colo facility," a data center in an unserved or underserved market (also known as a "second-tier city").

co-working

Meaning: A movement which gives elancers and independent contractors an alternative to working at home or camping out in cafes. In co-working, a group of freelancers or other solo entrepreneurs shares one big office space with perks that they might not get at home, such as conference rooms espresso machines, and opportunities for socializing. Co-workers can either drop in or rent a dedicated area in spaces ranging from funky industrial lofts to sleeker sites with a more corporate ambiance.

coaxial cable

Meaning: The primary type of cabling used by the cable television industry and widely used for computer networks, it is more expensive than standard telephone wires but less susceptible to interference and more capable of carrying data. Chances are, your cable TV is connected with "coaxial cable." Copper cable is used in both twisted-pair and coaxial cable, and to date, it has been the most common telecommunications cable. However, it is unable to carry as much bandwidth as fiber-optic cable.

cockroach

Meaning: A problem that is at first perceived to be small, but than leads to the introduction of many other problems.

codenapping

Meaning: Withholding source code and working files until paid in full for contract programming work - common practice amoung freelancers.

CodePie

Meaning: A celebration pizza, ordered after successfully writing and debugging a program.

codify

Meaning: Information that is organized or arranged into a code or system.

coin-operated employee

Meaning: An employee brought in for a particular project or set time period.

Cold Fusion

Meaning: A Rapid Application Development (RAD) system created by Allaire Corporation (which merged with Macromedia), it integrates browser, server, and database technologies into Web applications.

cold peace

Meaning: A relationship between two countries in which there is no war, no trade, no travel, and no diplomatic relations.

cold transfer

Meaning: Office slang for an incoming phone call transferred without notice or explanation from the transferring party. For example, "Someone in customer service cold transferred the call to me - by that point the guy was ready to crawl through the wire and kill somebody."

collaborative

Meaning: It means "working together" and has become an overly used buzzword in the industry.

collaborative filtering

Meaning: The process by which a software program sifts through user profiles or usage patterns and makes recommendations based on purchasing habits. For example, if you go to a Web site looking for a book on vegetarian cooking, and you click on the profile of that book, collaborative filtering technology kicks in and recommends a list of similar books. Its list is based on data that reflects the buying habits of other people who purchased that book. Collaborative filtering is a tool intended to increase e-commerce sales through targeted recommendations of additional products (though many see it as a cross between capitalism and big brother).

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

collaborative project

Meaning: A Web site (or other type of project or program) in which all entries are made by Internet users.

collaboratory

Meaning: A virtual laboratory, as in a lab without walls, in which all communication is done via the Net.

collapsible corporations

Meaning: Companies that reside in electronic networks rather than physical buildings, allowing them greater flexibility to change in size and configuration as market conditions dictate. Refers to click-and-mortar versus brick-and-mortar.

COM port

Meaning: A socket in back of a computer for hooking up or plugging in devices, such as modems or printers.

COMDEX

Meaning: A hardware and software exposition started in 1978, it has become the place to announce new product launches and to rub elbows with VCs and representatives from high-tech firms all over the world. In America, it takes place twice a year (in either Atlanta or Chicago during the spring, and in Las Vegas during the fall). Internationally, there are twenty-two annual COMDEX events in eighteen countries.

command line

Meaning: The location where a programmer enters commands to tell a Unix host system what he or she wants it to do. In DOS, the command line is the text you type after the prompt.

command line weenie

Meaning: A geek who prefers using the command line instead of a mouse.

commerce server

Meaning: A server that enables online transactions to occur via a secured socket layer (SSL) and credit card information.

common stock

Meaning: A unit of ownership of a corporation. In the case of a public company, the stock is traded between investors on various exchanges.

communications software

Meaning: Also referred to as telecommunications software, it is software that enables one computer to connect with another, across telephone lines (via modems), to share information. Communications software transmits instructions to your modem and directs it to make connections, transfer files, and carry out other procedures. An operating system such as Windows 95 has communications software built into it, but it must be configured for using a modem and connecting to an ISP.

compatible or compatibility

Meaning: A frequently used term referring to the ability of a hardware device or software program to work with another kind of device or program. For example, a user may try to substitute one brand (or model) of a computer with another and then try to run the same software on it; to be truly compatible, a program or device must operate on a given system without any changes.

competitive salary

Meaning: Organizations battle to offer their employees a compensation that is usually equal to or lesser than the industry average.

compiler

Meaning: A program that reads statements written in a human-readable programming language and translates them into a machine-readable program.

complimentary quote rule

Meaning: When a joint partnership is announced in a financial release, public relations experts agree that it is not legitimate unless it has quotes and comments from both companies.

compression

Meaning: A method for storing text, data, or images in fewer bits, it makes data smaller so less disk or file space is needed to represent the same information. Consequently, the information may be transmitted in less time. Compression takes place via one of several compression standards, including JPG, MPEG, GIF, TIF, and ZIP.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

computer

Meaning: A device that runs programs for displaying and manipulating text, graphics, symbols, audio, video, and numbers.

computer illiterate

Meaning: People who claim they know nothing about computers or who have actually never used a computer are said to be computer illiterate.

computer literate

Meaning: People who feel they know enough about computers to get around without any assistance or who have mastered the art and science of computing are said to be computer literate.

computer science

Meaning: The study of computers, especially of how they are designed and how they operate. Topics of interest include software and hardware and range from simple programming techniques to artificial intelligence research. Computer science is not just "tinkering around" with machines. It is the subject of serious research. David Gelernter, for example, is a Yale University computer scientist, the author of several books, and a leading figure in the third-generation AI.

computer simulation

Meaning: Software that models the dynamics of a real scenario in order to create a computerized version for learning and training. For example, real-time simulation is used for airline and fighter pilot training. Animated runways and enemy flight forces are recreated in a room called a simulator. A simulator also involves a headset, a chair, and other elements to ensure that it moves and sounds like the real thing. Computer simulation can also refer to the process of imitating a real phenomenon with a set of mathematical formulas (for example, weather conditions, chemical reactions, or biological processes). Any phenomena that can be reduced to mathematical data can be simulated on a computer.

Computer Vision Syndrome (CVS)

Meaning: The name for eye and vision problems experienced during computer use. People are using light therapy to combat CVS (including ultraviolet and full-spectrum wavelengths).

computer wiz

Meaning: One who is brilliant at all things computer-related.

concatenated speech

Meaning: Recorded or synthesized words that have been spliced together to create an answer or directive as part of an interactive dialogue between a computer and a person. For example, concatenated speech will direct you through the voice mail when you call certain corporations or government agencies.

configure

Meaning: To change software or hardware actions by changing their settings. Configurations can be set or reset in software or manipulated by changing hardware jumpers, switches or other elements.

connect time

Meaning: The amount of time you spend connected to an online service provider (OSP) or an Internet service provider (ISP).

connectivity

Meaning: The state of being connected to the Internet or to another type of computer network, such as a LAN. On the Internet, if you lose your connectivity, you are no longer online and must redial your ISP. When ISPs get many users signing on all at once, the connectivity weakens due to all the traffic (only so much data can transfer through certain phone lines). If someone asks, "What is your connectivity?" this usually means the speed of your Internet connection, such as 28.8, 56K, ISDN, DSL, or T1.

cons

Meaning: Slang for trade show conventions.

consumer profiling

Meaning: The process of assembling a comprehensive database on consumer shopping habits and product preferences. Data is typically captured from online and offline transactions (including cookies and credit cards). Consumer profiling enables targeted marketing.

contact center

Meaning: A new kind of customer service call center that offers not only telephone support for customers but also e-mail support, chat support, and other Web-based inquiries.

content

Meaning: A somewhat bland name for the creative contribution of the writers, artists, animators, and musicians whose work makes up the text, artwork, animation, and music on the Net. Usually thought of as simply the textual and graphical information contained in a Web site, content also refers to the structure and design in which the information is presented.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

content conundrum

Meaning: How to turn high-quality content into a money-making business online.

content provider

Meaning: A Web site that publishes dynamic and updated information on a consistent basis. This information, or content, can be in the form of news, entertainment, games, employment listings, dictionary terms, and so on. The term "provider" originated from online service providers (OSP), such as AOL, who provided updated news and information for a subscription charge. Most major content providers on the Internet, such as CNET, provide their service to users for free. Why do they do it for free, you may ask? Since the industry is so new, they are trying to grab market share.

content sponsorship

Meaning: A particular and distinct section of content located on a Web site that is sponsored often by a single advertiser. Often the sponsored content will coincide with the subject matter as well as the target demographic of the Web site.

contentology

Meaning: "Contentology" integrates research, knowledge and skills from all fields that focus on analyzing, developing, and designing or structuring content. Areas of interest include electronic publishing, information design, user experience design, Web design, information technology, etc.

context sensitive menu

Meaning: A drop-down menu that only appears in certain parts of a GUI. To see it, you click on the upper right button of your mouse (PC) or you click and hold your mouse button (Macintosh).

Contextual Commerce

Meaning: The use of editorial content to help sell products online. The act of writing contextual commerce is frowned upon because it blurs the distinction between editorial and commercial content, resulting in information that may not be objective.

contextual-based advertising

Meaning: Contextual-based advertising is when an ad is placed on a Web page, in real time, based on the specific content of that individual Web page. For example, a publisher may have a sports site and traditionally sells this placement option with the same ad displayed on all pages of the site. With contextual-based advertising, an ad for tennis shoes would appear on pages about tennis events, while an ad for golf clubs would appear on a page about golf events. And with news sites, it becomes even more powerful due the wide range of ever changing stories and topics covered by each page of the site.

converged network

Meaning: A single network that moves both voice and data simultaneously (versus running separate circuit-based and IP-based networks).

convergence

Meaning: Traditionally, it means the coming together of people, ideas, or things in ways that did not happen before. Within IT, it means the coming together of the computer, consumer electronics, and telecommunications industries and the merging of gadgets, such as the PC, the TV, and the telephone. Pundits believe convergence may mark the end point of the digital revolution, in which all types of digital information (voice, video, and data) will travel over the same network.

convergent programming

Meaning: Television shows that promote interactivity between home Internet users and TV programs. For example, MTV sometimes scrolls a ticker tape at the bottom of the TV screen displaying live transcripts of real-time chat. It also allows Net surfers to participate as game show guests and video voters.

conversion rate

Meaning: An online marketing measurement of the percentage of users who take a desired action (meaning they fill out a form or make a purchase).

COO

Meaning: An acronym used as a business title in the industry.

coopetition

Meaning: A play on the words "competition" and "cooperation," it is the result of the joint efforts of two competing companies with overlapping products or technology. Companies like this in the industry find it beneficial to work together with the goal of increasing sales for both companies. One example are the many widgets companies develop for Facebook.

copyleft

Meaning: A play on the word "copyright" this is the practice of using copyright law to remove restrictions on distributing copies and versions of a work and requiring that the same freedoms be preserved in modified versions. In the online world, it is a form of licensing and may be used to modify copyrights for works such as computer software, documents, music, and art. The main effect is that through a "copyleft" licensing scheme, an author gives every person who receives a copy of a work permission to reproduce, adapt, or distribute the work as long as any resulting copies or adaptations are also bound by the same copyleft licensing scheme. Similar licenses are available through Creative Commons (called Share-alike); see the GNU definition for GPL, a widely used and originating copyleft license.

cord

Meaning: Short for telephone cord or telephone wire.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

corporate kabuki

Meaning: Slang for the "yadi yadi yadi" chit chat that seems to occur during the first 15 minutes in corporate meetings.

CoSN

Meaning: A nonprofit organization that promotes the use of telecommunications to improve learning in kindergarten through twelfth grade education. Members represent state and local education agencies, nonprofits, companies, and individuals that share this vision, as well as hardware vendors, software vendors, and Internet Service Providers (ISPs).

counter-experience

Meaning: Similar to "counter-effective," this is slang for when a person applies previous experience to a problem without the recognition that his or her experience is obsolete and irrelevant to the problem at hand.

courseware

Meaning: Another name for instructional software, courseware can come in the form of a CD-ROM, a Web site, a floppy, an instructional video, or a program tutorial. Courseware is often used to train people on computer business applications, and is the term given to ancillary material in computer training classes.

courtesy call

Meaning: A "courtesy call" previously was seen as a polite phone call meant to welcome someone to the neighborhood or to thank someone for their valued business. However, now-a-days with so many telemarketers calling home phone lines and starting off with, "Good evening, Mr. Smith, this is a courtesy call from __", these calls are seen more as a disturbance than a nice gesture.

CPA

Meaning: An online advertising payment model in which the publisher is only paid when a user takes a desired action (such as filling out a form or making a purchase).

CPC

Meaning: An online advertising payment model in which the publisher is only paid when a user clicks on an online ad. Cost per click models have become more popular, particularly on search engines because the technology can target the ads based on the keywords a person used to search. For example, if I search Google on "radio stations Seattle" --in addition to the search results, a couple of sponsored links appear about "Washington State Radio Stations" and "AM, FM Station Lookup"-- these sponsored links are cost per click ads.

CPM

Meaning: A marketing term that refers to the amount of money charged for one thousand page impressions. For example, a $5 CPM represents $5 per 1,000 displays of an ad banner. The "M" comes from the French term mille, which means thousand.

CPO

Meaning: An acronym used as a business title in the industry.

CPU

Meaning: The most powerful microprocessor chip in your computer is the CPU. For example, the Intel Pentium and the Motorola 68040 chips handle the central management functions of a high-powered PC or Mac, respectively. Sometimes, the term CPU is used to describe the whole box, including the chip, the motherboard, the expansion cards, the disk drives, the power supply, and so on. Both uses are widespread, but only the first is really accurate.

crackable

Meaning: A network (or any other computer system) that is vulnerable to being hacked by a cracker.

CRAFT

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: craft)

crash

Meaning: When your computer or a network suddenly stops working, it has crashed. The result is generally a frozen keyboard, a frozen mouse, or a frozen screen (meaning that nothing moves or responds to input). In most cases, you have to reboot to get the thing started again (all the while hoping you saved the latest version of your work).

crash dummies

Meaning: Slang for street criminals hired by crooked doctors and lawyers to cause traffic accidents and file phony injury claims. Crash dummies are paid a set fee; the doctors and lawyers split the insurance settlements. You may see this term in the chat rooms and newsgroups.

crash test dummies

Meaning: Slang for those of us who pay for unstable, not-ready-for-prime-time software marketed by (greedy) computer companies.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

CRC

Meaning: A mathematical technique used to check for errors when sending data by modem. Because some phone lines are notoriously crackly and can cause breaks in transmission, this is a crucial step. If the CRC fails to add up, the receiving end of a data transmission sends a NAK (Negative Acknowledgement) signal back to the sending modem until it does add up. CRCs are also used in tape backups and other streaming communications.

creeping featurism

Meaning: The tendency for programmers to add more and more features to a software product in an attempt to "keep up with the Joneses" (or in this case, to keep up with stiff competition from other companies). It generally produces a slow, clunky program.

critical differentiators

Meaning: Those aspects about your idea, product, service, or business model that make it unique and different from the competition.

critical mass

Meaning: In business-speak, it means having enough customers or market share to be profitable. The phrase comes from nuclear physics, where it is the amount of fissionable material it takes to sustain a chain reaction.

crog

Meaning: "Crog" stands for a "carefully researched blog," meaning it is a blog written by someone with expertise in a particular field.

cross post

Meaning: To post a message to several newsgroups simultaneously, an action usually frowned upon in Internet culture.

cross-channel marketing

Meaning: The use of one sales channel to promote another. For example, clothing company JCrew regularly promotes its Web site in its direct-mail catalogs.

cross-roasting

Meaning: The act of following up a message posted to a Usenet newsgroup by adding one or more additional newsgroups to the response in an effort to bring the original post to the attention of those likely to flame it. For example, in a follow-up to a particularly over-the-top feminist rant, a cross-roaster might add the post to alt.mens-rights and soc.men.

crowdsourcing

Meaning: Coined by Jeff Howe of Wired magazine, "crowdsourcing" is a neologism for the act of taking a task traditionally performed by an employee or contractor, and outsourcing it to an undefined large group of people in the form of an "open call." This term has become popular with business authors and journalists as shorthand for the trend of leveraging the mass collaboration enabled by Web 2.0 technologies to achieve business goals.

cryppie

Meaning: A nickname for a hacker who penetrates cryptographic software.

CSP

Meaning: a.k.a. "Computer Server Provider"

CSS

Meaning: A feature of HTML that gives both Web site developers and users more control over how Web pages are displayed. With CSS, designers and users can create style sheets that define how different elements, such as headers and links, appear. These style sheets can then be applied to any page on a particular Web site. So in theory all the pages can be formatted the same way making it much easier. The term cascading derives from the fact that multiple style sheets can be applied to the same Web page. CSS was developed by the W3C.

CTIA

Meaning: A trade group that represents cellular, PCS, and enhanced specialized mobile radio carriers.

CTO in business

Meaning: An acronym used as one of two business titles in the industry.

Ctrl

Meaning: This refers to the Control key on your keyboard, it is often used for shortcuts. For example, in Microsoft Word, instead of pointing your mouse to the File menu and clicking on it to see a drop-down menu and then clicking again on Save, you can simply press down Ctrl and S at the same time on your keyboard to save.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

cube farm

Meaning: The name for what the average workplace environment has become, it refers to a large mass of office space that has been subdivided into numerous rows of cubicles.

cuddletech

Meaning: Describes iMac, the new VW Beetle, and other objects marketed as cute and friendly. A related term is iCandy, referring to the bright colors being used on such products.

cumdex

Meaning: Nickname for the "adult technology" sideshow that spun off from COMDEX after trade-show officials were pressured to exclude porno exhibitors.

curbstoning

Meaning: Buying, selling, or participating in more than five vehicle transactions over a 12 month period, without possessing a vehicle dealer license. This IRL scam involves commercial car sellers concealed as private parties. The act of "curbstoning" is illegal in more than 20 states in the USA and is punishable by up to a year in jail.

curry

Meaning: Slang for an innovative technique or technology that solves something on a larger scale. For example, "The latest kernel modification was just the curry we needed to meet the new standard."

cursor

Meaning: The little blinking line on your computer screen that looks like this a vertical bar ("|"). It is there to indicate where your next typed character will appear.

customer acquisition cost

Meaning: A marketing term to describe the cost (or expense) associated with acquiring a new customer or user.

customer experience team

Meaning: Many organizations are adhering to the idea of employing "customer experience teams" to control the customer experience with the product that is offered by the company. Their job is to make sure that the customer encounters a positive experience when interacting with the company or its products.

customer facing

Meaning: This refers to the contact and interaction that a customer has with a particular company. In the software world, it is what the customer interacts with visually on the computer screen. In a business sense, it is the interaction the customer has with the company itself, such as the sales or customer service employee.

Customer Information Control System (CICS)

Meaning: A software program designed to process online transactions (OLTP), it was developed by IBM. It is one of the most widely used programs for creating customer transaction systems.

Customer Interaction Center (CIC)

Meaning: Traditional customer call centers are morphing into customer interaction centers, in which all customer contact-by phone, fax, e-mail, the Web, or other means-is integrated. Considered an integral part of customer relationship management (CRM), the CIC is fast becoming the control point for collecting and disseminating customer data within an organization.

customer-centric

Meaning: Meaning that a business product, service or experience has been focused on the customer. This stems from the process of taking any noun and adding "centric" to the end.

customize

Meaning: To make changes or specifications to a program or Web site so that it meets your individual needs. Similar to personalize, customize generally refers to the process of selecting the files you want to include in a software installation on your computer. On the Web, you can customize a Web site in order to personalize it. For example, you can often choose from a series of features (such as weather, news, and stock quotes) to set up a portal site.

cut-and-paste attack

Meaning: A hacker attack in which a forgery is assembled from pieces of valid messages to yield a message that will be decrypted more or less correctly.

CVS

Meaning: A network-transparent program that allows Web developers to keep track of different development versions of source code. CVS does not maintain multiple versions of source code files but keeps a single copy and records of all of the changes that are made. When a developer wants a particular development version of a file, CVS will reconstruct that version based on its records.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

cyber noir

Meaning: Used to describe dark, trippy, weird "cyber" films and shows like Wild Palms, Tank Girl, and VR.5.

cyber sitters

Meaning: Young, underemployed, computer literates who "sit" with rich kids, teaching them how to surf the Internet and create multimedia graphics.

CyberAngels

Meaning: An organization that assists victims of Internet crimes (such as online stalking, cyberfraud, credit card theft, or identity theft).

cyberbullying

Meaning: "Cyberbullying" is when a child, tween, or teen is tormented, threatened, harassed, humiliated, embarrassed or otherwise targeted by another child, tween, teen, or person using the Internet, interactive and digital technologies, or mobile phones. It is instigated by one minor against another minor; once adults become involved, it is cyberstalking or cyberharassment. Adult cyberharassment or cyberstalking is not called cyberbullying unless the bully was disguising him or herself as a teenager (see example below).

cybercad

Meaning: The electronic equivalent of a lounge lizard, one who hangs around cyberspace for extended periods of time.

cybercafe

Meaning: A public eating and drinking establishment, in the real world, where the principal form of entertainment is online access to the Net, via computer terminals at individual tables. The appeal of cybercafes has been half-jokingly compared with getting hooked on drugs: Many people who go to a Net bar and get online for the first time become "addicted" to the experience and wind up regular users. This term also refers to a chat room, which is designed to emulate a cafe.

cyberchondriacs

Meaning: Those who go online for health care information. Often times these people end up misdiagnosing their symptoms and cause more worry about their condition than needed.

cyberfraud

Meaning: Cyberfraud refers to any type of deliberate deception for unfair or unlawful game that occurs online. The most common form is online credit card theft. Other common forms of monetary cyberfraud include nondelivery of paid products purchased through online auctions and nondelivery of merchandise or software bought online.

cyberluddites

Meaning: Net users who are against the World Wide Web and Net commercialism and want it to return to all text-based communications.

cybernetics

Meaning: Originally the study of biological and artificial control systems, cybernetics has evolved into many disparate areas of research and study, including computer science, social philosophy, and epistemology. In general, cybernetics is concerned with discovering what mechanisms control systems, and in particular, how systems regulate themselves. It is the fundamental principle at work in IT. The term was first coined by Norbert Weiner in 1943.

cybernoir

Meaning: A term used to describe dark, trippy, weird cyber-related films and television shows, such as Wild Palms, Tank Girl, or VR.5.

cyberpork

Meaning: Government money that flows to well-connected information superhighway contractors.

cyberpunk

Meaning: Originally a cultural subgenre of science fiction, taking place in a not-so-distant, over-industrialized society, the term grew out of the works of William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. It has evolved into a cultural label, encompassing many different kinds of human, machine, and punk attitudes. Cyberpunk also refers to clothing and lifestyle choices. The current notion of a cyberpunk is of an anarchic young programmer.

cybersexism

Meaning: The unfortunate tendency of (white) male-dominated customs to influence online communication and netiquette.

cyberslang

Meaning: A synonym for geek-speak. NetLingo is a dictionary of cyberslang :-)

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

cybersquatting

Meaning: The practice of purchasing a domain name that contains a well-known trademark or commercial name (for example, generalelectric.com). The intent is not to develop it into a Web site but rather to sell it to the rightful owner for a big profit. This practice is being contested in various legal battles, and for the most part, the company wins, not the cybersquatter.

cyberstalker

Meaning: "Cyberstalking" refers to contacting a person online persistently, especially out of obsession or derangement. For example, if a man sends a woman threatening e-mails or repeatedly contacts her via her social networking page, he could be charged with a felony.

cyberterrorism

Meaning: A blanket term for any criminal attempt to disrupt computer or telecommunications services. With the majority of the world digitally connected, there is a large vulnerability to attack. Hackers, for example, are able to spread a virus or launch a denial of service (DoS) attack with relative ease and anonymity. The ripple effect of bringing down a system in Mountain View, California, can cause ramifications in Munich, for example. High-tech security to ward off cyberterrorism is a growing business.

cybertourist

Meaning: Slang for a person who only goes online on the weekends or holidays, with all the other cybertourists, clogging the Internet by their sheer numbers.

Cybrarian

Meaning: A person who makes a living doing online research and information retrieval. Also known as "data surfers" or "super searchers," these individuals are not necessarily librarians.

---

D

-- Select A Phrase -- d-commerceD2Ddaisy chaindancing baloneydarknetdas blinkenlightsdatadata backupdata dumpdata glovedata martdata repositorydata shadowdata storagedata storedata stormdata trafficdata warehousingdatabasedatabase front enddatabase-drivendataspheredaughterboardDBMSDBSDCEDDNde facto standarddead technologydead tree editiondead-tree versiondebbiedeboningDecember 12, 1991deckdecoderdecruitmentdecryptiondedicated hostingdedicated linededicated serverdeep divedefaultdefault browserdefenestrationdeletedeliverabledelurkingdemand-side managementdemo monkeydenizendeployDESdescription tagdeselectdesignosaursdesktop video (DTV)destination pagedestination sitedestructive payloaddevicedevice driverDHCPDHTMLdial groupdial-up accountdial-up connectionDICdigit modedigitaldigital cameradigital cashdigital certificatedigital dirtdigital dividedigital fingerprintingdigital nativedigital revolutiondigital signaturedigital SLRdigital video recorderdigital watermarkdigiteratidigitizerDINKdirect connectiondirectorydirectory advertisingDirectXdiscdiscussion groupdisintermediationdisk dancersdisruptive technologydistance learningdistributed computingdistributiondittoheadsdivergenceDMATDNS parkingdocubugdocumentdocument infodocument managementdog bonesdog-and-pony showDOMdomain namedomain name lookupdoorway domaindoorway pageDORDdot addressdot filedot-bombdot-com deadpooldot-commersdot-commiedot-commuterdot-condot-corpsdouble geekingdown timedownlinkdownloaddownstreamDPdpiDRIBdrill downdrip irrigationdrip marketingdrive-by VCdrop down menudrumpdrunk mouseDSigDSSdual-channellerdub-dub-dubdue diligencedumb terminalDutch auctionDVDDWDMdweebDWYMDYFMdynamicdynamic contentdynamic node

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

d-commerce

Meaning: A form of e-commerce by companies that sell news, documents, subscriptions, or any other content that can be delivered digitally over the Web. Under the ultimate "pay as you go" model, a d-commerce company acts as an electronic middleman: Users establish an account with a d-commerce company to purchase content from a variety publishers, which is easier because they give out their credit card number once instead of to a multitude of Web publishers. The d-commerce company, in turn, handles the billing, collection, refunds, and other payment processes for the publisher. D-commerce is considered a form of e-commerce because money is exchanged for a product or service that exists "electronically" (in this case, "digitally"). For more information, read the column "Digital Commerce," by Denise Caruso, in The New York Times.

D2D

Meaning: An acronym for any type of collaboration among developers. For example, "If they intend to build the next best-selling software, they are going to need some major D2D collaboration between the programmers and designers."

daisy chain

Meaning: A set of hardware devices connected to each other in a series, where the first device connects to the computer, the second device connects to the first, the third device connects to the second, and so on. "Daisy chain" is also used as a verb to describe the act of connecting devices in this pattern.

dancing baloney

Meaning: Gratuitous animated GIFs and other Web special effects that are used to impress clients. "This page is kinda dull ...maybe a little dancing baloney will help."

darknet

Meaning: A computer network or Internet service that lets users send and receive files and information over the Internet without fear of being monitored or logged. The service allows people to use an untraceable address in the "darknet," where they cannot be personally identified.

das blinkenlights

Meaning: An old phrase used to refer to the myriad of blinking lights on old mainframes, it is still popular because Hollywood often uses the term in sci-fi thrillers.

data

Meaning: In general, data is information: factual information, such as text, numbers, sounds, and images-anything that can be processed on a computer. Data also represents concepts and sensations that are suitable for communication, interpretation, or processing. As futurist Marshall McLuhan said, "The electric light is pure information," meaning that everything perceptible is data. The word "data" is plural, and the singular form is "datum." However, data is often taken to be singular (as it is in this dictionary).

data backup

Meaning: It is important and necessary to backup your files regularly! This means you must copy files from your computer to a storage medium (such as a disk or CD-ROM) as a precaution against something happening to your computer and causing the loss of data. "To backup," as a verb, is the process of storing your data; a "backup," as a noun, is the process of "backing up" or the media you chose to store your backed up files.

data dump

Meaning: Slang for a debriefing to ramp up the person who is assuming a project role from someone else. It can also refer to a brainstorming session in which everyone in the room is expected to contribute ideas.

data glove

Meaning: A glove that has sensors on it. These sensors transmit coordinate information to a computer in order to track what the hand is doing. Most often used in gaming or within a virtual world.

data mart

Meaning: The name for a computer file or a physical space in an office where an online marketer brings together all of his or her data, for the purpose of integrating it.

data repository

Meaning: A physical area, such as a file server, where data is stored for use by an enterprise. It usually has an organizational structure that arranges the data in directories and subdirectories.

data shadow

Meaning: Every time you use a credit card, send an e-mail, browse the Web, or use a cell phone, small traces of digital information are left behind. This is referred to as a "data shadow".

data storage

Meaning: The capacity of a device to hold and retain data, it usually refers to auxiliary storage (or "mass storage"). There are a variety of techniques and devices for storing large amounts of data (for example, disk drives or tape drives). Optical disks are a preferred method because they use a laser to read and write data and have very large storage capacities. Data storage is measured in kilobytes (1,024 bytes), megabytes (1,024 kilobytes), gigabytes (1,024 megabytes), and terabytes (1,024 gigabytes). Data storage is not to be confused with "memory," which refers to temporary storage areas within a computer.

data store

Meaning: The data store "layer" is made up of objects that contain database routines and interact directly with a DBMS product. For example, a Java method might use SQL statements to obtain data from a relational database.

data storm

Meaning: A phrase to describe the sudden incident that uncontrollably grows with exponentially larger amounts of news coverage in complete disproportion to its original newsworthiness. For example, when a Florida University student was Tasered, it resulted in a "data storm" (see example below).

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

data traffic

Meaning: The number of TCP/IP packets traversing a network.

data warehousing

Meaning: A generic term for a system that stores, retrieves, and manages large amounts of data. Data warehouse software often includes sophisticated compression and hashing techniques for fast searches, as well as advanced filtering. Planners and researchers can use this database freely without worrying about slowing down the day-to-day operations of the production database, for example.

database

Meaning: An organized collection of information, characterized by the use of data fields, it provides a foundation for procedures such as retrieving information, drawing conclusions, and making decisions. In other words, it is an electronic filing system. A database does not have to be digital; a collection of recipes written on index cards and stored in a filing box also counts as a database. Traditional, computerized databases are organized by fields, records, and files. A field is a single piece of information; a record is a complete set of fields; and a file is a collection of records.

database front end

Meaning: In the context of the Internet, this is an interface that integrates WWW applications with sophisticated database programs. For example, the homepage of a search engine is a database front end. Its easy-to-use GUI simplifies what you see, yet at the same time, a highly sophisticated technical process is at work behind it (the back end)..

database-driven

Meaning: A term that describes a Web site that organizes a vast amount of data and allows information to be retrieved on demand. As opposed to "flat HTML," where you must code each new piece of information before displaying it on a Web site, a database-driven Web site is written in a programming language that refreshes it dynamically when data fields in a database are updated. Most e-commerce and B2B Web sites are database-driven in that they are integrated with other databases. For example, when you try to order a product online, an inventory database will check to see if a particular item is in stock and will return the results to you.

datasphere

Meaning: A play on the word "atmosphere," this refers to data that is transmitted via satellites.

daughterboard

Meaning: A computer logic board that plugs into the motherboard, it offers additional computer functions (such as enabling 3-D graphics enhancement and video capture).

DBMS

Meaning: a.k.a. "a database manager"

DBS

Meaning: A television service that offers hundreds of channels in a crisp digital signal (at a price comparable to cable TV).

DCE

Meaning: An industry standard software technology for setting up and managing computing and data exchange in a system of distributed computers. DCE is typically used in a large client/server network of computing systems that include servers of different sizes, scattered geographically.

DDN

Meaning: A segment of the Internet that links to U.S. military bases and contractors around the world, it is used for unsecured communications.

de facto standard

Meaning: A standard that comes to pass because everyone uses it, not because it was ordained as such.

dead technology

Meaning: Technology that was developed but never gained approval or popularity. For example, the clipper chip.

dead tree edition

Meaning: The paper version of a publication available in both paper and electronic forms. As in: "The dead tree edition of the San Francisco Chronicle...."

dead-tree version

Meaning: Slang for a printed document or publication, as opposed to an electronic version.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

debbie

Meaning: A name for someone who is even newer than a newbie.

deboning

Meaning: The act of removing bound-in subscription cards, cardstock ad pages, and "blow in" cards from a magazine to make it easier to read.

December 12, 1991

Meaning: The date the first Web page was shown.

deck

Meaning: Refers to a PowerPoint slide show. For example, "There were only fifteen slides in the deck, but her presentation lasted over an hour."

decoder

Meaning: Another term used for a set-top box (STB), it converts a coded signal back into its original form.

decruitment

Meaning: A corporate euphemism for laying off workers.

decryption

Meaning: The decoding of an encrypted message.

dedicated hosting

Meaning: A service provided by a hosting company to businesses that wish to have their Web site on a stand-alone or "dedicated" computer. It can be costly, and therefore is usually only utilized by large companies that have a lot of traffic on their Web sites and an in-house technology team that provides 24/7 monitoring. The primary benefit of dedicated hosting is that you have root access to the machine and can literally turn it off or make any changes at any time.

dedicated line

Meaning: A telephone line that provides a computer or network with a direct, permanent connection to the Internet.

dedicated server

Meaning: In the Web-hosting business, a dedicated server is a rented service; a user rents the server, the software, and an Internet connection from the hosting company that maintains it. On a network, a dedicated server is a single computer that is "set aside" for serving the needs of the network, usually to manage communications and printer resources. Not all servers are dedicated; it is possible for a computer to act as a server and to perform other functions, as well.

deep dive

Meaning: Slang for exploring a subject in-depth.

default

Meaning: A computer software setting or preference that states what will automatically happen in the event that the user has not stated another preference. For example, your computer may have a default setting to launch or start Netscape whenever a GIF is opened; if you prefer to use Photoshop whenever you need to view a GIF, you can change the default setting.

default browser

Meaning: The World Wide Web browser that you want your computer to open (or launch) automatically whenever an HTML or Web page file is clicked on.

defenestration

Meaning: (dE-fe-ne-strA-shon)

delete

Meaning: To remove a file or erase information.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

deliverable

Meaning: The components of a project or affair that are promised to be completed by a specific time. Likewise, deliverables are the elements of a development process that are able to be provided as guaranteed.

delurking

Meaning: Slang for coming out of online "lurking mode", usually motivated by an irresistible need to flame about something. For example, "I just had to delurk and add my two cents to that conversation about global warming."

demand-side management

Meaning: A form of conservation presented by electric companies by offering incentives to organizations that observe "demand-side management". Companies that can adjust their power usage from peak times to off-peak times become more efficient.

demo monkey

Meaning: A nickname for a person who gives a really good demo.

denizen

Meaning: Often used in a derogatory manner to describe a netizen who is a newbie.

deploy

Meaning: A buzzword that means to use for an intended purpose or desired end.

DES

Meaning: A standard for encrypting data, developed at IBM in 1976. It is a 56-bit private key algorithm that uses the block cipher method. (A block cipher sends encrypted data to break the text into 64-bit blocks before transmitting it.)

description tag

Meaning: An HTML tag used by Web page authors for providing a description of the Web site. Whatever is written in the description tag will appear in search engine listings.

deselect

Meaning: If you change your mind after clicking a check box or radio button to select an item, you can deselect the item by clicking the box or button again.

designosaurs

Meaning: A species, nearing extinction, of designers who refuse to use computers.

desktop video (DTV)

Meaning: The merging of the camcorder and the home computer, made possible by advances in home computing power and affordability. DTV opens new possibilities for both the videomaker and the PC enthusiast and is considered to be at the forefront of video technology.

destination page

Meaning: The Web page you intend to visit. For example, if you are looking up an article on an e-journal, but you click on an interstitial or ad banner instead, you have not yet reached your destination page.

destination site

Meaning: Another name for a portal.

destructive payload

Meaning: A virus that erases data or interferes with a computer or network.

device

Meaning: A machine designed for a purpose. Within the context of computer technology, a device is a unit of hardware, outside or inside the case or housing for the essential computer (the processor, memory, and data paths). A device is capable of providing input to the essential computer, receiving output, or both. When the term is used generally (as in, "computer devices"), it refers to keyboards, mice, monitors, hard drives, CD-ROM players, printers, speakers, microphones, and other hardware units.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

device driver

Meaning: A software component that controls a peripheral device.

DHCP

Meaning: A protocol that provides a means to allocate IP address dynamically to computers on a LAN. It eliminates the need to assign permanent IP addresses manually. DHCP software runs on servers and can be found in network devices (such as routers) that allow multiple users to access the Internet. Microsoft introduced DHCP on their Windows NT server in 1994. Newer DHCP servers will dynamically update DNS servers after assigning the addresses.

DHTML

Meaning: Dubbed a next-generation HTML, this is a mark-up language that describes how text and images are displayed on a Web page. Developed by Netscape and the W3C, it is based entirely on industry-standard HTML and Java (featuring absolute positioning and layers, for example). It gives Web designers and Web developers greater control over the look and feel of their Web pages.

dial group

Meaning: People are gathered into a focus group and given an electronic dial. As the group watches a speech or commercial, each person adjusts the dial in a "feel negative about" or "feel positive about" direction. The group average is charted into a rising and falling line that records a collective second-by-second judgement on the presentation.

dial-up account

Meaning: A basic type of Internet account that allows you to to dial-up an Internet Service Provider’s(ISP) computer with a modem. These types of accounts usually have a UNIX or other command-line. interface.

dial-up connection

Meaning: One of the cheapest and most popular ways for a home user to access the Internet, this kind of connection uses standard telephone lines (POTS) to link your desktop to the host/server.

DIC

Meaning: In New Zealand & Australia, "DIC" means "drunk in charge" (of a vehicle).

digit mode

Meaning: This phrase is referring to an IP address once it receives its domain name.

digital

Meaning: In the most general sense, think of digital as a form of representation in which distinct objects (or digits) are used to express something in the real world (for example, time or temperature). That way, counting and other operations can be performed precisely. When data is represented digitally, it can be manipulated to produce a calculation or some other computation, such as a picture.

digital camera

Meaning: A portable camera that records images in a machine-readable format. These cameras eliminate the expensive and time-consuming methods normally involved in creating computer-readable images, including film processing and image scanning.

digital cash

Meaning: A generic term used to describe the electronic cash or digital currency used in cyberspace. There are several companies working to develop solutions for online payment processes. For example, one such technology allows items to be purchased by credit card, debit card, or check, providing secure online transactions and processing. Another company is working to provide software solutions that extend physical-world payment methods into the virtual world, enabling businesses to offer a variety of secure, private, and easy-to-use electronic payment options. These solutions include person-to-person (P2P), business-to-consumer (B2C), business-to-business (B2B), debit, prepaid, and mobile payments. The software solutions also enable merchant-specific payment options, including electronic gift certificates and customer loyalty points. There is also the notion of sending a check to a bank that in turn sends you software for access to an online account. From there, you draw funds to your hard drive for use when purchasing goods and services on the Internet. By using public key cryptography, this scheme combines computerized convenience with security and privacy-improving on paper cash (which some pundits believe will eventually become obsolete).

digital certificate

Meaning: The digital sibling of an identification card, it is used in conjunction with a public key encryption system to identify a person. Digital certificates are issued by a third party (known as a certificate authority) and are included in the transmission of an encrypted message (to prove that the sender is the person he or she claims to be). A digital certificate is an important component in e-commerce and data security transmissions. The two most prominent companies providing digital certificate services are VeriSign and GTE.

digital dirt

Meaning: Unflattering information or opinions that you may have written on blogs or in chat rooms that could come back to haunt you, for example in a job interview. "Digital dirt" also refers to unflattering information that someone else has correctly or incorrectly written about you that can be found on the Internet, usually on social networking sites.

digital divide

Meaning: The gap between people who have computers (and are connected to the Internet) and those who do not have computers (and lack Internet access). It refers to an economic trend of "the haves and the have nots," and it embodies the ideas that "what you learn is what you earn" and that those who do not have access to computers will be deprived of equal opportunities. It is expected that "the access gap" will close due to government programs, private funding, cyber-mentoring, lower computer costs, and initiatives to spread the benefits of Internet technology to all socioeconomic groups, rural and urban.

digital fingerprinting

Meaning: Similar to a netary public, this is one way of attaching information to a Web document to protect intellectual property. It works like this: Registered users send files to a company that specializes in digital fingerprinting; it generates a digital fingerprint on the file, assigning it a time stamp that shows when the file was first in use. Any change to the file (even one character or space) will render the fingerprints unmatchable.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

digital native

Meaning: A "digital native" refers to a person who is born after 1984 and uses computers. As opposed to a "digital immigrant" --one who had to learn their way around the Internet-- digital natives have always been surrounded by the culture of online technology.

digital revolution

Meaning: First was the agricultural revolution, then the industrial revolution. Now, there is the digital revolution, which refers to the radical reshaping and restructuring of society caused by digital technology.

digital signature

Meaning: Like a written signature at the bottom of a page, this is a piece of code that can be attached to an e-mail message or an online transaction to prove that you are the person who sent the information. A digital signature is not to be confused with a sig file. It is an important component for e-commerce, since it provides authentication and an increased level of security.

digital SLR

Meaning: A camera design that allows the user to view directly through the lens for more accurate framing and composition. The design also makes it easy to change lenses if you want to use a specialty lens. These specialty lenses are larger so the overall cameras tend to be heavier. These digital cameras are more expensive and as an added benefit, they typically do not have a long lag time between shots.

digital video recorder

Meaning: A stand alone piece of equipment used to record and save television prgrams on hard disks inside cable and satellite receivers. Primarily known as a "DVR" it is also called a "PVR" (personal video recorder), and TiVo (which is actually the best-known brand of digital video recorders).

digital watermark

Meaning: A method for identifying an electronic document, it is usually information placed in the code. see also: netary public, steganography

digiterati

Meaning: The literati of the digital world, it includes people in the industry who are considered knowledgeable, hip, or otherwise in-the-know with regard to the online revolution. A popular digerati gathering is the annual TED Conference, a three-day party for notable people in technology (T), entertainment (E), and design (D), orchestrated by Richard Saul Wurman.

digitizer

Meaning: A person who loves to convert "ink on paper" into a digital form. "Ink on paper" includes any kind of hard copy document, including pictures, that can now be converted to pixels.

DINK

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: dink)

direct connection

Meaning: A permanent connection between your computer system and the Internet. This is sometimes referred to as a leased line connection because the line is leased from the telephone company.

directory

Meaning: Best thought of as the "table of contents" of a computer disk, hard drive, or server. A directory, sometimes called a folder, often lists the following information about its contents: file name, file size, creation date and time, file type, and author name. It can also refer to a search directory.

directory advertising

Meaning: Any variety of advertising (usually banner ads) found on directories. Directories typically are focused on local areas, opposed to general search engines that seek out requested information and categorize it.

DirectX

Meaning: A set of APIs developed by Microsoft to let programmers access the hardware features of a computer without knowing exactly what hardware will be installed on the machine where their programs eventually run. Several versions of DirectX focus on multimedia hardware and applications.

disc

Meaning: A round, read-only optical storage medium made of nonmagnetic material. Read from and written to by laser, discs include CDs (Compact Discs), CD-ROMs (Compact Disc-Read-Only Memory), laserdiscs, DVDs (videodiscs), and the like.

discussion group

Meaning: A group of people who exchange messages about topics of common interest. Often associated with the newsgroups, discussion groups can take the form of discussion boards, online forums, and e-mail lists. Dubbed as "online encounters with your own kind," discussion groups vary widely in topic and format.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

disintermediation

Meaning: The business concept of "cutting out the middlemen." It refers to the elimination of intermediaries in a supply chain.

disk dancers

Meaning: Slang for teenagers who use the AOL disks, given away in magazines and via direct mail, to hop from one free account to another.

disruptive technology

Meaning: Any technology that overturns a traditional business model. For example, the Internet is a disruptive technology in the age of paper publishing. This term was coined by Clayton Christensen of Harvard Business School.

distance learning

Meaning: The method of obtaining training without being physically present during the class. Instead, you view the class on a computer screen or by satellite broadcast. For example, an engineer may use distance learning by computer to solve (by teleconference) a malfunction on a Pacific oil rig.

distributed computing

Meaning: In general, distributed computing is any computing that involves multiple computers which are remote from each other, where each has a role in a computation problem or information processing.

distribution

Meaning: Generally refers to a controlled subset of recipients for postings to a mailing list or Usenet group. In this instance, distribution lists are handy for such things as "for sale" messages or discussions of regional politics. A distribution list helps organize any topic-oriented messages for multiple recipients.

dittoheads

Meaning: People who are in perfect alignment on an issue, an idea, or a belief system. Allegedly coined by Rush Limbaugh to refer to his legion of faithful followers.

divergence

Meaning: The proliferation of small, single-purpose devices (such as MP3 players) at the expense of the "do-it-all" PC. For example, smaller devices, such as PDAs, are favored by many users who need to manage digital information while they are mobile (and PDAs are even more portable than laptops). Divergence is the opposite of convergence, which is the coming together of communication devices.

DMAT

Meaning: The trademark for products that comply with SDMI specifications.

DNS parking

Meaning: When someone registers a domain name, does not develop it into a Web site, but just sits on it (and keeps paying the annual fees), the domain is said to be "parked." Web hosting companies offer to "hold" specific domain names as a service to their customers. It is referred to as "parking" because once the hosting company registers the domain name with InterNIC, it must "park" it on a server until it is ready to be activated.

docubug

Meaning: Slang for a mistake in computer documentation. Used in the technical writing department (the "DocuZoo") at Sun Microsystems.

document

Meaning: As a noun, a document is recorded information, usually saved as a file (for example, a letter or invoice saved as a Word document). On the World Wide Web, a document is any file that contains text, media, or hyperlinks that can be transferred from an HTTP server to a client program. As a verb, to document is to record or annotate something; it is the act of putting information into permanent form so it can be retrieved later. And, in computer-speak, documentation is the product information and help materials provided to customers or users. Electronic Document Management (EDM) deals with the management of electronically stored documents.

document info

Meaning: The properties of a Web page, including structure, composition, and security status. In a browser, this information is available as a selection on a drop-down menu. Structure information lists the URLs of images within the document. Composition information includes location, file, MIME type, source, local cache file, modification date, expiration date, content length, and character set (charset). Security information informs you about encryption and certification.

document management

Meaning: The computerized administration of electronic and paper-based documents. A document management system generally includes a scanner and an optical character recognition (OCR) program for converting paper documents into electronic form.

dog bones

Meaning: The bone-shaped holographic stickers that are used to seal new CD boxes. Supposedly "for your protection" to guard against repackaged used discs.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

dog-and-pony show

Meaning: A presentation an entrepreneur or exec must make in order to receive financing for his or her company. For example, "Last week, I did the dog-and-pony show for two VC firms and three incubators."

DOM

Meaning: A platform-neutral and language-neutral interface that allows programs and scripts to access and update the content, structure, and style of documents dynamically.

domain name

Meaning: The address or URL of a particular Web site, it is the text name corresponding to the numeric IP address of a computer on the Internet. For example: www.netlingo.com is the domain name for the numeric IP address "66.201.69.207." There is an organization called InterNIC that registers domain names for a fee, to keep people from registering the same name. To register a domain name, you can contact a company (such as Network Solutions, Inc.) or you can ask your ISP or hosting company to register names for you.

domain name lookup

Meaning: In the traditional sense, it is the process of converting a numeric IP address into a text name (for example, 66.201.69.207 is converted to www.netlingo.com).

doorway domain

Meaning: A domain name specifically used to gain a higher ranking in search engine results, which are based on particular keywords. A doorway domain serves only as an entry point through which users click to go to an actual Web site (which often has a different domain address).

doorway page

Meaning: A Web page that serves only as an entry point through which users click to go to the actual homepage. In the past, search engines would classify and retrieve Web sites based primarily on meta tags, but now each search engine has its own set of criteria that you must adhere to if you want your site listed near the top of the results.

DORD

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: dord)

dot address

Meaning: The common notation for IP addresses (for example, 66.201.69.207). In the form A.B.C.D, each letter represents, in decimal, one byte of a four-byte IP address.

dot file

Meaning: A file on a Unix public-access system that alters the way you or your messages interact with that system. For example, your login file contains various parameters for such things as the text editor you get when you send a message.

dot-bomb

Meaning: A play on the term dot-com, it refers to a bad idea, a failed business venture, or April 14, 2000.

dot-com deadpool

Meaning: The thousands of dot-com companies that went belly-up due to overambitious business plans, wasted use of VC funds, or poor management; also, those dot-com companies that had to declare chapter 11.

dot-commers

Meaning: A nickname for people who work in the industry or are employed at a dot-com.

dot-commie

Meaning: A nickname for anyone who believes that everything on the Web should be free of charge. It also refers to someone who favors all things dot-com instead of F2F interaction in the real world.

dot-commuter

Meaning: Someone who commutes from a suburban neighborhood to the downtown area. It usually refers to working in the inner-city area and being up scaled for dot-com startup companies. This term is heard frequently in Seattle, Portland and San Francisco.

dot-con

Meaning: A play on the term "dot-com," it refers to getting conned on an industry business deal or a fraudulent e-commerce Web site.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

dot-corps

Meaning: Slang for corporations that existed predominantly on the Internet prior to 2000. They lacked physical assets and based much of their value on future projections, as a result they took a huge hammering when the stock market crashed on April 14, 2000.

double geeking

Meaning: When you use two computers at the same time. "Triple-geeking" is using three computers at the same time, and so on. A person who is using more than one device simultaneously is said to be multitasking, and a person who has more than one handheld device in their possession is said to be wearing digital jewelry.

down time

Meaning: This expression refers to lost production time due to a broken machine and its operator being unable to work. In modern usage, it refers to a slow network, or to the time a person needs to relax and recoup after hard work. For example, "I finished the project on Thursday and headed to Napa Valley for a long weekend and some major down time."

downlink

Meaning: Once a signal has been sent to a satellite (an uplink), the information is then broadcast back down (or "downlinked").

download

Meaning: To transfer a file or files from one computer to another, for example, from a server to your desktop computer. Download is the opposite of upload. There are a few methods of downloading on the Internet: HTTP, FTP and e-mail attachments are the most common. When you "load" a Web page into your browser, you are essentially "downloading" the page from the server it is hosted on. One of the most resourceful functions of the Internet is that you can download almost any type of computer file or program. Many of these files are shareware, which means you can try them before you buy them.

downstream

Meaning: Whenever you receive information via a network, it flows downstream. The speed at which you receive (or download) the information is known as the "downstream rate." Whenever you send information over a network, the speed at which you send (or upload) the information is called the "upstream rate."

DP

Meaning: It refers to a domestic partnership; a relationship between two individuals who live together and share a common life.

dpi

Meaning: A metric used to measure print and screen resolution.

DRIB

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: drib)

drill down

Meaning: To investigate something thoroughly and then discuss it in detail. For example, "In order to accurately assess the type of candidate they needed, we had to drill down on the skill set and management experience required for the job." This term also refers to the process of clicking on links within a Web site to find information in the deep Web.

drip irrigation

Meaning: A marketing term that describes the process of slowly obtaining personal information from a customer over time. Asking for a little bit of information at a time can slowly build the relationship with the customer versus being too intrusive upon first meeting.

drip marketing

Meaning: A direct marketing strategy that allows marketers to control the generation of sales leads. It involves sending out several promotional pieces over a period of time, so that the leads arrive at a rate the sales force can accommodate without the leads getting cold.

drive-by VC

Meaning: Slang for a venture capitalist who puts money into a company and then abandons it (as many did after the Nasdaq plunge on April 14, 2000).

drop down menu

Meaning: A list of options that "drops down" when you click on the downward-pointing arrow placed next to the first item on the list of a menu. These are often used in online forms.

drump

Meaning: Slang for a middle-aged, pot-bellied, sexually frustrated, bachelor who has practically given up on dating and has come to accept a life of living alone, focusing only on his (or her) career, the online world, and personal hobbies.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

drunk mouse

Meaning: When the pointer on your computer screen moves around wildly or irregularly, you are said to have a drunk mouse. This commonly happens when there is dirt inside the track ball area of your mouse.

DSig

Meaning: a.k.a. "DSS"

DSS

Meaning: A network of satellites that broadcast digital data. For example, DirecTV broadcasts digital television signals. DSSs are expected to become more important as TVs and computers converge into a single medium for infotainment.

dual-channeller

Meaning: A person who gets all their information by channel-flipping between MTV and CNN.

dub-dub-dub

Meaning: Short for the WWW or the World Wide Web.

due diligence

Meaning: A process undertaken by potential investors -- angels, venture capitalists, or institutions -- to analyze and assess the desirability, value, and potential of an investment opportunity. 

dumb terminal

Meaning: A terminal that doesn’t contain an internal microprocessor. It responds to simple control codes, and usually displays only characters and numerals.

Dutch auction

Meaning: In this type of online auction, a seller offers multiple copies of the same item, and the winning bidders pay the amount of the lowest winning bid. Therefore, if the top three bids on an item are $25, $15, and $10, the three winning bidders pay $10.

DVD

Meaning: a.k.a. "Digital Versatile Disc" "DVD-ROM"

DWDM

Meaning: An optical technology used to increase bandwidth over existing fiber-optic backbones, it works by sending numerous, unrelated light signals down the same fiber, each identified by a unique color or wavelength.

dweeb

Meaning: Considered to be an even lower form of life on the Net than the spod, dweebs are generally found in a similar habitat, though they tend to be more prevalent on talker systems. Upon receiving the desired response to the question, "Are you male or female?" dweebs (unlike spods) will then engage upon a detailed description of themselves and how wonderful they are, apparently hoping to truly impress you with what they consider charm and wit. Nearly all dweebs are male, and very few actually live up to the image they present. Dweebs are often the cause of ill will and may well bring a bad reputation to the chat room or system in question. They tend to be, however, easy to wind up and can be the source of great mirth for the seasoned user.

DWYM

Meaning: Instead of "Know What You Mean," this refers to a bot or tech support person who "Does What You Mean."

DYFM

Meaning: (also seen as DUFM)

dynamic

Meaning: A word for the interactive features of the Internet, implying activity, consistent change, or motion.

dynamic content

Meaning: Information, on a Web site or Web page that changes often, usually daily or each time a user reloads or returns to the page. It is also content that is structured based on user input. For example, when you search with keywords on a search engine, the results you get are on a "dynamic" page, based on the words you typed into a form on the previous page. Dynamic Web sites are usually driven by Web application environments, such as active server pages or CFML, and the content is taken from a database each time a page request is made.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

dynamic node

Meaning: A technique enabling nodes to automatically select a unique network address.

---

E

-- Select A Phrase -- e-anythinge-bombe-booke-carde-collar workerse-commercee-distributione-documente-dresse-learninge-lotteryE-Mail Channel Specialiste-mail forwardinge-mail shreddere-malle-publishinge-pursee-readinge-texte-wasteE2EE3EADDear candyearly adopterearly moverearly stageEARNeaster eggEBPPECMLECNEDGEEDIeditorEDMEEejectrodeelancerelectronelectronicelectronic book readerelectronic exchangeelectronic mall/storefrontelectronic payment systemselectronic publishingeliteEMACSembedembedded hyperlinkEMGencodingencrypted EnglishencryptionEnglishEngrishenterpriseentityenvironmentEPICepisodic gamesEPS or .epsergonomicsERMESPEudoraeurominutesEUV lightEVDOeverneteverywareexceedanceexecsextremophileeye candyeyeblasters

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

e-anything

Meaning: An "e" placed before a word or phrase stands for "electronic." For example, an e-book is an electronic version of a book. Commonly used in the media to describe something that has to do with being online, e- has prefaced nearly everything in the real world that can be made electronic, including: e-campaign, e-life, e-broker, and so forth. For a detailed discussion on when to use the hyphen and when not to use it, see the e-mail definition.

e-bomb

Meaning: Slang for a very powerful computer virus.

e-book

Meaning: (also seen as ebook and eBook)

e-card

Meaning: An electronic version of a greeting card, it is a message sent to your e-mail address, usually by a friend or family member. In most cases, you must visit a Web site in order to see it.

e-collar workers

Meaning: A nickname for people who work in the industry.

e-commerce

Meaning: Simply put, it means conducting business online. Selling goods, in the traditional sense, is possible to do electronically because of certain software programs that run the main functions of an e-commerce Web site, including product display, online ordering, and inventory management. The software resides on a commerce server and works in conjunction with online payment systems to process payments. Since these servers and data lines make up the backbone of the Internet, in a broad sense, e-commerce means doing business over interconnected networks.

e-distribution

Meaning: The delivery of digitized products to the end-user via the Net. This includes books, films, magazines, music, newspapers, photography, software, and more.

e-document

Meaning: A digital document that you can read on a computer screen using widely available free software (such as Adobe Acrobat Reader or Adobe Acrobat eBook Reader).

e-dress

Meaning: A general way of describing one or more of your electronic addresses, such as your e-mail address or your IM address.

e-learning

Meaning: a.k.a. "educommerce"

e-lottery

Meaning: A Web site that gives away money for using the site. It works like this: Each time a surfer goes to an "e-lottery" site to look up sports scores, for example, he or she earns points toward an entry into a sweepstakes giveaway.

E-Mail Channel Specialist

Meaning: Some Web businesses believe plain-old e-mail is the next great channel for new products, services, direct-marketing efforts, and sales. In-house E-mail Channel Specialists oversee outbound e-mail channel operations, from product development and strategic planning to corporate policy issues.

e-mail forwarding

Meaning: The process of redirecting your incoming mail to a different mailbox. For example, if you have a number of e-mail addresses, you can have them forwarded to a single mailbox. This makes it easier to retrieve and manage your messages.

e-mail shredder

Meaning: An option (from Omniva Policy Systems) that lets users specify a "detonation time" of anywhere from 30 minutes to years after an e-mail is sent. The e-mail itself remains after the detonation date, but recipients who try to open it get only gobbledygook. The e-mail remains alive but the recipient must have a unique key to read it after the detonation time.

e-mall

Meaning: A virtual shopping mall on the Web where you can browse and buy products online.

e-publishing

Meaning: To display, present, or post some type of written, auditory, or visual media on the World Wide Web, with the intent of making it available entirely or in part to all users or just certain users. This is "publishing without paper," and most newspapers and magazines now e-publish an electronic version of their publication on the Web. Access to these e-journals or e-zines is usually free if you register, or in some cases, there is a subscription price. A widely held thought is that any time you put up a Web page of your own, even if it is a simple homepage or vanity page, for personal reasons, you are actually publishing electronic content. Online publishing is easier and cheaper than traditional print publishing, and better yet, your content is available to almost anyone in the world for practically free. It took a little time for print publishers to understand the online arena, but now that they do, e-publishing is considered the future of that industry as well. The production, distribution, and sale of books via the Internet as print-on-demand (POD) paperbacks or downloadable files are especially promising.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

e-purse

Meaning: An electronic monetary transaction card being proposed by several government agencies.

e-reading

Meaning: Quite simply, it means reading content on a computer screen, an electronic book reader, or some other electronic device.

e-text

Meaning: Any text document in an electronic format. An e-text may take the form of a short pamphlet, a README file, or a note.

e-waste

Meaning: A general term that describes old computers, dead cell phones, old PDAs, even old television sets, it refers to obsolete technology that is thrown in the trash instead of recycled.

E2E

Meaning: Also known as "soup-to-nuts" it is an acronym for a sector of the industry that specializes in providing end-to-end solutions. E2E solutions extend technology beyond the Web, utilizing Internet, wireless, and broadband technologies and enabling companies to run e-businesses. Usually, E2E companies classify themselves as professional services firms.

E3

Meaning: The most popular event in the gaming industry, it is a convention that takes place once a year in the U.S. and addresses all of the business needs of the interactive entertainment industry.

EADD

Meaning: A widespread condition among entrepreneurial business executives. Many will establish one company, and in a matter of time will get bored and move on to start up a new company.

ear candy

Meaning: Like eye candy for the ears, this refers to musical additives that usually lack substance but are included on a Web site to make it sound more appealing.

early adopter

Meaning: A person who uses a new form of technology from the onset of its development, incorporating it into his or her lifestyle.

early mover

Meaning: A company that strives to gain a first-mover advantage.

early stage

Meaning: A state of a start-up company that typically has completed its seed stage and has a core senior management team, has proven its concept or completed its beta test, has minimal revenues, and no positive earnings or cash flows.

EARN

Meaning: The European equivalent to BITNET.

easter egg

Meaning: A hidden element written into a program or placed on a Web site. Basically, it is a special feature that is not otherwise made obvious, but when "clicked on," it offers something special. This could be in the form of an extra game level or a secret area or an animation or a surprise image of some kind. Programmers often "bury" easter eggs in their programs to add a certain extra depth to the program and to challenge their users to find it.

EBPP

Meaning: An acronym that implies using the Internet to send, receive, and pay bills, this is considered by some people to be the next step in online banking. The convenience factor of an EBPP is often highlighted for the user, but the real winners in this new scenario are the high-volume billers and banks that would save a substantial amount of operating costs by switching from a paper-based system to an electronic system.

ECML

Meaning: A set of standards for Web merchants that allows an e-wallet to fill in automatically the shipping address, billing address, and credit card information on any ECML-compliant Web site. This technology never emerged as the standard in this space, instead, PayPal took over as the dominating technology in online payment processes.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

ECN

Meaning: Alternative computerized trading systems that automatically route, match, and execute orders between buyers and sellers of stocks. Currently, they handle approximately 38 percent to 50 percent of Nasdaq trading.

EDGE

Meaning: Wireless communication technology that uses GSM spectrum, which enables data speeds of up to 384 Kbps. It is the name for the high-speed cell phone network at T-Mobile used to transmit not only voice and data, but also music, video clips and Web sites.

EDI

Meaning: The transfer of data between two or more companies, using networks and the Internet. EDI is an increasingly important and easy mechanism used by companies to buy, sell, and trade information. A standard format for exchanging business data, EDI saves messages as a string of data elements, each of which represents a singular fact (such as price or product model number). The parties who exchange EDI transmissions are called trading partners. ANSI approved a set of EDI standards known as the "X12 standards."

editor

Meaning: A software program used to write and edit HTML code.

EDM

Meaning: A system that manages different kinds of documents, using computer programs and storage. An EDM system allows a company and its users to create a document or capture the hard copy of a file in electronic form. It can then store, edit, print, and process documents in audio, video, or text form. EDM also stands for Engineering Data Management which uses computers and electronic storage media to store data that relates to engineering applications.

EE

Meaning: It refers to e-mail, IM, texting, and other forms of electronic communication.

ejectrode

Meaning: A tool (usually made from a bent paper clip) used for manually ejecting disks from a disk drive.

elancer

Meaning: A freelancer who is computer literate, plugged-in, and available to work for anyone, anywhere in the world. Elancers provide their services over the Net, without ever having to leave their home office.

electron

Meaning: Slang in online marketing circles for a consumer who clicks all over a Web site with no particular logic. The "likes and dislikes" of this kind of user are difficult to pin point.

electronic

Meaning: This refers to electrical devices or machines that "can be plugged in" and make use of actual electrons (such as hardware). It also refers to that which is digital and makes use of binary numbers (such as software).

electronic book reader

Meaning: A lightweight, handheld portable device used for reading e-books, and electronic versions of magazines and newspapers.

electronic exchange

Meaning: An electronic marketplace in which goods and services are traded. These exchanges are global in nature, operate 24/7, and connect large communities of buyers and sellers, primarily within the B2B sector. Electronic exchanges range from auctions of all types to VPNs. For example, the Automotive Network Exchange (ANX) is expected to link the entire North American auto supply chain. While "B2B" and "Web marketplace" broadly refer to any transaction between businesses over the Internet, usually one-to-many, "electronic exchange" is a more precise term, connoting many-to-many transactions. An electronic communications network (such as an electronic stock and bond exchange) is also considered a Web marketplace. The actual point where the buyers and sellers come together is known as "the vortex" or "the butterfly hub."

electronic mall/storefront

Meaning: A virtual shopping mall where you can browse and buy products and services online.

electronic payment systems

Meaning: A comprehensive term for a wide range of systems that electronically manage payment and receipt of payment over the Net. Commonly used electronic payment systems include SET, SSL, PKI, and encryption.

electronic publishing

Meaning: The displaying, presenting or "posting" of some type of written, auditory, or visual media onto the World Wide Web. To be viewed either entirely or in parts by all users or just certain users.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

elite

Meaning: Contrary to what one would think, in the computer world, this term refers to the seedy side of hacking. For example, an "elite BBS" features pirated software, lists of stolen credit card numbers, phreak files, utilities for cracking passwords, and so on.

EMACS

Meaning: The ne plus ultra of hacker editors, it is a programmable text editor with an entire LISP system inside it. Originally written by Richard Stallman at the MIT AI Lab, it is described as "an advanced, self-documenting, customizable, extensible, real-time display editor." It has been reimplemented any number of times, by various hackers, and versions exist for major operating systems. Perhaps the most widely used version, also written by Stallman, is called GNU EMACS (or GNUMACS), which runs principally under Unix. It includes facilities to run compilation subprocesses and to send and receive mail. Many hackers spend up to 80 percent of their "tube time" inside it. However, some hackers find EMACS too heavyweight and baroque for their taste, and they expand the name as "Escape Meta Alt Control Shift" to spoof its heavy reliance on keystrokes decorated with "bucky bits." Other spoof expansions include "Eight Megabytes And Constantly Swapping" and "EMACS Makes A Computer Slow."

embed

Meaning: This term refers to using computer code to place something, such as a video or song, on a Web site or blog. When something is "embedded" on a Web page, the user can watch the video or listen to the song without leaving the page.

embedded hyperlink

Meaning: The name for a hyperlink incorporated into a line of text.

EMG

Meaning: Acronym for Empty Magnanimous Gesture. As in, "We think your idea is great and would love to fund it, but [insert excuse here]."

encoding

Meaning: The process of rewriting and/or transferring media sources from one format to another. For example, you can encode a VHS tape into a RealVideo file.

encrypted English

Meaning: Slang for international correspondence from someone whose command of English is well intentioned, but tenuous at best. For example, "We will most please thank you for investigating our problem in your computer."

encryption

Meaning: The process of protecting information as it moves from one computer to another. Passing through a complex mathematical process (an encryption algorithm), the information is encoded before it is sent and decoded with a secret key when it is received. Without this key, the information is undecipherable. Computers use a binary number, usually 40- to 128-bits in length, as the key. The larger the key, the more difficult it is to break the encryption and decipher the message in transit.

English

Meaning: The primary language used on the Net. As of the year 2000, English language Web sites accounted for about 96 percent of all e-commerce Web sites, and 50 percent of all Internet users were native English speakers. As of 2007, one in every five humans speaks English with a reasonable degree of competency, making English the first language in history to be spoken by more people as a second language than as a first.

Engrish

Meaning: The term "Engrish" refers to the humorous English mistakes that appear in Japanese advertising and product design. While Engrish can be found all over the world, the vast majority of really funny and creative Engrish comes from Japan.

enterprise

Meaning: Another name for a business. On the Web, it refers to any large company or organization that utilizes computers. For example, an intranet can be called an "enterprise computing system."

entity

Meaning: Used in the business world, "entity" is used when discussing a thing of significance, either real or conceptual. Sample entities include, employees, departments, cars, etc. "We are outsourcing that work to be completed with another entity."

environment

Meaning: A general computing term for the hardware and operating system used for application programs. For example, you may use a "Macintosh environment."

EPIC

Meaning: Founded by Marc Rotenburg, David Sobel, and David Banisar in 1994, EPIC is a public advocacy group and research center in Washington, D.C. It draws public attention to the civil liberties issues emerging online, in order to protect our privacy and to ensure that our First Amendment rights are upheld, even in cyberspace.

episodic games

Meaning: A form of digital entertainment in which each level of a game concludes with a cliffhanger, to keep gamers "tuning in" (or coming back) for the next installment. Gaming companies let players download the first episode for free and then charge around $5 or $10 for subsequent downloads.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

EPS or .eps

Meaning: A type of graphics file written in the PostScript language. It stands for "Encapsulated PostScript." It is a file format generally used for desktop and offset printing. EPS is based on vector points and line segments (and gradient fills of color), as opposed to raster, individual pixels of color.

ergonomics

Meaning: The study and implementation of ways to make work spaces and electronic devices more physically comfortable for humans to use. For example, the shape of a keyboard or the distance of a computer monitor can help reduce RSI and blurred vision.

ERM

Meaning: A form of CRM, it is a tactic that uses e-mail to establish a bond between consumer and company.

ESP

Meaning: A vendor that creates and sends out email marketing campaigns or newsletters for a company.

Eudora

Meaning: A popular e-mail application on the Internet, it is developed and distributed by Qualcomm Inc. The Eudora e-mail application is available for Windows and Macintosh.

eurominutes

Meaning: Scenes in syndicated TV shows that are included in foreign versions but cut from US episodes to increase the time available for commercials. "The scene where Rachel gets to Paris is only in the eurominutes."

EUV light

Meaning: A method of using shorter wavelengths of light to create smaller circuits. Current technology uses light waves about 240 nanometers long (so-called deep ultraviolet light) to create circuits about 100 nanometers wide (a nanometer is one-billionth of a meter). If scientists succeeded with EUV light, circuits could shrink in width to 10 nanometers, which in turn could make microprocessors 100 times more powerful.

EVDO

Meaning: The name for the high-speed cell phone network at Verizon and Sprint used to transmit not only voice and data, but also music, video clips and Web sites.

evernet

Meaning: The name given to the always-on, high-speed, broadband, ubiquitous, multiformat Web, coined by author Thomas Friedman.

everyware

Meaning: Technically ubiquitous computing refers to a post-desktop model of human-computer interaction in which information processing has been thoroughly integrated into everyday objects and activities. As opposed to the desktop model, in which a single user consciously engages a single device for a specialized purpose, someone using "everyware" engages many computational devices and systems simultaneously, in the course of ordinary activities, and may not necessarily even be aware that they are doing so.

exceedance

Meaning: A term that typically is used to describe an occasion when air pollution is high. Basically, it is the amount by which something exceeds a standard or permissible measurement. "It exceeds standards."

execs

Meaning: Slang for executives.

extremophile

Meaning: Slang for an organism that can live in conditions of heat, radiation, or toxicity normally considered inhospitable to life.

eye candy

Meaning: Slang for extra graphics (or images) included on a Web page with the intent of making it look better. It turns out, however, that too much eye candy on a Web site usually makes it look worse. As in, "that site has way too much eye candy going on." The auditory equivalent is "ear candy."

eyeblasters

Meaning: An online ad that is sound-enabled and free-moving. These Flash movies over HTML are ads that usually have nothing to do with what the user is typically looking for; some people find them to be bothersome. Many believe that any click-throughs that derive from these ads are purely out of user confusion.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

F

-- Select A Phrase -- Facebookfacebookingfact-based managementfarm outFastCGIfat binaryfatwarefaviconfavoriteFBOCDFCFCSfeatureferroelectronicsFetchFFAfiber-optic cablefilefile compressionFIPAfirefightersFirefoxFireWirefirmwarefirst eyesfirst moverfirst-generationfirst-mover advantagefirst-purchase momentumfirst-to-marketFISHfiskfive-and-dimefix it in postfixed wirelessflameflame baitflame warflash crowdflash crowdsflash memoryflat fileflavorfliesfloaterfloodgatersfloppy diskFLUIDflutteringflypaper meetingFOAFfollow-upfoo/foobarforced coolnessforelashforklift upgradeformform artformatfortune cookieforumforward slashfractalframframesfreeFree Lizard Projectfreenetfreewarefrendorfreshness factorFriday night pizza makerfront endfrontdoorFrontPageFTPfudge factorFUIfulfillmentfull user mobilityfull-on honkey handshakefull-text searchfunctionalityfunemploymentfurvertsfusionfuzzy objectsFYIFV

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

Facebook

Meaning: Facebook is a website (referred to as a "social utility") that connects people with friends and others who work, study, and live around them. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, share links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet. It is considered a social networking site because people it contains profiles, semi-persistent public commentary on the profile, and a traversable publicly articulated social network displayed in relation to the profile (which basically means you can view information about a person, make comments to them, and see who their friends are).

facebooking

Meaning: Based on a popular social networking site, the term "facebooking" has emerged as a verb to describe the activity of logging in to Facebook in order to create a profile, share personal information, and meet other members.

fact-based management

Meaning: More or less a self-explanatory concept implemented by businesses for improving profits. This tactic begins with evaluating and assessing a given business process, then using the discovered "facts" to restructure the process to maximize profits.

farm out

Meaning: To give work to a third-party entity, such as an independent contractor or a freelance agent. This is also known as outsourcing. Companies farm out work when they believe a person or organization has better expertise and can complete a project quicker (or more efficiently) than in-house resources.

FastCGI

Meaning: An open extension to CGI that reuses processes to handle multiple requests and to achieve higher performance.

fat binary

Meaning: When you see a download or program labeled "fat binary," it means that the program is a little larger than a regular application.

fatware

Meaning: Another name for bloatware.

favicon

Meaning: The name for a small icon used in Internet Explorer (version 5 and higher) to identify a favorite or a bookmark.

favorite

Meaning: Another name for a bookmark.

FBOCD

Meaning: A modern condition that exists when a person has an uncontrollable urge to correct the spelling of last names on tags in Facebook. Also evidenced by the overwhelming need to finish tagging every single photo in another person’s folder.

FC

Meaning: Refers to the magazine, "Fast Company". However, this can also correspond to those who work in e-corporations with their faces to their computers screens and their backs foolishly to the door. Some may take this to signify that these people tend to get F*C*ed.

FCS

Meaning: Similar to the framed dollar bill you see behind a retail counter. Some investors believe a company becomes "real" when it ships a product for the first time.

feature

Meaning: A component of a software program that makes it unique and that enables you to do something with that program (for example, a spell checker). The slang translation is a bug or discrepancy, inadvertently made by a programmer, that the marketing department somehow made useful.

ferroelectronics

Meaning: A component of a software program that makes it unique and that enables you to do something with that program (for example, a spell checker). The slang translation is a bug or discrepancy, inadvertently made by a programmer, that the marketing department somehow made useful.

Fetch

Meaning: A Macintosh program that uses FTP (File Transfer Protocol) to transfer files from your computer onto a server, and vice versa. It was created at Dartmouth College by Jim Matthews, who later founded Fetch Softworks to license the name and source code, so the product could be enhanced and marketed independently. (He was able to do this because he won money on the TV show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire.)

FFA

Meaning: An acronym. It refers to a free-for-all links list where there are zero qualifications required for adding a link.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

fiber-optic cable

Meaning: A cable that acts as a medium to transmit data at high speeds. Using fiber-optics, the cable guides the light of the transmitting lasers without significant loss of information, and it helps enable high-speed networking (for example, at speeds of 100 Mbps).

file

Meaning: A collection of data or information that is stored on a computer. There are many different types of files. For example, program files store programs, and text files store text.

file compression

Meaning: An essential tool for computer users. It is a method of making data smaller so that more of it can be transmitted in less time. Compression takes place via one of several compression standards, including JPG, MPEG, GIF, TIF, and ZIP. Files that contain more sophisticated data, such as audio, video, JAVA, VRML, Shockwave, and other multimedia, are usually compressed quite thoroughly before being made accessible over the Internet. Many shareware or freeware programs found on the Internet come compressed in one of many different formats, such as .ZIP, .HQX, .BIN, or in a self-extracting .EXE format. Programs such as StuffIt and WinZip are available to make the decompression of a compressed file easy and fast. Data compression is an important concern for netcentric businesses: Exponential growth in the volume of data that companies (and individuals) must manage, the increased need for conserving local and network storage space, and the increased need to conserve system bandwidth continue to "drive demand" (or create a need) for data compression tools.

FIPA

Meaning: A nonprofit organization established in 1996, in Geneva, Switzerland.

firefighters

Meaning: Net users who try to put out flame wars early in their gestation.

Firefox

Meaning: Firefox is an open source browser organized by the folks at Mozilla that empowers users to browse faster, more safely and more efficiently than other browsers.

FireWire

Meaning: a.k.a. "IEEE-1394"

firmware

Meaning: System software written onto read-only memory (ROM), it is a combination of software and hardware. ROMs, PROMs, and EPROMs are considered firmware if they have data or programs recorded on them.

first eyes

Meaning: Advertisers constantly battle for their online ad to get the most views so that they can sell their product. The first page that a Web user lands on after signing in gets "first eyes". This term is used by many ISPs and portals, as it refers to the first opportunity at selling and influencing a user.

first mover

Meaning: A business term that refers to the company that gains a powerful competitive edge by being the first company to establish itself in a particular industry segment. Allegedly, this gives them a "first-mover advantage" and the opportunity to dominate the market amongst the competition.

first-generation

Meaning: An adjective for the first version of a technology or the first group of people to implement a craft. Much of the commercial Internet technology was built on first-generation applications that first-generation programmers coded.

first-mover advantage

Meaning: A so-called truism of business, it refers to gaining a powerful competitive edge by being the first company to establish itself in a market (or by being an early successful player). In other words, a company attempts to become the most popular brand name within an industry segment due to the fact that it was the first to get its brand name known as the brand to buy within a particular niche. Referred to by some execs as a "sprint-and-spend strategy," it requires a large amount of marketing dollars to launch a new brand. Quite simply, it means getting a head start on everyone else in your industry.

first-purchase momentum

Meaning: The number of required clicks it takes a user to purchase an item, divided by the number of actual clicks the user makes to reach the first purchase. By counting the actual number of clicks-to-purchase and comparing it to the minimum requirement to buy something, businesses can gain valuable information about the clarity of the content and navigation on their Web site.

first-to-market

Meaning: When a company thinks they have a hot new idea or product, it will try to operate at hyperspeed in order to seize first-mover advantage and gain market share. First-to-market means being the first not necessarily to launch a new product, but to gain consumer confidence and hence market share. (Netscape is a prime example: Technically Mosaic was the first browser, but Netscape was first-to-market.)

FISH

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: fish)

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

fisk

Meaning: Most often used as a verb "to fisk," this word was coined by British journalist Robert Fisk who is a frequent target of fisking. It is a popular term in the blogosphere that describes the act of drawing attention to errors in a point-by-point basis, in a very critical manner.

five-and-dime

Meaning: Slang for the area code "510," which covers the east bay (including Oakland and Berkeley, in northern California). This term is common among telco workers.

fix it in post

Meaning: Used in video production to mean: "We (or somebody else) will deal with this in post-production." Sometimes used as an excuse to get out of a sticky situation, postponing the agony of confronting a serious problem.

fixed wireless

Meaning: A network service in which wireless devices or systems are situated in fixed, stationary locations (such as an office or home) and data is transmitted via large antennas (as opposed to wireless mobile devices, such as cell phones or PDAs). Fixed wireless devices normally derive their electrical power from utility mains, as opposed to portable wireless devices, which derive their power from batteries. The biggest advantages of fixed wireless networks include the fastest data throughput (up to T1 speed) and the ability to connect users in remote areas without laying new cable (because the technology uses satellites).

flame

Meaning: To send nasty or insulting messages via e-mail or to post them on a newsgroup or a blog. This is usually done in response to someone having broken the rules of netiquette. A "flamer" is someone who sends these message, sometimes resulting in a flame war.

flame bait

Meaning: An intentionally inflammatory posting in a newsgroup or discussion group, designed to elicit a strong reaction and to create a flame war.

flame war

Meaning: When an online discussion degenerates into a series of personal attacks against the debaters, rather than a discussion of their opinions and positions. A heated exchange.

flash crowd

Meaning: A phrase that describes intense periods of heavy use on a network system. This term was coined by sci-fi writer Larry Niven in The Flight of the Horse.

flash crowds

Meaning: Swarms of users on a computer network that appear, then disappear, in a flash. The term originates from a short story of the same name by Larry Niven. In the story, riots break out when thousands of people pour out of teleportation booths to see major social events.

flash memory

Meaning: A kind of storage for computers, camera memory cards, and other devices that does not include a traditional hard drive. Because there are no moving parts, flash storage is seen as more durable than traditional hard drives. IPods, other MP3 players and key chain USB "thumb drives" all use flash memory and more laptops are being made with flash memory as storage.

flat file

Meaning: A single-dimension file containing encoded ASCII characters. Flat files can be processed with text editors and are portable between different operating systems , application programs, and e-mail.

flavor

Meaning: A distinctive quality of a hardware or software, it generally means version with regard to the feature set. For example, if you hear "This software comes in two flavors" that could refer to the full flavor version (which has all of the features) versus the lite flavor (which has a limited number of features).

flies

Meaning: The people who are reeled in and trapped in the Web by clever marketing strategies that offer the user free points, coupons and credit toward merchandise. These "flies" spend hours fixed in to their computers viewing these online ads so that they can accumulate these free rewards.

floater

Meaning: An online ad format that is transparent and appears over a Web page.

floodgaters

Meaning: Individuals who send inquiring e-mail messages and, after receiving only a slightly favorable response, begin flooding you with multiple messages of little or no interest.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

floppy disk

Meaning: A data storage medium that is widely used to . . . store data :-) It is a magnetically coated, flexible disk of Mylar, enclosed in a plastic envelope or case. At one time, floppies were the only medium of data storage for PCs, but the need to store larger amounts of data led to the development of cheap hard disks, CD-ROMs, and Zip Disks, which have become more popular than the little, old floppy.

FLUID

Meaning: (pronouced as a new word: fluid)

fluttering

Meaning: The act of comparing product features of several companies on the net simultaneously, resulting in confusion, anxiety and product indecision .

flypaper meeting

Meaning: Office slang for a spontaneous gathering that takes place after two people begin talking in the hallway or an office cubicle, then draw a passersby into their conversation.

FOAF

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: fohf)

follow-up

Meaning: A reply to a newsgroup posting.

foo/foobar

Meaning: A sort of algebraic placeholder for discussing the structure of something online. For example, "If you want to know when another site is run by a for-profit company, look for an address in the form of ."

forced coolness

Meaning: An artificial image that a company tries to convey in an attempt to appeal to the younger generation when in fact, the company is not really cool at all. For example, "The interview was fine, but there is definitely an element of forced coolness over there."

forelash

Meaning: Negative or indifferent reactions to nonexistent, but already overhyped technologies. Examples would include video-on-demand, 500 channels, interactive TV, and anything promised in the AT&T "You Will" ads.

forklift upgrade

Meaning: Slang for a massive overhaul of a computer system or network, requiring a major investment in hardware.

form

Meaning: A Web page that accepts user input. With an online form, you can usually input comments, order products, sign up for newsletters, or search for information. At the bottom of a form, you will usually see submit and reset buttons; these allow users to either "send in" the information or clear out the form and start over. For a more technical discussion of how it works, see the CGI definition.

form art

Meaning: A genre that uses only HTML-coded form elements to create Web-based art.

format

Meaning: The organization of information for display, storage, or printing. This term is commonly used in the industry when asking another person about the state in which particular information exists. For example, "What format is it in, PDF or CD-ROM?"

fortune cookie

Meaning: An inane, witty, or profound comment that can be found around the net. When you come across a unique piece of insight, you can say, "What a fortune cookie."

forum

Meaning: An online community where users read and post topics of common interest. BTW: the plural of "forum" is "fora."

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

forward slash

Meaning: The forward slash is the name of the "/" character on the computer keyboard. On a QWERTY keyboard, it is commonly located below the "?" mark on the same key. Forward slashes are used to describe a network address, a URL, and other kinds of Internet addresses. For example, when relaying the URL of NetLingo, you will hear "http colon slash slash dub-dub-dub dot netlingo dot com" which translates to "http://www.netlingo.com".

fractal

Meaning: A word coined in 1975 by Benoit B. Mandlebrot, from the Latin fractus (for "to break"). It is, in the words of one fractal creator, "a shape with the property of self-similarity." A small section of a fractal has the same shape as a larger section, and this similarity appears across a wide range of scales.

fram

Meaning: Slang for spam sent to you by your friends or family.

frames

Meaning: A method of coding a Web page to divide the layout into two or more independent parts. Technically, it is the simultaneous loading of two or more Web pages within the same browser screen. For certain kinds of content frames are an excellent way to organize information on a Web site. Originally developed by Netscape and implemented in the Navigator 2.0 browser, it is now a popular feature supported by most browsers.

free

Meaning: Something that is available for no charge, without monetary cost. There is a lot of free stuff on the Web.

Free Lizard Project

Meaning: A Web site dedicated to the free release of Netscape/Mozilla source code.

freenet

Meaning: A community-based BBS, usually in a public library (which is now a place where you can access the Internet).

freeware

Meaning: Free software available on the Internet for downloading. It is used and redistributed at no cost to the user. Shareware, on the other hand, requires that you pay a registration fee after a certain amount of time.

frendor

Meaning: Slang for a preferred vendor.

freshness factor

Meaning: An online business measurement that takes the average content refresh rate (how many times your Web site is updated) and divides it by the average visit frequency rate (how often people come to your site). A freshness factor of less than 1 means that users are seeing stale content, since they visit more often than you change your content. A freshness factor greater than 1.5 means your content changes more often than users come to see it, and that equals wasted resources.

Friday night pizza maker

Meaning: A term coming from Japan that refers to a salary man who leaves a puddle of vomit on the subway platform.

front end

Meaning: The portion of a program that interacts directly with the user. A front end can also be a separate program that acts as a user-friendly interface for a more difficult environment. For example, HTML is considered a front end for the Internet. Similarly, a LAN can distribute a front end to workstations so users can interact with a back end application on the file server.

frontdoor

Meaning: The standard user interface for logging in to an application or computer system.

FrontPage

Meaning: A software program developed by Microsoft for Web site creation and management. It gives you everything you need to create and manage a Web site.

FTP

Meaning: The standard method for downloading and uploading files over the Internet. With FTP, you can login to a server and transfer files (meaning you can "send" or "receive" files). Some sites have public file archives that you can access by using FTP with the account name "anonymous" and your e-mail address as the password. This type of access is called anonymous FTP. Macintosh owners use a program called Fetch; one of the best FTP programs for Windows is called WS-FTP. Knowing FTP is necessary (and easy) if you want to create your own Web site.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

fudge factor

Meaning: Slang for a margin of error.

FUI

Meaning: GIF advertisements that have phony interface elements (search boxes, pulldown menus, input fields, et cetera) to trick you into clicking on them. Not to be confused with TFUI (Touch and Feel User Interface), a gimmick used by a porn CD-ROM publisher.

fulfillment

Meaning: The process of completing transactions, including sales orders, requests for information, redemption of coupons, premiums, giveaways, rebates, or refunds. Fulfillment relates to warehousing, returns processing, database management, inventory, and quality control. A new generation of business providers specializes in "e-fulfillment," which is basically fulfillment for e-commerce entities. Other business providers now offer turnkey fulfillment.

full user mobility

Meaning: A wireless term for the ability of a user to access data while mobile.

full-on honkey handshake

Meaning: Used to describe a standard handshake protocol that allows peripherals to connect "without a lot of street jive" (no complicated configuring).

full-text search

Meaning: Different than searching online, a "full-text search" refers to a search that is performed within a Word document or on your local computer. Instead of searching by keyword, as with many online search engines, a FTS compares its results word for word.

functionality

Meaning: The way something works or operates, or online, what purpose it serves.

funemployment

Meaning: The modern version of the pink slip parties during the tech bust beginning in 1999, it refers to the 2009 recession in which thousands of white-collar workers may be out of work, but still manage to make it to the gym. In this line of thinking, losing a job is like pulling up the anchor that once moored you to a mortgage, a daily routine and a career, setting you free to pursue your wildest fantasies. Blogging is become a popular sideline for the newly sacked.

furverts

Meaning: The denizens of FurryMUCK and alt.fan.furry, or other people who enjoy emulating anthropomorphs (humanoid animals). Not to be confused with the people who post on alt.sex.bestiality.

fusion

Meaning: To collaborate in order to get a project done more efficiently. For example, "She told me that they pulled fusion to get stage two implemented and that the designers and programmers worked pretty well together."

fuzzy objects

Meaning: Fuzzy logic combined with object-oriented programming. Conventional software objects have their own functional methodology incorporated within them, but it is usually based on "fixed" logic. So, although objects can be adjusted as the functionality requirements are revised, they are usually not flexible enough to accommodate a range of calculations. By incorporating fuzzy logic, "fuzzy objects" are much more flexible and can accommodate both approximations and extensions.

FYIFV

Meaning: Used in the golden days of Silicon Valley start-ups circa 1997, it implies that a person will retain his or her stock holdings, with no penalties, even after leaving the company.

---

G

-- Select A Phrase -- G or GBg-wordgadget fatiguegamergaminggaming networkgang FAQgastrobotgatewayGbpsgearheadgeekgeek-gasmgeeksploitationgenerationgeneration eGEniegenius killergiggiga-gigabitgigabytegingerbread houseGiuliani-esqueglitchglobalizationglocalizationglocalizeGMPCSGNOMEGNUgobbledygookgoing Cyrillicgoing forwardgoing postalgold-collar workersGolden RolodexGoogleGoogle bombingGoogle hackingGoogle narcissistGooglegangergopherheadgopherspaceGore, AlGPRSGPSgrabber handgrand challengegranular or granularitygraphic or graphicsgrass-roots campaigngray mattergreen adultsgreen teensgreenwashgremlinsgroupwaregrowing the businessGSMguardianguerrilla marketingguestbookgumintgutenberggutter tribes

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

G or GB

Meaning: Abbreviation for gigabyte.

g-word

Meaning: Slang for the "goto command," which is practically taboo among programmers.

gadget fatigue

Meaning: The result of having to deal with too many gadgets.

gamer

Meaning: A person who plays any one of many electronic games, including video games, PC games, online games, handheld games, wireless games, and interactive TV games. The term "gamer" is usually reserved for enthusiasts who are considered to be experts in the realm of playing interactive online games.

gaming

Meaning: It means "playing a game." Gaming also refers to the gaming industry as a whole, which was built upon video and computer games. Some games are available on CD-ROM, while others are available directly online and can be played by more than one user, simultaneously. The software is usually based on traditional game categories, such as adventure, role-playing, or strategy.

gaming network

Meaning: A network of PCs linked together through a gaming server, it allows users to play together simultaneously from practically anywhere in the world.

gang FAQ

Meaning: When a group e-mails a FAQ to an individual who has asked a particularly stupid or old question on a newsgroup. Differs from a mail bomb in that each person sends only one copy, but numerous members of the newsgroup participate.

gastrobot

Meaning: A name for a robot that eats and digests sugar to generate its own power, or a robotic lawn mower that eats the grass and clippings for power... kewl!

gateway

Meaning: A system for exchanging information across networks that are incompatible and use different protocols. Basically, a gateway is a combination of hardware and software that connects two different types of networks so that information can be exchanged. The hardware devices (called "bridges") and the computer programs perform the necessary translations.

Gbps

Meaning: A measure of bandwidth (the total information flow over a given time) on a telecommunications medium. Bandwidth is also measured in the Kbps range (kilobits or thousands of bits per second) or the Mbps range (megabits or millions of bits per second), depending on the medium and transmission method.

gearhead

Meaning: Another name for a nerd or geek, this term describes a person who is interested in owning the latest gadgets or gizmos.

geek

Meaning: A popular term used to describe a person who knows a lot about computers and/or the Internet. In the past, it was considered somewhat derogatory to call someone "a geek," but now that the Internet has made computer usage mainstream, even computer savvy grrls affectionately call themselves "geeks."

geek-gasm

Meaning: A term that describes the satisfaction a geek gets when a machine or computer is behaving and running normally.

geeksploitation

Meaning: A term in the Internet industry used to describe the "taking advantage of 20-something digital workers who are flushed with pioneer enthusiasm and willing to work long hours" if rewarded by certain freedoms on the job (as in no dress code, flextime, an onsite cappucino machine or pool table, etc.)

generation

Meaning: In the computing world, it describes the age of a hacker.

generation e

Meaning: Similar in tone to generation x and generation y, this marketing term refers to people of all ages who are fully wired, know how to surf, and are ready to buy online.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

GEnie

Meaning: An extinct online service run by General Electric. If you have an account of GEnie and your mail name (not your username) is "tonynelson", your Internet address is tonynelson@genie.geis.com.

genius killer

Meaning: Slang for a dot-com exec who suppresses technological innovation within his or her own company out of concern that it will detract cash flow from the flagship product.

gig

Meaning: Short for gigabyte.

giga-

Meaning: Prefix to denote one billion, as in gigabyte.

gigabit

Meaning: A unit of measurement describing data transfer rates that move approximately 1 billion bits. When used as a unit of measurement describing data storage, it is equal to 1,024 megabits.

gigabyte

Meaning: A unit of measurement approximately equal to 1 billion bytes. A gigabyte is used to quantify memory or disk capacity. One gigabyte equals 1,000MB (actually 1,024 megabytes).

gingerbread house

Meaning: Slang for a company that hires NCGs, places them in high-pressure positions, but pays only minimal compensation. This commonly happens in small companies with a long history of no growth, engineering design firms, and commercial art firms. Instead of cash bonuses or equity, a gingerbread house will hand out token gifts (such as tickets or T-shirts).

Giuliani-esque

Meaning: Grace and strength under pressure. A term coined by CBS anchor Dan Rather after watching the extraordinary performance of New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

glitch

Meaning: An unexpected disturbance in the flow of electricity to a PC, network, or server, most commonly due to a power surge or a dirty connection. It can sometimes cause a computer to crash.

globalization

Meaning: The international efforts of a company to attain worldwide market share. Yahoo! is one of the first global brands of the Internet era.

glocalization

Meaning: A strategy of global management for creating a marketing and technology template that can easily be implemented around the world. At the same time, the strategy must democratize the decision-making process. For example, offices in the local markets of a worldwide company could adapt a model given to them by headquarters but could also share their best ideas across the company as a whole.

glocalize

Meaning: A term coined by author Thomas Friedman, it refers to the positive side of globalization. It means the ability of a culture or country to absorb enriching influences of other cultures without being overwhelmed.

GMPCS

Meaning: A mobile satellite system that provides global wireless phone service.

GNOME

Meaning: A project intended to create a user-friendly desktop based entirely on free and open source software. GNOME includes several utilities and applications for text editing and file management. GNOME is often used in Linux and can also run on other Unix variants, such as FreeBSD, IRIX, and Solaris.

GNU

Meaning: A project of the Free Software Foundation to write a free version of the Unix operating system. The acronym was coined by Richard Stallman of MIT.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

gobbledygook

Meaning: A string of incoherent letters and symbols. You may see a bunch of gobbledygook on your computer screen when a program is trying to read data from a program it does not support, or when a message is encrypted.

going Cyrillic

Meaning: Slang for when a graphical display (LED panel, bit-mapped text and graphics) starts to display garbage, as in "The thing just went Cyrillic on me."

going forward

Meaning: A favorite phrase among industry execs, it is used to put bad news in the past and good news in the future. For example, "Downsizing was a necessary evil at this point. Going forward, we intend to emphasize our core competencies and take advantage of changing market conditions."

going postal

Meaning: A modern euphemism for being totally stressed out and "losing it." This expression makes reference to the unfortunate number of U.S. postal employees who have committed mass shooting rampages.

gold-collar workers

Meaning: A play on the terms "blue-collar worker" and "white-collar worker" this is a designation for employees who survive a downsizing. Analysts say mass layoffs, where companies dismiss more than 50 workers, are not about weeding out the bad employees, but about keeping the ones who can handle extra workloads. Any employee who can easily pick up the slack in a downsized organization greatly improves his or her chances of being retained during a reorganization. They say any employee can become a "gold-collar worker" by taking advantage of training and continuing education opportunities. While human resource professionals are looking through the pool of readily available candidates with pink slips in hand, they are also courting the overburdened multitaskers who remain.

Golden Rolodex

Meaning: The small handful of experts who are always quoted in news stories and asked to be guests on discussion shows. Example: Henry Kissinger appears to be in the "Golden Rolodex" under foreign policy.

Google

Meaning: Founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two Stanford Ph.D. candidates who developed a technologically advanced method for finding information on the Internet, its most famous product is a hybrid search engine that ranks the popularity of results that match your keyword search. It has an index of billions of Web pages. Google focuses primarily on delivering the best search experience on the Web, by providing a search site and by licensing its search technology to commercial sites. Ultimately, Web sites are now allowed to freely using Google technology on their own sites, such as Google Local and Google Maps.

Google bombing

Meaning: Influencing traffic so it spikes a particular site to get a better rating on Google.

Google hacking

Meaning: As part of a university project simulating an identity theft ring, elite teams of hackers (good guys) harvested millions of names, birth dates and social security numbers in less than an hour using Google. It turns out that the powerful search engine can ferret out all kids of sensitive information never meant to be made public.

Google narcissist

Meaning: Another name for ego-surfing on Google.

Googleganger

Meaning: Similar to a digital doppleganger, it is another individual with the same name as you whose records and/or stories are mixed in with your own when you Google yourself. For example, "Hey, I just Googled my name and found that I have three googlegangers!"

gopherhead

Meaning: Slang for one who is obsessed with Gopher sites.

gopherspace

Meaning: The large, computer-based "space" on the Internet that is created by the global dissemination of Gopher-accessible resources. Veronica allows you to search gopherspace for resources that match your keywords.

Gore, Al

Meaning: Al Gore, on January 14, 1994, became the first U.S. vice president to hold a live interactive news conference on an international computer network. He gave a speech at UCLA in which he talked about the "information superhighway" as a way to describe future computers communicating over a worldwide network.

GPRS

Meaning: A service that allows non-voice data to be sent and received across GSM and TDMA communications networks. GPRS can send larger messages than SMS, and it enables cell phones to achieve transfer rates of 100 Kbps. Mobile phone users are provided with a continuous connection to the Internet, and they are only billed for the amount of data transferred. GPRS is a step toward third-generation (3G) mobile phone services.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

GPS

Meaning: A series of twenty-four geosynchronous earth-orbiting satellites. The satellites continually transmit signals that help people determine their actual, geographic (3-D) position. This satellite-based navigation technology works 24/7, in all kinds of weather, anywhere in the world, and is accurate within 30 meters.

grabber hand

Meaning: The hand icon that replaces the mouse cursor when you move selected text or graphics from one place to another. Seen in many software programs, including PDF and Photoshop.

grand challenge

Meaning: A sarcastic phrase referring to a great, unsolved problem of such amazing complexity that no one individual could hope to figure it out alone.

granular or granularity

Meaning: In business terms, this describes the fine details, after you drill down to get to the nitty gritty.

graphic or graphics

Meaning: A picture or still image generated on a computer. There are two basic types of computer-generated graphics: object-oriented graphics (vector graphics) and bitmapped graphics (raster graphics). "Graphics" may be short for "graphic arts," including the creation, modification, and printing of visual works.

grass-roots campaign

Meaning: Cyber "grass-roots campaign" assisted by fiber optics and computer networking.

gray matter

Meaning: Older, experienced business people hired by young entrepreneurial firms looking to appear more reputable and established.

green adults

Meaning: A term coined by Jupiter Research that describes online adults (age 18 and over) who are very concerned about the environment. Surveys show that 49% of online adults are concerned about the environment and 21% are "hard core" meaning they are serious about "green living" and are familiar with the terms carbon footprint and cleantech.

green teens

Meaning: A term coined by Jupiter Research that describes online teens (age 13 to 17) who are very concerned about the environment. Surveys show that 38% of online teens are concerned about the environment and 15% are "hard core" meaning they are serious about "green living" and are familiar with the terms carbon footprint and cleantech.

greenwash

Meaning: A play on the term "whitewash," it lampoons the way companies play up the environmental benefits of a product (or policy), in order to deflect attention from other, less savory aspects.

gremlins

Meaning: The mysterious characters that sometimes appear on your computer screen, often in text documents and sometimes in code or e-mail messages.

groupware

Meaning: Software that allows people to share documents and work collaboratively.

growing the business

Meaning: Originally used in the farming business to mean the addition of fertilizer, then water to make your crops grow. This term now is being used in the business world, meaning to increase your revenue and expand your operations to make your business grow.

GSM

Meaning: The dominant set of standards used in Europe and parts of Asia for wireless communications. The audio-encoding subset of the GSM standard is best known to computer users because its data compression and decompression techniques are also used for Web-phone communication and for encoding WAV and AIF files. GSM is based on TDMA and can carry eight simultaneous calls on the same frequency. It is a 2G technology used by AT&T Wireless, Cingular, and VoiceStream.

guardian

Meaning: An authentication and authorization scheme developed by InterNIC to help protect domain name records, contact records, and host records from unauthorized updates. Guardian is available free of charge and helps support secure registration transactions in an automated environment. It also provides flexible security mechanisms that can accommodate changes in organizations, personnel, and security needs.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

guerrilla marketing

Meaning: Unconventional marketing programs designed to get maximum results out of minimal resources. Guerilla marketing by definition means making an investment in marketing with your time, energy, and imagination rather than merely your money. Coined by Jay Conrad Levinson, guerilla marketing is more about matching wits than matching budgets. Popular with the SOHO market, online tactics include newsletters, making use of e-mail lists, making appropriate newsgroup postings, sending out multiple press release announcements, establishing a dynamic Web site, submitting to the search engines, posting content such as product reviews, getting your business listed in all the appropriate places, and so on (as opposed to buying superbowl ads or investing in ad banners).

guestbook

Meaning: An area of a Web site that encourages users to sign it and post comments or feedback.

gumint

Meaning: Slang for government.

gutenberg

Meaning: A person who insists on printing out everything available onscreen. "Keith is such a gutenberg. He printed out a 150-page manual just to read a few sections of it."

gutter tribes

Meaning: Slang for nomadic bands of homeless people in their teens and early twenties who travel from city to city, making their living primarily through panhandling.

---

H

-- Select A Phrase -- H9Hack-o-gramshackerhacker ethicHaiku poetry error messagesHALhalo effecthamHANDhandheldhandheld devicehandlehands-onhandshakehandyhangHARhard drivehardlinkhardwarehardwiredharvest or harvestingHayes compatibleHBUHDHDMLHDSLHDTVheaderheadmountheat-seeking work forceheight technologyhelper applicationhemming and hawingHenry the Forgerhertz (Hz)heuristicshexadecimalhierarchyhigh domehigh-speedhigh-techhigh-touchhighbrowhijackerhire numberhistoryhithiveHOHollywiredhome networkinghomepageHomePlug PAHomePNAHomeRFhomeshoringhoneypothorizontal playhosthost namehostinghot issuehot potato routinghot spotHotBotHotDogHotJavahotlinkhotspothouse adhouse file hygienehoverHPPOHSDPAHTMLHTML bannerHTML e-mailHTML Reference LibraryhtpasswdHTTPD or httpdHTTPS or httpshubhuge pipeshunt-and-peckhydraulics of the situationhyperlinkhypermediahyperpowerhyperspeedhyperstitialhypertext

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

H9

Meaning: Similar to CD9 or 9, which refers to "parent in room" H9 and W9 are "considered essential for husbands and wives conducting extra marital affairs."

Hack-o-grams

Meaning: The handwritten memos dispensed by General Motors manufacturing czar Donald Hackworth. Hack-o-grams often end in a request for a "chinwag".

hacker

Meaning: A computer enthusiast who enjoys learning everything about a computer system and, through clever programming, pushes the system to its highest possible level of performance. Often confused with crackers, these hobbyists are skilled programmers with the reputation of having a mischievous bent for breaking into secured systems. In one sense, a hacker is a person who enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about it. In another sense, the term "hacker" tends to connote membership within a global community defined by computer networks; it implies that the person subscribes to some version of the hacker ethic. Hacking has been going on since computers were invented, and sometimes there have been extremely damaging consequences. A variety of old-time hackers have now "gone commercial" and taken hacking to the business level (they are now referred to as "ethical hackers").

hacker ethic

Meaning: A set of moral principles common to the first-generation hacker community. According to hacker ethic, all technical information should, in principle, be freely available to all. However, destroying, altering, or moving data in a way that could cause injury or expense to others is always unethical.

Haiku poetry error messages

Meaning: In Japan, they have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft error messages with Haiku poetry messages. Haiku poetry has strick construction rules, each poem has only 17 syllables; 5 syllables in the first, 7 in the second, and 5 in the third. They are used to communicate a timeless message, often achieving a wistful, yearning and powerful insight through extreme brevity (and are much better than "Your computer has performed an illegal operation.") Here they are:

HAL

Meaning: The name of the computer in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Its full name is HAL 9000 and "HAL" stands for a "Heuristically programmed ALgorithmic" computer. Computers in the real year 2001 had nowhere near the speech-articulation HAL does in the movie. To engage computers in extended conversations, programmers need to integrate speech recognition, natural-language understanding, discourse analysis, world knowledge, reasoning ability, and speech generation. DARPA is working on wide-ranging conversational interfaces.

halo effect

Meaning: The phenomenon of people taking you seriously because a big-name venture capital firm has chosen to finance your company.

ham

Meaning: A nickname for good e-mail, not spam.

HAND

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: hand)

handheld

Meaning: Any one of several electronic devices that essentially fit in your hand and are mobile. These include a palmtop, a pager, a cell phone, a PDA, a handy, and even a Walkman or a calculator. "Handheld" is the most recent name for PDAs, which are converging with cell phone technology to become all-around communication devices.

handheld device

Meaning: A computer or communications gadget that you can carry around with you, such as a cell phone, a BlackBerry, a pager, a PDA, a laptop, a smart phone, and so on.

handle

Meaning: Remember CB radio? Your handle is your online nickname or the name you go by in a chat room. Sometimes, a handle serves as a username, but certain Web fanatics even get their own domain name based on a handle.

hands-on

Meaning: A management attitude that favors remaining involved on a project only to keep in touch with its progress. It is not the opposite of hands-off. It describes a manager who still does a little grunt work, such as coding, for example, to "keep in touch with reality." In fact, many hands-on managers have a hands-off attitude, which makes for an ideal, independent working environment.

handshake

Meaning: When two modems are trying to connect, they handshake first to agree on how to transfer data.

handy

Meaning: Another name for a cell phone in Europe and parts of Asia, but this cell phone is also a PDA with a wireless connection. A handy is capable of many things including browsing the Web, and sending and receiving short messages (SMS), text messages, and e-mail.

hang

Meaning: When a modem fails to hang up or when a computer fails to respond, it is said to be hung.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

HAR

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: har)

hard drive

Meaning: A data storage medium that houses all of the electronic information and software programs on your computer. It is one of the most important pieces of hardware inside your PC.

hardlink

Meaning: A hardlink is a method of hyperlinking objects in the real world, including graphical tags (QR code), SMS tags, and RFID tags. The hardlink method establishes a reference link between a physical world object and a .mobi web page, just as a traditional hyperlink establishes an electronic reference to information on a web page.

hardware

Meaning: The electronic components, boards, peripherals, and computer equipment that make up a computer system (as opposed to the software, which tells these components what to do).

hardwired

Meaning: Online ad banners that are set in a fixed position on a page and delivered each time that page is delivered (as opposed to dynamic rotation).

harvest or harvesting

Meaning: Similar to the traditional definition of gathering crops off the fields, harvesting in the online world refers to gathering e-mail addresses or IM addresses from the Internet. For example, harvesting is the leading method spammers use to acquire new addresses.

Hayes compatible

Meaning: A type of modem that uses the AT command set.

HBU

Meaning: An acronym or text message used in online [[chat or chatting|chat]], IM, e-mail, blogs, or newsgroup postings.

HD

Meaning: An acronym often seen in the message "PLS HD," which means, "please hold."

HDML

Meaning: The HTML for PDAs, it is a computer language used to define hypertext-like content and applications for handheld devices that have small display screens. HDML is designed to leverage the infrastructure and protocols of the World Wide Web while providing an efficient markup language for wireless and other handheld devices.

HDSL

Meaning: A technology for enabling two high-speed, bidirectional data control channels for video, audio, and text transmission over T1 lines. It is expected to be configured for interactive network television, depending on HDSL equipment availability.

HDTV

Meaning: A video system with a higher quality of color and clearer audio than existing TV standards. HDTVs have wider screens and twice the resolution. It needs as much as 19 Mbps of bandwidth to work. The images are digitized and compressed prior to transmission, and then decompressed at the receiver end. This new technology is commonly delivered via satellite and cable modems.

header

Meaning: The header is the name for the part of an e-mail message that precedes the body and contains, among other things, the message originator, the date and time, and the subject line. It also refers to the portion of a packet that contains error-checking information, the source and destination addresses, and other information.

headmount

Meaning: The piece of hardware a user wears over the face while playing a virtual reality game or experiencing simulated environments.

heat-seeking work force

Meaning: Slang for the style of some people who work in Silicon Valley or other new economy hotspots. They flock to the "hot" companies and then move on if the stock price drops.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

height technology

Meaning: Silly engineer speak for a "ladder".

helper application

Meaning: A supplementary program that enables a Web browser to handle multimedia files, especially those containing animation, audio, and video. Most helper apps are freeware or shareware but do not come with Web browsers, so users must hunt down the ones they want and go through the tedious task of installing them and configuring them so the browser will launch the particular helper app when it encounters a multimedia file. An example of a helper app is RealPlayer.

hemming and hawing

Meaning: To stammer or beat around the bush, as in, "Stop your hemming and hawing and just tell me what you think the problem is."

Henry the Forger

Meaning: Attacker that generates completely forged network messages to try to fool victims.

hertz (Hz)

Meaning: A unit of measurement for vibration, one Hz is equal to one cycle per second. It replaces the earlier term "cycle per second (cps)." For example, in the United States, the common household electrical supply is at 60 hertz (meaning that the current changes direction or polarity 120 times, or 60 cycles, per second).

heuristics

Meaning: Refers to common-sense rules drawn from experience. As opposed to algorithmic programming (which is based on mathematically provable procedures), heuristic programming is characterized by programs that are self-learning, meaning they get better with experience. Heuristic programs do not always reach the best result but they usually produce a good result.

hexadecimal

Meaning: Refers to the base-16 number system, which consists of 16 unique symbols: the numbers 0 to 9 and the letters A to F. It is most commonly used online to assign color to Web pages. For example, the decimal number 15 is represented as F in the hexadecimal numbering system. The hexadecimal system is useful because it can represent every byte as two consecutive hexadecimal digits. It is easier for humans to read hexadecimal numbers than binary numbers. To convert a value from hexadecimal to binary, you merely translate each hexadecimal digit into its 4-bit binary equivalent. Hexadecimal numbers have either and 0x prefix or an h suffix. For example, the hexadecimal number: 0x3F7A translates to the following binary number: 0011 1111 0111 1010.

hierarchy

Meaning: In Usenet, it is a category of newsgroups, or the way the newsgroups are internally categorized.

high dome

Meaning: Synonym for "egghead" as in a scientist.

high-speed

Meaning: A common phrase used to mean very, very, very fast, as in, "We finally got a high-speed connection."

high-tech

Meaning: A popular adjective used to describe almost everything related to computers and Internet technology. It can also refer to other technological pursuits, such as genetic engineering or biotechnology.

high-touch

Meaning: Since the high-tech world can seem sterile or impersonal to some people, an ecruiter may try a high-touch approach, acknowledging that people do not want to be treated like commodities and that people want to know someone cares about their dreams. In fact, recruiters within the industry have begun to realize that getting good talent depends on having good people already at the firm and that they need to keep in touch with them on a regular basis.

highbrow

Meaning: An attitude of believing oneself to be superior or of a "higher class." For example, a "highbrow company" is one in which a majority of the staff has a graduate degree, and the company only wants to hire the "right" people who have gone to the "right" schools and who have the "right" mindset. These companies look at lowbrow companies with contempt.

hijacker

Meaning: A "hijacker" is a type of spyware designed by certain online publishers that allow them to snoop on your browsing activity, invade your privacy, and flood you with those annoying pop-up ads.

hire number

Meaning: The number of an employee, based on when that person was hired in relation to the rest of the company. In the early days, it was a popular thing to say you were the twelfth person, for example, to be hired at such-and-such firm, but low hire numbers (thirty or below) made people too egotistical. Now, most companies do not tell employees their hire number (especially if there are more than 100 people at the firm).

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

history

Meaning: Slang for "in the past." For example, "That technology is history, dude. Where have you been hiding?"

hit

Meaning: The request for and delivery of a file (such as a Web page) on a server. Each element of a requested page (including graphics, multimedia, and the HTML file itself) is counted as an individual hit. So, if a Web page contains five graphics, then accessing that page will generate six hits. Hits were originally used to determine the amount of traffic a Web site received, but since businesses eventually needed to isolate the exact number of times a Web page was requested (in order to charge for ad banners), the method of counting hits was tossed aside. Instead, businesses count the actual HTML page requests. There was also a time when, in an effort to say that such-and-such Web site got more hits, programmers and designers were told to add as many elements as possible, to make the number of hits look higher. In actuality, all this trick did was slow down the download speed of the pages. "Hit," as a verb, can mean "press down," as in, "Hit any key."

hive

Meaning: Social life on computer networks. The "hive mind" is considered by some to be the quintessential metaphor for the digital revolution.

HO

Meaning: (also seen as H/O)

Hollywired

Meaning: A play on the name "Hollywood," this refers to a group of entertainment companies using Internet technology to create media products.

home networking

Meaning: At its basic level, it is the construction of a network system that enables users within a single home to simultaneously connect to the Internet over a single account and to share printers and other peripherals. As smart homes become an everyday reality, a wide variety of devices that contain chips will become part of the system (including lighting, appliances, security, and televisions). Systems are based on coaxial cable, existing telephone wires (POTS), and wireless radio frequency (RF).

homepage

Meaning: The first page or front page of a Web site. It serves as the starting point for navigation, not be confused with a buffer page, doorway page, or splash page.

HomePlug PA

Meaning: An industry group developing networking systems that use home power lines.

HomePNA

Meaning: A 10 Mbps networking standard that uses phone lines but does not interfere with phone calls.

HomeRF

Meaning: An alternative to Wi-Fi, it is a protocol for wireless networking (at 1.6 Mbps and increasing to 10 Mbps). HomeRF is a leading RF technology backed by corporations such as Compaq, Motorola, National Semiconductor, Proxim, and Siemens. Like Wi-Fi (also known as 802.11b), HomeRF operates on the 2.4 GHz spectrum but differs in that its signals hop among different frequencies (or bands) within the radio frequency spectrum.

homeshoring

Meaning: Refers to the growing trend of shifting many jobs so that the employee works out of his or her home instead of the office. The name "homeshoring" comes from the practice of "offshoring", or sending U.S. jobs overseas. Also referred to as the hidden labor force, "cyberagents" can be very cost effective for companies as they usually cover their own health care and computer costs. Working from home can also save the employee money on daycare and gas.

honeypot

Meaning: An e-mail server intended to attract and trap spammers.

horizontal play

Meaning: To provide a common service across many industries (as opposed to a "vertical move," providing a service within the same industry).

host

Meaning: A computer that functions as the beginning and end point of data transfers. It is most commonly thought of as the place where your Web site resides. An Internet host has a unique Internet address (IP address) and a unique domain name or host name. A host can also refer to a Web hosting company.

host name

Meaning: The unique name by which a computer is known on a network. It is used to identify the host in e-mail, Usenet news, or other forms of electronic information interchange.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

hosting

Meaning: In a general sense, "hosting" refers to "Web site hosting" which is the business of providing the equipment and services required to display Web sites. The business of hosting also involves maintaining files and providing fast Internet connections. If you run a Web site or do business on the Web, you have a host and you know the importance of having a good, reliable host. Hosting is very affordable nowadays; the most important factor continues to be good customer service, make sure they have it!

hot issue

Meaning: A newly issued stock that is in great public demand. Hot issues usually experience a dramatic rise in price at their initial public offering (IPO) because the market demand outweighs the supply. 

hot potato routing

Meaning: As opposed to cold potato routing, this phrase refers to switching data packets from one network to the next as quickly as possible.

hot spot

Meaning: In the world of IT this term refers to places that have wireless Internet connections. Many national and local retailers, especially coffee shops, are adding wireless hot spots to provide the tech-savvy another reason to stop in and spend some money and some time.

HotBot

Meaning: An early favorite, it is a hybrid search engine developed by HotWired and Inktomi and now owned by Lycos. HotBot exploits NOW (Network Of Workstations) parallel computing technology to achieve scalable, supercomputer-class performance from clusters of reliable, commodity workstations and high-speed local area networks (LANs). Sounds confusing? How about this: HotBot is an award-winning, brightly colored, sophisticated search engine with more than forty tools to help users better articulate their searches and get relevant search results quickly and easily.

HotDog

Meaning: The HotDog Professional Web Editor is an HTML Authoring tool for Windows 95. Even though HotDog is tremendously powerful and feature-rich, the program is very user-friendly thanks to the superb built-in help files, detailed tutorials and intuitive interface. You can download a free fully-functional evaluation copy of HotDog now and try this Web editor for 14 days. Get A HotDog Now

HotJava

Meaning: A modular, extensible World Wide Web browser from Sun Microsystems. HotJava can execute programs written in the Java programming language. These programs, known as "applets," can be included (like images) in HTML pages. Because Java programs are compiled into machine-independent bytecodes, applets can run on any platform on which HotJava runs.

hotlink

Meaning: Text or graphics that contain a link to another location. When a user clicks on the "hotlink", they are then taken to the other location of content found either on the same, or different server.

hotspot

Meaning: A radius of approximately 300 feet, a "hotspot" is an area that enables wireless Internet access. For example, if your laptop is properly equipped with a wireless card, you can access the Internet without having to be connected by phone line or cable if you are in a hotspot.

house ad

Meaning: A self-promotional online ad that a company will run on their own Web site if they need to use unsold advertising inventory.

house file hygiene

Meaning: The practice of keeping your list of e-mail names and addresses "clean" so that the names are deliverable.

hover

Meaning: The act of positioning your cursor on top of a selection on your computer screen or on a Web page until a comment or a new menu appears. This is usually achieved on the Web with JavaScript.

HPPO

Meaning: (pronounced as a new word: hippo)

HSDPA

Meaning: The name for the high-speed cell phone network at Cingular used to transmit not only voice and data, but also music, video clips and Web sites.

HTML

Meaning: The lingua franca for publishing hypertext on the World Wide Web. HTML is a nonproprietary format based on SGML. It can be created and processed in a wide range of software programs, from simple plain text editors to WYSIWYG programs to sophisticated authoring tools.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

HTML banner

Meaning: An ad banner that makes use of HTML elements, such as an interactive form or the ability to click on different areas of the banner.

HTML e-mail

Meaning: E-mail that is formatted using HTML, as opposed to plain text, so that graphics and links appear in the e-mail body. In order to see the format and images correctly, both the sender and the recipient must have an e-mail program that supports HTML e-mail (most e-mail programs do; otherwise, the message will have broken links or broken graphics).

HTML Reference Library

Meaning: A Microsoft Windows software program that uses the Windows Help file format to document HTML, the language used to create Web pages. It includes the nonstandard extensions to the language that are used by various browsers and servers. In addition to definitions, helpful usage examples are included, along with quick reference tools.

htpasswd

Meaning: A file used to store username and passwords for basic authentication of HTTP users. Used on a Unix server and in conjunction with the .htaccess file, the .htpasswd file works to "password protect" Web directories by only providing access to the users it lists.

HTTPD or httpd

Meaning: An HTTP server (or Web server) available from the NCSA for various versions of Unix. HTTPD was the first Web server.

HTTPS or https

Meaning: A type of server software that provides "secure" transactions on the World Wide Web. If a Web site is running on an HTTPS server, you will see HTTPS instead of HTTP in the URL section of your browser. This verifies that you are indeed in the "secured mode." Windows NT HTTPS and Netscape Commerce server software support this protocol.

hub

Meaning: In computer terminology, it is a common connection point for devices in a network. For example, hubs are used to connect segments of a LAN. A hub has multiple ports so that when a packet arrives at one port, it is copied to the others so that all segments of the LAN can see all of the packets. Therefore, in data communications, a hub is a place of convergence, where data arrives from one or more directions and is forwarded out in one or more other directions.

huge pipes

Meaning: Slang for a high-bandwidth Internet connection.

hunt-and-peck

Meaning: A technique for typing employed by those who do not know how to type properly. Instead of using ten fingers, he or she will only use one or two fingers and must look around the keyboard to find the next letter to type.

hydraulics of the situation

Meaning: An MBA buzzword meaning to know and understand all aspects of how something works in order to make the necessary alterations.

hyperlink

Meaning: The text or graphics on a Web site that can be clicked on with a mouse to take you to another Web page or a different area of the same Web page. Hyperlinks are usually created (or coded) in HTML. They are also used to load multimedia files, such as AVI movies and AU sound files.

hypermedia

Meaning: The multimedia links on a Web page that let you download graphics, sound clips, video files, or text documents.

hyperpower

Meaning: A term coined by French foreign minister Hubert Vedrine to describe the US as "predominant in all categories". US strength extending beyond military might lead to a "domination of attitudes, concepts, language, and modes of life".

hyperspeed

Meaning: Slang for very, very, very fast.

hyperstitial

Meaning: An online ad that allows advertisers to present full-screen ads during the time it takes a Web page to download. Viewers must manually close the additional browser window that loads the hyperstitial ad, and this makes it more difficult to ignore than the common ad banner. The difference between this ad and a regular interstitial is the size; hyperstitials are full-screen sized, interstitials are smaller.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

hypertext

Meaning: A system for writing and displaying text that can be linked in multiple ways to related documents and available at several levels of detail. The term was coined by Ted Nelson to refer to a nonlinear system of information browsing and retrieval based on associative links between documents. The World Wide Web uses hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) to link pages and multimedia files.

---

I

-- Select A Phrase -- I-commerceIABIANAIBMIBM-PCIC/OOCiconoclastICQideavirusIDK, my BFF JillIEEEIESGIETFimageIMG SRC or img srcimmersive experienceimportimpressionsin real timein the cloudin the demoin the plastic closetin the podin-line imageInContext WebAnalyzerincubabyincubatorindexindexerindicesindigenous contentinfected fileinfobahninfomediaryinfonesiainformation ageinformation architectinformation leakageinformation overloadinformation packetinformation retrievalinformation superhighwayinformation traffickerInfoSeekInfoSpaceinfotainmentinfotisementinfrastructureinitiativeInktomiinmigrantinsertion order (IO)installinstant messagingintegrateintegrated sponsorshipintegrityintellectual gill-nettinginteractiveinteractive marketinginterfaceintermediaryinternal linkInternautinternesiaInternetInternet accountInternet backboneInternet billboardsInternet eraInternet securityinternetworkingInterNICInternutinteroperabilityinterstitialintranetIOS - organizationIOVIPiPhoneIPM campaignippieIPTVIPv6IPXIRCIrDAIRLISISAPIiscrapeISDNISHISNISOCissueiTunesiTVIVR

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

---

I-commerce

Meaning: An umbrella term that describes any form of revenue generated via use of the Internet. It is spelled with a capital "I" because that stands for Internet commerce, and Internet is capitalized. It includes B2B, B2C, e-commerce, d-commerce, and m-commerce.

IAB

Meaning: The IAB stands for the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an organization that sets the standards relating to online advertising.

IANA

Meaning: A committee that oversees registration for various Internet protocol (IP) parameters (such as port numbers, protocol and enterprise numbers, options, codes, and types).

IBM

Meaning: Known informally as "Big Blue," IBM is one of the largest, most well-known corporations that designs and manufactures computer systems, software, networking systems, storage devices, and microelectronics. Credited with inventing the first PC, in 1981, they are known for many inventions (including the "casual Friday" dress code, a button-up blue shirt and a pair of khaki pants). Joking aside, IBM is responsible for many innovative products. Be sure to also read through: ASP, BITNET, Bluetooth, Customer Information Control System (CICS), Data Encryption Standard (DES), holy war, IBM-PC, Mac, mainframe, MS-DOS, OS, PAN, PC-compatible, personal computer, PGML, reverse engineering, SQL, wild ducks

IBM-PC

Meaning: The first personal computer, made by IBM in 1981. IBM-PC now refers to any personal computer made by IBM. They are now referred to as PC-compatible computers or as clones.

IC/OOC

Meaning: Used in MUDs or other online role playing to indicate you are either in or out of character. For example, "OOC: I have to leave soon."

iconoclast

Meaning: One who attacks the traditional way of doing things. For many, this term has become synonymous with the role of the Internet consultant. In the project-based environment of the industry, the gray-flanneled organization man has been replaced by the iconoclastic independent whose occasional bouts of noncomformity are tolerated in exchange for his or her creative contributions.

ICQ

Meaning: A user-friendly Internet program that tells you when other users are online and lets you communicate with them IRT. ICQ searches the Net and alerts you when friends or colleagues who also use ICQ sign on. With ICQ, you can chat, send messages, swap URLs, exchange files, play games, or just hang out as fellow netizens surfing the Web. ICQ lets you communicate regardless of the application you choose, be it chat, voice, message board, data conferencing, file transfer, or Internet games, and it supports a variety of popular Internet applications. It serves as a universal platform from which you can launch any P2P application (such as CoolTalk). It can also be used in a multiple-user mode, so groups can conduct conferences. The program runs in the background and takes up minimal memory and Net resources.

ideavirus

Meaning: Coined by author and marketer Seth Godin, who also coined the term permission marketing, an ideavirus is the concept that ideas are the new currency of business. The notion is to come up with a new idea and then spread it through the Internet using e-mail and viral marketing techniques. The object is to get people to embrace the idea and support it.

IDK, my BFF Jill

Meaning: A phrase that became popular after Cingular aired a funny television commercial about a mother scolding her daughter for too much texting and the daughter is responding to her only in text lingo. There are several homespun video follow-ups to this commercial posted on video sharing sites and right after it aired, apparently it was all you heard in high schools across the country "IDK, my BFF Jill?"

IEEE

Meaning: (pronouced: I-triple-E)

IESG

Meaning: The operational management arm of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).

IETF

Meaning: An open community of networkers who manage and shape the Internet by developing standards within the industry. The IETF is an international, voluntary body consisting of network designers, engineers, researchers, vendors, and other interested individuals. They work together to address and resolve technical and operational problems on the Internet and to develop Internet standards and protocols. The IETF, which was formed by the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), meets three times a year. However, the bulk of the collaboration and work takes place on various mailing lists maintained by participants.

image

Meaning: A picture (as opposed to text).

IMG SRC or img src

Meaning: A piece of HTML code that enables Web authors to include a picture on a Web page.

immersive experience

Meaning: This refers to a Web site that "immerses" users in an "experience" by taking them on a journey using a non-linear 3D navigation.

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

import

Meaning: The ability of one application to use data produced by another application. For example, many programs are able to import graphics in a variety of formats. The import feature is under the File menu in most programs; it will show you a list of programs that are recognized for importing data. In other applications, such as a database program, an import window may appear giving you the option to select the location of the document to be imported and to select from a list of file formats.

impressions

Meaning: An online advertising term that refers to the number of times an ad banner is downloaded (and presumably seen) by users.

in real time

Meaning: The present, as in right now. Not the past, not the future, not even one minute from now, it means this actual moment. Commonly used in the industry to refer to something that is not cached.

in the cloud

Meaning: Whenever you see an illustration in a magazine or newspaper about how the Internet works, there is usually a cloud drawn in the top portion of the picture to represent the technology and data transfer processes. Since these are too complex to illustrate in a simple diagram, they are shown as happening "in the cloud."

in the demo

Meaning: MTV corporate slang for being a member of a targeted demographic group.

in the plastic closet

Meaning: Said about someone who refuses to admit to having cosmetic surgery. For example, "Is Tori Spelling in the plastic closet, or what!?"

in the pod

Meaning: Silicon Valley slang for restricting your job performance to tasks you are expected to do because anything done differently is not encouraged and will be criticized. Being "in the pod" also means being in a cubical within a cube farm.

in-line image

Meaning: Another name for a graphic displayed by a Web browser as part of an HTML document.

InContext WebAnalyzer

Meaning: A Windows software program for managing an Internet or intranet Web site for business or personal reasons. InContext WebAnalyzer gives you a full range of diagnostic and statistical tools to manage a Web site. For example, it detects broken links and tells you which pages need updating. UPDATE: It looks like the company failed. Try Business.com instead.

incubaby

Meaning: Slang for an entrepreneur who is receiving assistance from an incubator.

incubator

Meaning: A support and investment arrangement for creating, launching, and operating Internet businesses, financed by a network of investors. Incubators are designed to nurture young businesses by providing a wide range of services, including management assistance, access to financing, business or technical support services, shared office equipment, flexible and affordable leases, and expandable space.

index

Meaning: A file or directory on a server that usually contains information about the directory or Web site, such as access privileges, dates, and even a list of other indexes (indices). A file called "index.html" is most likely the starting point (or homepage) for a Web site; a server will most likely be configured to automatically display the index.html (or .htm) file when a request for a Web site comes to the server. This means it is the default page that appears when you type in a URL. (Sites that use Cold Fusion may have index.cfm as the default page.)

indexer

Meaning: Another name for a search engine.

indices

Meaning: Plural of index, it is a listing or directory of more than one index. Also known as an "index of indexes" or a "directory of directories."

indigenous content

Meaning: