Damm Coyote's

Glossary Of Terms

Saturation
The purity of a colours hue, moving from gray to the pure colour. A very dark blue may have mostly black with only a small amount of blue, and thus would have a very low saturation. See Hue.

Screen saver
A moving graphic or pattern that appears on your screen when you have not pressed a key or moved your mouse for a specified amonut of time. Screen savers prevent screen damage that is caused when the same area of light and dark are displayed for long periods of time.

Script
In the context of the World Wide Web, A script is a program that runs on a server and processes requests based on the input from the browser.

Scroll bar
The bar across the bottom or down the side of a desktop window that lets you scroll through the windows contents. Scroll bars have arrow buttons at either end and a scroll box, all of which can be used to scroll up & down or from side to side.

Search engine
A program that enables users to search key words on Web pages throughout the World Wide Web. For example Yahoo.

Secure channel
A technology that provides privacy, integrity, and authentication in point to point communications such as a connection on the Internet between Web browser and a Web server.

Security
Ensuring that private information stays private in an atmosphere where all other information is free. Security also means that viruses are prevented form infecting computer systems.

Security Certificate
A chunk of information (often stored as a text file) that is used by the SSL protocol to establish a secure connection. Security Certificates contain information about who it belongs to, who it was issued by, a unique serial number or other unique identification, valid dates, and an encrypted fingerprint that can be used to verify the contents of the certificate. In order for an connection to be created both sides must have a valid Security Certificate.

Serial interface
An interface between a computer and a serial device, such as a modem or printer, by which the computer sends single bits of information to the device, one after the other.

Serial line
Serial means one by one. A serial line is used to refer to data transmission over a telephone by way of a modem or when data travels from a computer to a printer or other device.

Serial line interface protocol
A method of Internet access that enables your computer to dial up a service provider and exchange info reliably. see also SLIP.

Server
A computer that serves information and software to the Internet community.
2)
Computer that can distribute services or resources. A server is often a piece of hardware and software that provides access to information requested from it. A server is also called a host computer.

Server push
A Web animation technique designed by Netscape, by which the server can initiate the transmission of a series of images to the Web Browser. Server push is sometimes referred to as the "poor man's animation." The server push technique is being replaced by other methods, such as animated GIFs, Shockwave, and Java applets.

Server service
A business that provides the services and resources required for other businesses to establish a server presence on the Internet. Server services offer an affordable potion for businesses that can't afford the cost of establishing their own in-home server.

Server-side image maps
An image map that stores the map information in a separate file (usually ending with a .map extension). Server-side images require the server to look up the map information. Client-side image maps are quickly replacing server-side image maps.

Service
An application that processes requests by client applications, such as storing data, or executing an algorithm.

Service provider
A business that sells Internet connections to individuals and small companies. Also called an access provider. See Albedo.net

SGML
Standard Generalized Markup Language, is an International standard, a encoding scheme for creating textual information. HTML is a subset of SGML.
2)
The precursor to HTML. SGML is a language designed to solve portability problems. SGML was designed to describe all kinds of markup languages. An Intorduction to SGML.

Shareware
Software that is available on the Internet, so you can try it free. If you like the software and want to continue to use it, you send the author a fee to register the product. Shareware is based on the honour system. Registering usually gives you the benefit of technical support and documentation, and in some cases added features are enabled after you register the software.Shareware Shop.

Shell
A user interface to the Internet using only character-based, command-line access to a UNIX system.

Shell account
A UNIX based account on a service provider's computer.

Shockwave
A plug-in that lets you view a specially formatted version of Macromedia Director multimedia files. Shockwave files are created using Macromedia Director and a special post processing program called Afterburner.

Signal-to-noise ratio
The amount of useful information to be found in a given Usenet newsgroup. Often used derogatorily, for example: " the signal-to-noise ratio in this newsgroup is pretty low."

Signature
A standard sign off used by people for e-mail and news groups posts, often contained in a file and automatically appended to an outgoing mail message or network news post.

Site
The file section of a computer on which Web documents or other files are stored for example: a Web site, a gopher site, an FTP site.

Slag
To bring a network to its knees because of extremely high traffic.

SLIP
Serial Line Internet Protocol. A standard for using a regular telephone line (a serial line) and a modem to connect a computer as a real Internet site. SLIP is gradually being replaced by PPP.

SMDS
Switched Multimegabit Data Service. A new standard for very high-speed data transfer.SMDS Interest Group

Smiley
A combination of symbols designed to indicate the true intent or emotional state of the auther. The classic smiley is the sideways happy face :-). Smileys are fine in moderation, but overusing them not only indicates that your writing isn't as clear as it could be, but it also brands you as a newbie. See sol: chat-o-rama: smileys

SMTP
Simple Mail Transport Protocol. The main protocol used to send electronic mail on the Internet. SMTP consists of a set of rules for how a program sending mail and a program receiving mail should interact. Bill Wohler maintains the ultimate (E-MAIL REFERENCES).

Snail mail
Mail delivered by any private or Govt. Postal Service.

Sneakernet
To physically carry information or data from one computer to another on diskette of tape.

SNMP
Simple Network Management Protocol A set of standards for communication with devices connected to a TCP/IP network. It is often used to communicate with hubs and switches.

Software
A set of instructions that make computers hardware perform tasks. Operating systems, programs, device drivers, and applications are all software.

Solid colour
A colour that appears on a display when all pels are the same colour. On a monochrome display, there are only two solid colours; Black and white.

Soruce code
The form in which a computer program is written.

Source directory
The directory that contains the file or files you intend to use, copy, or move.

Source document
The text based document that contains the HTML commands for a World Wide Web document.
2)
The document from which a linked object originates

Spam (or Spamming)
Unsolicited Junk e-mail. 90% of SPAM on the Internet comes from Cyber Promotions.
An inappropriate attempt to use a mailing list, or other networked communications facility as if it was a broadcast medium (which it is not) by sending the same message to a large number of people who didn't ask for it. The term comes from a famous Monty Python skit which featured the word spam repeated over and over.
Spam is also a Canned food product made by Hormel.

Spider
A program that prowls the Internet, attempting to locate new, publicly accessible resources such as WWW documents, files available in public FTP archives, and gopher documents. Also called wanderers or robots (bots), spiders contribute their discoveries to a database, which Internet users can search by using an Internet accessible Search engine such as Lycos or Yahoo. Spiders are necessary because the rate at which people are creating new Internet documents greatly exceeds manual indexing capacity.

Spinner
An extremely slow link. The name comes from Mosaic's globe icon, which spins while the program tries to access a site. If the site is particularly slow, the only sign you have that anything is actually happening is the spinning globe. See also dirt road and JIPG.

Spool
A queue of files waiting to be printed.

Sprayer
A computer program designed to serve Web documents from multiple hosts in order to optimize traffic between the hosts.

SQL
Structured Query Language specialized programming language for sending queries to databases. Most industrial-strength and many smaller database applications can be addressed using SQL. Each specific application will have its own version of SQL implementing features unique to that application, but all SQL-capable databases support a common subset of SQL.

SSL
Secure Sockets Layer. A protocol designed by Netscape Communications to enable encrypted, authenticated communications across the Internet.

Static IP address
A numeric IP address that does not change each time you connect to a service provider.

Status bar
A bar at the bottom of a window that is used to indicate the status of a task.

String
A sequence of alphanumeric characters.

Subdirectory
A directory within another directory.

Subnet address
A number that is used to identify a subnetwork. Using a subnet address called subnetting lets different subnetworks on a LAN share the same Internet IP address.

System administrator
The person who manages a network computer or host computer.

Subroutine
A piece of a program that is called from another part of the program. often a well-structured program will consist of a short main routine that calls many subroutines to do the work.

Sundowner
A person who changes his or her daily sleep schedule to coincide with being awake when Web traffic is lowest (i.e., late at nite).

Surf
To leap giddily from one Web page to another by furiously clicking on any link in sight; to travel through cyberspace.

Surge protector
A device, usually in the form of a multi-plug bar, that protects your computer from being damaged by power surges.

Symmetrical
Providing equal speeds in both directions. Compare with asymmetrical.

Synthesizer
A device that produces sound from digital instructions rather than from recorded sound.

Sysadmin
See sysop.

Sysop
Systems operator. Anyone responsible for the physical operations of a computer system or network resource.

System disk
A disk that contains the system files necessary to start your system. The disk from which your system is loaded when you start your computer is called a boot disk.

Systems network architecture
A proprietary networking architecture used by IBM and IBM- compatible mainframe computers.

System time
The time according to your computers internal clock.

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