Internet
Definitions
Sorry we can't do a mind meld or direct computer to brain transfer
yet. You just have to read. We've done our best to make this
information as concise as possible, yet cover all of the important
terms you are likely to encounter on the Internet.
Contents
Internet - A bunch of computers that range from personal
computers to minicomputers, mainframes and supercomputers
interconnected by communications systems that range from copper
telephone wires and television cables to fiber optic cables and
microwaves. Microwaves are a range of communication frequencies used
as a carrier of digital data (one's and
zero's) that are beamed from broadcasting stations and bounced among
terrestrial and satellite repeaters to receiving stations. When two
or more computers are connected such that they can communicate with
one another, they are known as a network. When one of
those computers is dedicated to providing information to the other
computers, it is known as a server.
When it or another computer in the network is dedicated to
interconnecting with another network, it is known as a
hub. Each intermediary network or computer between a
server and an Internet hub is known as a jump. The
normally incompatible computers of the Internet can communicate with
each other because they all support TCP/IP. The
Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol is the key to the
Internet.
It helps to separate the Internet into three functions: Supply,
Intermediary and Demand.
- Supply makes things available to the communications
media and standards known as the Internet.
- Intermediary helps you find Web sites using words
instead of numbers.
- Demand is everyone and everything, including computer
programs that want things.
To see what these things are graphically, view the definitions
diagram, which is an image map.
- Information Provider
(IP) - Anyone who performs one or more of the following
functions:
- Text author - Uses word processing
program to create text files (.text, .txt)
- HTML author - Uses word processor or HTML
development program to create HTML
files (.html, .htm). A lead HTML author
will organize all of the various files into a Web site.
- HTML
(HyperText Markup Language) - character sequences, e.g.
<P>text</P> that
tell a browser what to do with "text" or what it
references using a Uniform Reference Locator
(URL), which may use its HyperText Transfer
Protocol (HTTP) command to access a different
location in the same file as you are doing here, access a
file on the same computer as you did to get here, or
access a file on another computer somewhere on the
Internet, or its File Transfer Protocol
(FTP) command to move a file from one computer to
another computer via the Internet, or its
MailTo command to convert the data in a
form to an email message.
- Image Map - An
image that has URLs associated with areas thereof such
that when clicked, take the user to another file
related to that area.
- Form - Provides input
fields so data can be collected from Internet users
and emailed or collected in a database.
The fields on a form correlate with fields in a
database.
- Graphic artist, - Uses graphics
program to create two-dimensional (2-D) diagram and image
files (.giff, .gif, .jpeg, .jpg) from
scratch or modify digitally scanned or photographed
images.
- Modeler - Uses modeling program to create
three-dimensional (3-D) model files (.iges)
from scratch or modify digitally scanned or measured real
object.
- Virtual reality (VR)
developer - Uses image correlation program to create files
(.mov) views of 2 and 3-D scenes from the perspective of users
and under the direct or indirect (game) control of users
- Video developer - Uses video
capture hardware and software to convert analog video to
digital data for modification by editing software and
publication of the result in files
(.mov).
- Sound developer - Uses sound
capture hardware and software to convert analog (tape) and
digital (CD) sounds to digital data for modification by editing
software and publication of the result in files (.aiff,
.aif).
- Animation developer - Uses specialty software to
control the apparent motion of 2-D graphics and 3-D models and
publish the result as files (.gif,
.mov).
- Programmer) - Uses text editor
or specialty program to create commands (CGI),
data (Cookies), or programs (Applet)
used by the Web site on your behalf.
- Common Gateway
Interface (CGI ) - The specification for communication
between an HTTP server and server gateway programs, which is
supported by most servers. CGI tells other programs, like
database management systems and email programs what to do
with information your supplied, or what to search for and
return to you as new content for the HTML file or as a new
HTML file
- Cookies - Data sent to your
computer for storage and future reference by other pages of
the same site or the same page should you return to it in
the future.
- Applet - A small application
program, usually written in the Java
programming language that provide special effects from
dynamic images to monitoring real-time data from a browser.
Java Applets can be downloaded from a Web server and run on
most computers without the knowledge of computer users
unless they have set their browser preferences such that it
will notify them of such events.
- Java - Programming language
developed by Sun Computers™ to run on practically
any computer.
- File - Data organized on a computer
disk or CD according to file names
that is used by a computer program. Files may have any of a
number of formats that are peculiar to the program that created
them. Some file formats are understood by more than one
program. Text files limited to the ASCII
character set (a-b, A-B, 0-9, !@#$%...) are understood by many
programs. Files are usually a collection of ASCII characters.
Each character is defined by two bytes of data.
Each byte is comprised of four bits. A bit is on
or off (1 or 0). It's the basic element of digital computers
and communications. The size of a file is described in
Definitions of bytes, kilobytes (KBytes = KB =
1,000 bytes) or megabytes (MBytes = MB = 1,000
kilobytes). That's why disks are defined in Definitions of
kilobytes, megabytes, gigabytes (1,000 megabytes) and terabytes
(1,000 gigabytes). Files are communicated between computers as
a string of bits. The speed of the communications is described
in Definitions of bits per second (b/s), kilobits per second
(Kbits = Kb/s = 1,000 bits per second) and megabits per second
(Mbits/second = Mb/s = 1,000 kilobits per second).
- File name - A human-readable
tag for a file that uniquely identifies it within a folder
(Apple Macintosh terminology) or directory
(IBM, Unix, Microsoft terminology). The same file name may be
used for other files as long as they are in different folders
or directories. What is displayed as the name of a Web page on
the top of a browser window is HTML file header information
called a Title. It is not necessarily the file
name.
- Folder/Directory - Metaphorically
a container of files that can also contain containers of files.
It provides a method of hierarchically organizing files on a
computer disk or a partition thereof, both of which are
known as a volume. A computer may have many volumes
integral to it, connected locally to it via SCSI or
FireWire cables, or connected remotely to it by way of a
network.
- Site - A set of files on a
server that manifest a topic or theme.
Topics and sub topics are usually organized in a hierarchy of
folders/directories. Each site has a
home page.
- Home page - The default file
in a site to which browsers default if a file name is not
specified by their user. The Home page is usually associated
with a unique Internet Address and domain name.
- Sever - A computer that has data
communication software (TCP/IP) that enables it to communicate
with other computers over data communication hardware, like a
modem, Ethernet or AppleTalk that enable the
computer communications software to communicate over wires or
microwaves. Servers may host a number of Internet services like
host email programs, forums, chat
rooms, stores and malls.
- Modem (MODulator/DEModulator) -
Converts digital data to modulated signals on a carrier wave so
it can be transmitted via wires, FM, HAM, light or microwaves
to another modem that converts the signals back to digital
data, and vice versa.
- Forum - One or more files that
comprise a collection of topics related to some subject.
Messages related to each topic are posted by customers and
stored for reading and response by subsequent visitors.
Discussions may last a month or more. Access can be limited to
subscribers. (There is a forum
system for use and for sale.)
- Chat Room - One or more
files that comprise a "real-time" conversation related to some
subject. Statements are typed by customers for immediate
viewing by others in the same "room." Discussions among the
same participants seldom last more than an hour, but others may
continue the conversation for days. Access can be limited to
subscribers.
- Mall - Allows customers to take a
shopping cart with them to different stores
(databases or Web sites) and fill it will products. Product
quantity can be changed prior to "checking-out" and paying for
the products with one of various methods. (Bill
Holmes Consulting) can reactivate a Mall for use and for
sale.)
- Database - Anything from a file
to a complex data management system of related files that
stores data, facilitates complex searches for specific data and
can collect data from Internet visitors. Often known as a
backend database because it is front ended by HTML
files that use CGI
to translate database data into something viewable by Internet
users. HTML forms are used to communicate data to databases.
Most search engines are databases.
- Information
Service Provider (ISP) - ISPs provide servers
to IPs and make the servers
available to the Internet via an Internet
Access Provider (IAP). ISPs range from teenagers with a
personal computer in their bedroom to corporations with rooms full
of shelves full of specialized computers.
- Webmasters - Originally anyone who created a Web
site. Now those who configure and maintain
ISP servers. They
usually originate as IPs. Frustrated with ISP response or cost,
they become ISPs to themselves for their own Web sites and
eventually to others if it's profitable.
- Internet Access
Provider (IAP) - Connects servers to
Internet. The servers are either remotely located at the ISP
or collocated in an IAP room. Special communication
hardware and leased telephone lines are typically used to connect
remote servers to the IAP and thence they are treated like
collocated servers. Typically each collocated server is connected
by way of an Ethernet cable/protocol to an Ethernet multiplexer
that gives the dozen or so servers connected to it a 10 Megabit
per second (Mb/s) time slice of a much faster communications
medium (T1/T3/ATM). that connects to hierarchy of networks of
specialized computers dedicated to passing the information along
to one or more Internet hubs somewhere in the world.
Expensive IAPs connect to multiple hubs in multiple ways so if a
major Internet failure occurs, its servers remain connected to the
Internet. Expensive IAPs are fewer jumps away from an Internet hub
than less expensive IAPs. IAPs are often also ISPs and IPs. Each
IAP has one or more primary and secondary Domain
Name Servers
- Domain name - Unique text
address (billholmesconsulting.com) reserved by an IP
or IAP on behalf of an IP
from Network Solutions for a fee
($35/year).
- Network Solutions
(InterNIC) - A government granted
monopoly business that keeps domain names unique, correlates the
textural domain name (billholmesconsulting.com) with its actual
IP Address (204.216.182.3) and posts that mapping on
number of computers connected to the Internet as primary Domain
Name Servers. There is no reason why there shouldn't be
multiple competing domain name providers as long as they connect
their primary domain name servers such that all domain names are
unique.
- Primary Domain
Name Server (DNS) - Any of a number of usually dedicated IAP
servers throughout the Internet that periodically communicate with
the Network Solutions computers
to get the latest mappings and translate domain name (se1.com)
requests from browsers to their actual numeric IP Address
(204.216.182.1). The TCP/IP setups on the computers of Internet
users usually list a number of Domain Name servers in addition to
those of their IAP for any browser or FTP program on the computer
to use to get the actual IP address of a domain and connect to the
Web site. If the first DNS on the list in unavailable, the next
one on the list is accessed for the mapping.
- Secondary Domain
Name Server - In the event a primary Domain Name Server is not
operating, a secondary Domain Name server will notify the user
that the domain name is valid, but the server of the domain is not
operating or is too busy to respond.
- Virtual Domain
Name Server - Originally each domain had to be on its own
server. One domain per server is expensive, so means were devised
to trick the Internet into accommodating multiple domains on one
server. ISP as well as IAPs provide Virtual Domain Name services.
Good providers map each domain name (billholmesconsulting.com) to
a unique IP address (205.216.182.3), which allows search
engines to supply its location to their users. Cheap providers
map every domain to one IP Address, leaving search engines nothing
unique to use for an IP Address.
- Search Engine - A program
on a server used to find sites of interest. It's usually driven by
a database with data about Internet sites
supplied by IPs or Web Crawlers.
- Web Crawler - A program
that searches the Internet for Web sites and extracts
descriptive information from them for use by search
engines.
- Internet Access
Provider - Connects client to
Internet via analog (modem) or digital (ISDN)
telephone lines
- Client - Your computer if it has
TCP/IP and a browser, assistant,
or other program that can use it.
- Browser - A program that
interprets information in files and displays it on your monitor
or television (WebTV), e.g., Netscape
Navigator and Microsoft
Explorer and NCSA Mosaic.
Most browsers retain a cache of downloaded files from visited
Web sites and allow users to go Back to previous files and
Forward to again more recent files. They also include a Go
button or equivalent that lists the Titles of the HTML
files in the order they were visited during the current
session. Selecting any file in the list
returns the user to that point in their Internet
adventure. Some browsers are more
capable than others. Savvy IPs design sites that accommodate
older widely used browser versions as well as current versions.
- Versions - Earlier versions are less capable than later
versions.
- Options - Users may disable some options like image
display to minimize response time.
- Helper applications - Programs browsers trigger to
display certain file formats. Not everyone has them
all.
- Plug-ins - Adds interpreters to browser. May not be
available for some browsers or computer types. Users may
exclude plug-ins to minimize response time.
- Assistant - Program used to
automate searches throughout the Internet for products or
information.
The Internet is passive. The supply just sits there waiting for
you to ask for it. When you enter a URL in your
browser, it asks the first DNS
listed in your TCP/IP setup for the IP Address
of that domain name in the URL. The DNS
responds with the IP Address (four sets of 1-3 digits). Your browser
connects to the server at that address and asks for the default file
name of the domain. If you supplied a pathname
(folder/folder/filename) in addition to the domain name, your browser
asks for that specific file.
The server finds the HTML file and supplies it
to your browser. Your browser examines its HTML and presents a
formatted view of the file to you on your monitor. If the HTML file
references graphic, sound or other non-HTML files, your browser uses
their URLs to ask the server for those files. As they are supplied by
the server, your browser displays them to you where and how the HTML
dictates.
Imbedded in the HTML may be URLs to other HTML files. These
normally appear as underlined blue text, but may be associated with a
button or graphic or a portion of a graphic. When you select these
links, your browser asks the server for the file if the link is local
to it, else it asks a DNS for the IP Address of the domain name in
the link URL. If the actual IP Address is supplied in the URL, your
browser skips the DNS lookup step and goes straight to the designated
server. (You too can supply IP Addresses directly to your browser and
skip the domain name lookup process.)
The URL may include CGI,
Cookies or Java code.
Purpose of Web Site (Contents)
Expand market for product or service, reduce labor costs by
off-loading repetitive information requests, or make information or
opinions available to people throughout the world.
Range of Media (Contents)
- Text - Basic information for old browsers, serious
shoppers and new assistants. To appeal to the widest possible
market and provide substance for assistants, every important piece
of information must be represented as text, even if it is
redundant with that which is in images, video or audio, because
some people disable graphics, Java and other
features to improve response time.
- Hypertext (A.K.A., hyperlink) - Customer selection
causes jump to another file on the same server on another server.
Gives customer control of navigation and sense of power.
- Graphic - Two-dimensional (2-D) images used to increase
interest and understanding. Should be informative or invoke a
desired emotion as well as provide visual relief.
- Image maps - Graphic with areas that behave like
hypertext. Useful for spatially dependent information like linking
a location on a map with a building or a room on a floor plan with
details about the room. Unfortunately, image maps of text are
often used as "sexy" navigation tools. They take much longer to
download.
- Video - Use to increase interest and understanding by
providing an example of what can be seen or done.
- Virtual reality - Position, orientation and direction
under customer control within simulated 3-D scene used to increase
interest, understanding and comfort. Should use three concurrent
views:
- Position on map or floor plan - x, y, z.
- Orientation on map or floor plan - pointer(s), yaw, pitch,
roll.
- Display at that position and orientation in world
view.
- Sound - Use to increase interest or provide solace,
i.e. comfort with pleasant music. Should correlate with graphic,
video or animation.
- Animation - Multiple, vectored or rotated 2-D and 3-D
images used to increase interest and understanding.
- Language - Should have Spanish, French, Polish and
Russian versions of every page to appeal to the international
market.
If something is not displayed within five seconds or something
interesting is not displayed within ten seconds, the customer will
move on. To maximize performance:
- Graphic files should be kept small (<50KB).
- Larger graphic, video and animation files should be interlaced
(alternate lines display as the graphic file is downloaded) or
threaded (first part of sound file is played before entire file is
downloaded).
- Discourage background patterns (image that is repeated as
mosaic to fill page).
- Limit page to three screen scrolls on 13-inch monitors.
To avoid that "Where am I?" feeling, all of the pages must have a
style consistent with their theme in the form of a background color,
graphic (logo), arrangement and navigation link color.
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