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Glossary: Chapter 10
- analog signal
- A signal often transmitted over telephone lines in the form of electronic waves.
- ARPANET
- The grandfather of the Internet, founded in the 1960s by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the U.S. Defense Department to network selected universities and defense research contractors.
- backbone
- A term applied to a high-speed communications channel that links several LANs or computer installations in an institution like a college.
- baud rate
- A measure of the speed at which data are transmitted over communications lines by a modem, expressed as bits per second.
- bits per second (bps)
- The measure expressing the transmission speed of a modem; usually, but not always, synonymous with its baud rate.
- bridge (gateway)
- A hardware interface for interconnecting similar computer networks.
- client/server
- A computer environment in which applications on a file server are sent out to client machines as needed. The client machine can access and display information sent out from the server.
- coaxial cable
- A common metallic cable used for hardwired communications channels because it can carry large amounts of data.
- Communications Decency Act
- A 1996 federal law that makes it a crime to distribute sexually explicit materials over a computer network that might be seen by minors.
- communications software
- A program that enables a computer to be connected to other computers or that allows a document to be set up in fax format.
- digital signature
- A term for a secure transaction code used to encode sensitive personal information sent over a network so that the decoder will know that it is unique to the sender.
- downloading
- Transferring files from a host computer on a network to remote machines, typically microcomputers.
- encryption software
- A category of computer programs to encode a document so that it cannot be read if it is intercepted by unauthorized users in a network transaction.
- fiber optic cable
- A modern communications channel using light impulses traveling through clear glass fibers to transmit data safely at very high speeds.
- file server
- A term applied to both a host computer and its special software that makes programs and data available to individual workstations on a network.
- FTP (file transfer protocol)
- A common Internet standard which supports transfer of files over the network.
- Gopher
- A popular text-based worldwide document search and retrieval protocol developed for the Internet.
- HTML (Hypertext Markup Language)
- The standard formatting language for creating World Wide Web pages with text, graphics, and other media.
- home page
- A term for the opening Web document that one sees at a site, which may contain links to other pages.
- information utility
- A term applied to a commercial network information service like CompuServe or Prodigy, which sells access to its wide variety of files and public forums.
- Java
- A programming language now being used to create small, self-contained applications, called applets, suitable for being distributed on the World Wide Web and run on the client machine.
- local area network (LAN)
- A system of networked computers and other hardware, like printers, that are in relatively close proximity to one another.
- netiquette
- A term for acceptable manners on electronic mail.
- network protocol
- A set of technical specifications that allow different computers to receive and transmit Internet messages through their interconnected communication channels.
- network
- A group of computers or other devices, like printers, connected to form a system that can communicate with each other directly through a physical link.
- parallel transmission
- Method of transmitting data within a computer in which a bundled set of bits is sent over a data bus all at the same time.
- public key (PK) cryptography
- A kind of software algorithm based on pairs of numerical keys, one public and one private, for encrypting e-mail and other network transactions.
- search engine
- Any of the many indexing programs created for searching for information on World Wide Web pages, usually based on Boolean search strategies.
- serial process
- The transmission of data in a communications channel like a phone line one bit at a time.
- site license
- A fee paid to a software company to allow multiple users at a site to access or copy a piece of software.
- smiley
- A set of keystrokes that can be included in e-mail to express emotion in a kind of graphical shorthand.
- snail mail
- Computer jargon for surface mail, which is normally slower than electronic mail.
- telecommuting
- The use of personal computers and data communications at home to do work without being physically present at the office.
- Telnet
- An Internet protocol that permits a user to log onto a remote computer on the Net and work on it at long distance.
- twisted-pair wire
- Two copper wires twisted together, often used for home telephone lines and for computer connections in a LAN.
- uploading
- Transferring files to a central computer on a network from a remote machine such as a personal computer.
- USENET
- A general term for the thousands of user discussion groups on the Internet devoted to many subjects, including some that are strictly for adults.
- value-added network (VAN)
- A communications channel leased from a telephone company to offer customers with modems access to network services through a local or toll-free number.
- Web page
- The name for a document formatted to contain information for distribution on the World Wide Web. It may contain hypertext links to other pages and various multimedia resources.
- wide area network (WAN)
- A geographically dispersed communications network, with many owners, linking computers for the purpose of communicating with each other, such as a national network for airline reservations.