• Jargon Buster

Browser - Any client software that is used for looking at World Wide Web resources, the most famous being Netscape’s Navigator and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

Byte - A series of bits that represents a single character.  Usually there are eight bits in a byte.

Cookies - Information stored on a user’s computer by a Web Browser at the request of software at a web site.  Web sites use cookies to recognize users who have previously visited them.  The next time the user accesses that site, the information in the cookie is sent back to the user so the information displayed can vary depending on the user’s preferences.

DNS - (The Domain Name System, aka Domain Name Server) Every web server has DNS settings to point to the correct server which has the website on. DNS is a system that stores all the information associated with domain names in a database. DNS is used to attache easy-to-remember domain names to hard-to-remember IP addresses in the form of URLs and email addresses.

Domain Name - The unique name that identifies an Internet site.  Domain names have two or more parts separated by dots.  For example www.whitetigerdesigns.co.uk

Download - To copy or move data from a main source to another source (such as your PC).

E-mail (Electronic mail) - Messages, usually text, sent from one person to another via computer.  E-mail can also be sent to a large number of addresses automatically.  Any communications service that permits the electronic transmission and storage of messages and attached/enclosed files.

E-mail Forwarder - an email address that passes all emails sent to it to another email address.

FTP (File Transfer Protocol) - A standard way of transferring files from one computer to another on the Internet and other TCP/IP networks.  FTP is also the name of any of various computer programs that implement the file transfer protocol.

Hex Code - A hash followed by a series of 6 characters or numbers which defines an exact colour. example: #FFFFFF = white

Home Page - The first or top page in a collection of pages that make up a Web site.

HTML (HyperText Markup Language) - The authoring language used to create documents on the World Wide Web.

IP Address (Internet Protocol Address) - The numeric address of a computer that is in the format used on the Internet. 

Interactive Web Site - A method where information entered on a Web site is passed to other systems for processing to store, confirm, or respond to an inquiry.

Internet - A vast, globe-spanning network of networks.  The networks communicate with each other based on certain protocols, such as the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP).  Every time you tap into the Internet, your own computer becomes an extension of those networks.

Internet Service Provider (ISP) - A company, which provides access to the Internet for customers.

Intranet - A secure, private network shared by a group of users.  An Intranet uses the same type of protocols (TCP/IP) and software found on the public Intranet.

LAN (Local Area Network) - A network of computers that is usually confined to one office building.  LANs can be linked together in larger networks called Wide Area Networks (WANs).

Link - On the World Wide Web, a link is reference to another page, which takes you to the other document when you click on it.

Mailbox - An electronic message storage place for data.  A customer can retrieve messages from his/her own mailbox and can send messages to other trading partners’ mailboxes.

Modem - Electronic device that converts signals from one form to a form compatible with another kind of equipment, e.g. transmitting computer data over telephone lines.

Network - The connecting of two or more computers to share resources forms a network.  Connect thousands of networks together and you have the Internet.

Nominet - Nominet is the Internet registry for .uk domain names. Nominet run one of the world's largest Internet registries and managing over six million domain names. Nominet maintain the register of .uk domain names.

Server - A server is a computer connected constantly to the internet. This server will have websites on, when someone types in a web address, your computer will look on the server and bring it back to your web browser for viewing. If the website has a coding language or database, the connection will go onto a second or third server to process before returning to your computer.

Upload - To transmit data to a central computer from another computer or a computer at a remote location.

Web Site - A location of the World Wide Web.  Each Web site contains a home page, which is the first document users see when they enter the site.  The site might also contain additional documents and files.

WWW (World Wide Web) - A system of Internet servers that support specially formatted documents.  The documents are formatted in a language called HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) that supports links to other documents, as well as graphics, audio, and video files.  This means you can jump from one document to another simply by clicking on specific locations.

XML (Extensible Markup Language) - Allows designers to create their own customized tags, enabling the definition, transmission, validation and interpretation of data between applications and organizations.