Domain Name...

All new web site projects needs a domain name (youcompany.com). This will be the name that visitors will type into their browser to view you website. Affordable Web Sites has it's own domain registrar (affordabledomains.ws) that will allow you to register a new “.com” domain for as little as $8.75 a year or less.

These domains are registered in your name. We recommend that you register your domain for at least the 1st 2 years. .

You can also transfer a new domain to our registrar for as little as $6.99. This automatically adds a 1 year extension to your current domain. If you do not want to transfer your domain to our registrar, we recommend that you use “affordabledomains.ws’.

Website Design...

All projects needs professional design, development, and hosting. Affordable Web Sites has been designing websites since 1996. We have excellent references and you can always start small and upgrade when you need to. We’ll even finance your project if needed.

We use industry standard tools to design your layout
from scratch. You choose your colors, effects, navigational style, images, or whether to use audio, video or special effects.

Hosting...

All new web sites needs high speed hosting. Hosting is the business of providing the storage, connectivity, and services necessary to serve files for a website. We set up your initial configurations using the same hosting companies we use.

We offer shared, semi-dedicated and dedicated servers from Three(3) data centers. Translated, this means we lease our own servers and place your project on the server that best fits your needs.

All accounts are managed by affordable web sites, you spend time with your business and we handle your website
modifications.

For maximum security and reliability, we can offer our exclusive “dual host” system. We never place shopping carts on shared servers. Call us for details.

eCommerce (online stores)...

We specialize in the design and development of eCommerce websites or online stores. Electronic Commerce. Refers to the general exchange of goods and services via the Internet.

There are 4 main components of an eCommerce system. 1). Merchant Account (for processing credit cards), 2). Shopping Cart or Order Page (for calculating and processing orders), 3). Payment Gateway (for transferring funds to your account), 4). SSL Certificate to Authenticate and secure your site (for receiving sensitive information from your visitors)

We can obtain a merchant account for you in 1 day. If you have a PayPal account, we can integrate your account with our shopping carts. If you do not need an actual shopping cart, well program paypal buttons instead.

Spices & Special Programming...

Some projects require a few spices to make them custom. Some of the most popular spices includes, but are not limited to:

Shopping carts, paypal payment buttons, digital (SSL) certificates, password protected directories, image galleries, logos, animated slide shows, application forms, advanced drop down menus, audio, video, event calendars, guest books, counters, bulletin boards, weblogs, and more.

Affordable Web Sites can develop these services for you.

Support...

We offer Live Support from your designer. You deserve a
support technician, not a customer service representative. We are LIVE available 5 days a week from 9:00a-6:00p est. We are also available 24 hours a day via email, we usually respond in 1 to 24 hours.

We have an expanded support page that include tutorials, links and much more. Each time we encounter an issue that is new to our team, we post the results to our support page/blog.

For our clients, we also have easy access to helpful info.

Maintenance...

For those clients that want to administer changes to their website, we offer two options

Option 1). Affordable websites can complete your changes for you or
Option 2). A software based system using Adobe Contribute for updating any of your pages and adding new pages.

Marketing...

All web sites needs successful marketing or advertising.
No matter how attractive your site is, it will produce nothing unless you let someone know that it's available.

Affordable Web Sites has been on the 1st and/or 2nd page of the major search engines since 2002. In addition, we have multiple clients who are also experiencing 1st and/or 2nd page results. Our optional marketing services ensures 1st and/or 2nd page placement on those major search engines.

We concentrate on the following search engines and directories. Altavista, AOL, Excite, Google, Looksmart, Lycos, AllTheWeb, MSN, Yahoo, WiseNut, Netscape, Ask Jeeves, Iwon, MyWay.

Conclusion...

We accept major credit cards (AMEX, Visa, Mastercard) Checks, and PayPal for payments.

Our design packages, may offer what you need. If not, request a quick quote from us. Take a look at some of our samples.

We make every effort to work with your budget.

Thank you for visiting our tour, call us today! 478.922.8978 for your free initial consultation and a demonstration of our services. You can use the navigators to start the tour over or go to a particular page.

Affordable Web Sites has assembled a list of non-technical terms for a better understanding of the internet and website development.

Glossary

 

.gif - 
Graphics Interchange Format (GIF) filename extension

.jpg or .jpeg - 
Filename extensions of images in JPEG format.

.mov - 
File name extension for files with video sequences. A QuickTime player is needed in order to play such a file.

.mpg or .mpeg - 
Filename extension for files in MPEG format.

.NET Hosting ("dot net") - 
Web hosting that supports .NET, an application framework by Microsoft.

.zip - 
File name extension for files compressed with PKZIP program or similar.

A Record - 
An A record is part of the zone file. It is used to point Internet traffic to an IP address. For example, you can use an "A record" to designate abc.yourdomain.com to send traffic to your web site at IP address 209.15.23.255. You can also designate xyz.yourdomain.com to go to a separate IP address.

ActiveX - 
ActiveX is a brand name referring to a set of Microsoft's technologies and services based on COM (Component Object Model) widely released in 1997. On the Internet, ActiveX can be used with IE versions 3 and above and with Netscape Navigator though plug,ins. ActiveX control is a COM object, written as a DLL in a programming language like Visual Basic, that follows ActiveX standards. Once downloaded, ActiveX controls have a large degree of freedom, presenting a security risk.

Address - 
Unique identifier of a web page. URL (Uniformed Resource Locator) is more frequently used for this purpose.

ADN - 
(Advanced Digital Network) Usually refers to a 56 Kilobit per second leased,line

ADSL - 
(Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) -- A method for moving data over regular phone lines. An ADSL circuit is much faster than a regular phone connection and the wires coming into the subscriber's premises are the same (copper) wires used for regular phone service. An ADSL circuit must be configured to connect two specific locations, similar to a leased line. A commonly discussed configuration of ADSL would allow a subscriber to receive data (download) at speeds of up to 1.544 Megabits per second, and to send (upload) data at speeds of 128 kilobits per second. Thus the 'Asymmetric' part of the acronym. Another commonly discussed configuration would be symmetrical: 384 kilobits per second in both directions. In theory ADSL allows download speeds of up to 9 megabits per second and upload speeds of up to 640 kilobits per second. ADSL is often discussed as an alternative to ISDN, allowing higher speeds in cases where the connection is always to the same place.

AIFF - 
Audio Interchange File Format. High quality audio file format introduced by Apple.

Anonymous FTP - 
Anonymous File Transfer Protocol allows the public to log into an FTP server with a common login (usually "ftp" or "anonymous" and any password (usually the person's e,mail address is used as the password). Anonymous FTP is beneficial for the distribution of large files to the public, avoiding the need to assign large numbers of login and password combinations for FTP access.

Apache - 
An open source web server software.

Applet - 
Most often refers to a small Java program designed to run in a Web browser. Java applets run in a sandbox, so they can't perform unauthorized functions like file reading or opening Net connections to other computer from your computer.

Archive - 
Archives are large files containing valuable data. Archives are often compressed to save space.

Archive site - 
A server that contains archives. It can be accessed by FTP, E,mail or HTTP.

ASCII - 
(American Standard Code for Information Interchange). A standard for coding text files. Every character has an associated number and any text can be represented by a sequence of numbers.

ASP - 
Active Server Pages, which provide web developers with a way to build web applications. The embedded scripts can be written in any language and processed by the server when the file's URL is requested.

Asp Hosting - 
Web hosting that supports Active Server Pages, a server,side scripting environment from Microsoft.

Attachment - 
A part of an email message. Usually a file (a data file or a multimedia file) or a web page. It is not a part of the text of the message, instead it is attached to the message.

AU - 
Audio file format for Unix systems.

Authentication - 
Authentication is used to confirm the identity of the other party involved in the data transmission.

Autoresponder - 
A program that sends an automatic form response to incoming emails.

AVI - 
Audio/Video Interleave. Audio file format used by Microsoft Widows.

B Channel - 
Bearer Channel. It is a 64 Kbps communication channel in ISDN.

Backbone - 
A high speed line or series of connections that forms a major pathway within a network. The term is relative, as a backbone in a small network will likely be much smaller than many non,backbone lines in a large network.

Backbone - 
Main high speed network connection composing the Internet. Backbones are operated by major telecommunications companies like Sprint, MCI, or AT&T. Internet backbone maps are here.

Bandwidth - 
Bandwidth is the amount of data that can be transferred over the network in a fixed amount of time. On the Net, it is usually expressed in bits per second (bps) or in higher units like Mbps (millions of bits per second). 28.8 modem can deliver 28,800 bps, a T1 line is about 1.5 Mbps.

BBS (Bulletin Board System) - 
A computerized meeting and announcement system that allows people to carry on discussions, upload and download files, and make announcements without the people being connected to the computer at the same time. There are many thousands (millions?) of BBS's around the world, most are very small, running on a single IBM clone PC with 1 or 2 phone lines. Some are very large and the line between a BBS and a system like CompuServe gets crossed at some point, but it is not clearly drawn.

Binary - 
Data represented in binary format uses only two digits 0 and 1.

binary mode - 
FTP client mode used to transfer binary files (multimedia files, executables and other data files). Not suitable for transferring normal text files.

Bit - 
(Binary DigIT) A single digit number in base 2 in other words either a 1 or a zero. The smallest unit of computerized data. Bandwidth is usually measured in bits-per-second. See Also: Bandwidth, Bps, Byte, Kilobyte, Megabyte.

Body - 
The part of an email message that contains the actual text of the message.

Bookmark - 
A way of storing a frequently visited website address. It is then easier to access the website in the future.

Bot - 
An automated piece of software that can be used in chat rooms or to crawl the web.

Bps - 
(Bits-Per-Second) A measurement of how fast data is moved from one place to another. A 28.8 modem can move 28,800 bits per second. See Also: Bandwidth, Bit

Bridge - 
A network device used to connect two LANs using different cabling.

Broadcast - 
Sending a packet to all machines on the network.

Browser - 
Client software that is used to look at various kinds of Internet resources. Examples include Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator.

Browser sniffing - 
The process in which the web site tries to determine what kind of web browser the user is using. This is done to suit the website to the particular capabilities of the browser.

Burstable Bandwidth - 
A hosting option that allows sites to use the available network capacity to handle periods of peak usage.

Business Hosting - 
Web hosting geared towards the mission,critical functions demanded by business,class customers.

Byte - 
A set of Bits that represent a single character. Usually there are 8 Bits in a Byte, sometimes more, depending on how the measurement is being made. See Also: Bit

C/C++ - 
Popular programming languages (C++ includes objects) that can be used to create server programs that run after compilation. C and C++ were not designed specifically for web programming, but they can still be useful, especially because mature compilers producing very fast code and large code libraries already exist.

Cable Modem - 
A cable modem is used for connecting to the Internet using the cable TV infrastructure. It offers high speed Internet access.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) - 
A style,sheet determines how the HTML document is displayed by the browser. The current version of CSS is version 2 (CSS2).

Certificate - 
Digital ID used for SSL transactions. It includes owner's public key, the name of the owner, the issuer, hostname, and the expiration date.

Certificate Authority - 
An issuer of Security Certificates used in SSL connections.

CGI - 
(Common Gateway Interface) A set of rules that describe how a Web Server communicates with another piece of software on the same machine, and how the other piece of software (the 'CGI program') talks to the web server. Any piece of software can be a CGI program if it handles input and output according to the CGI standard. Usually a CGI program is a small program that takes data from a web server and does something with it, like putting the content of a form into an e-mail message, or turning the data into a database query. CGI "scripts" are just scripts which use CGI. CGI is often confused with Perl, which is a programming language, while CGI is an interface to the server from a particular program.

cgi-bin - 
The most common name of a directory on a web server in which CGI programs are stored. The 'bin' part of 'cgi-bin' is a shorthand version of 'binary', because once upon a time, most programs were referred to as 'binaries'. In real life, most programs found in cgi-bin directories are text files -- scripts that are executed by binaries located elsewhere on the server. While most programs using CGI are stored in this directory, it is not a requirement for using CGI. See Also: CGI

Client - 
A software program that is used to contact and obtain data from a server software program on another computer, often across a great distance. Each client program is designed to work with one or more specific kinds of server programs, and each server requires a specific kind of client. A web browser and an FTP program are specific kinds of clients.

Client/Server - 
A network architecture where a system is divided into two parts: the client and the server.

clustering - 
Connecting many computers and making them appear as one machine. This is done to increase reliability and performance.

Cold Fusion - 
Cold Fusion is a scripting language for web designers that want wish to do advanced development and/or database interfacing. Cold Fusion supports MS Access, dBASE, FoxPro and Paradox databases.

ColdFusion Hosting - 
Web hosting that supports ColdFusion, a web application language introduced by Allaire and currently owned by Macromedia.

Collocation - 
Network Operations Centers offer the ability for customers to place their web servers and other network equipment in their center which is connected via high speed fiber data lines to the backbone of the Internet. Administration is done remotely so that a customer far away can configure and control their equipment.

Colocated Hosting - 
When one party houses their web server(s) at another company's location for Internet connectivity.

com - 
A domain name used by commercial enterprises.

command,line interface - 
The opposite of the GUI (Graphical User Interface). A way of interacting with a computer system using the keyboard and a text,only display. Usually more powerful, but less user,friendly than a GUI.

Contact Record - 
In the case of many registries, contact information for technical, billing and administrative purposes are maintained in their database. It is important to keep your contact records updated to ensure that billing and renewal can proceed without problems.

Control Panel - 
Control panel included in web hosting packages is an online web,based application that allows you to easily manage different aspects of your account. Most control panels will let you upload files, add email accounts, change contact information, set up shopping carts or databases, view usage statistics, etc.

Cookie - 
The most common meaning of Cookie on the Internet refers to a piece of information sent by a web server to a web browser that the browser software is expected to save and to send back to the server whenever the browser makes additional requests from the server. Depending on the type of Cookie used, and the browser's settings, the browser may accept or not accept the Cookie and may save the Cookie for either a short time or a long time. Cookies might contain information such as login or registration information, online shopping cart information, user preferences, etc. When a server receives a request from a browser that includes a Cookie, the server is able to use the information stored in the Cookie. For example, the server might customize what is sent back to the user, or keep a log of particular user's requests. Cookies do not read your hard drive, but they can be used to gather more information about a user than would be possible without them. More details here.

CPU - 
Central Processing Unit. The most important part of the computer.

Crawler - 
Also known as spider, an automated software that retrieves webpages and follows the hyperlinks contained in them. Used to generate indexes used by search engines.

Cyberspace - 
Term originated by author William Gibson in his novel Neuromancer the word Cyberspace is currently used to describe the whole range of information resources available through computer networks.

D Channel - 
The ISDN signaling channel. Runs at 16 or 64 Kbps.

Data transfer - 
In Web hosting, the total size of files transferred by an account in a month. Sites with a lots of graphics, downloads, or streaming audio or video and a lot of visitors will require plans with more available transfer.

Database - 
Data in a structured format stored on a web server. Most popular type is a relational database. The most common query (information retrieval) language for relational databases is SQL. Linux-based hosts most commonly include MySQL database and Windows NT-based hosts usually include Access or MS SQL databases.

Dedicated Hosting - 
Hosting option whereby the host provides and is responsible for the equipment, dedicating an entire server to the client's websites.

Dedicated IP - 
An IP address dedicated to a single website.

Dedicated Server - 
(Link term to http://www.carpathiahost.com/dedicated.php) - Similar to co-location, except that you lease or rent hardware from a Web host. The main advantage over co-location is easier upgrade and usually better support. Getting a dedicated server or co-locating is necessary for sites that outgrow shared servers because they use a lot of bandwidth and resources or they require total control over software environment.

Dedicated Server - 
For those customers that want the advantages of co-location without the hassles of purchasing their own server. See co-location.

Dial up - 
Dialup access is a way of connecting a computer to the Internet using a modem and the telephone line. It is rather slow and blocks the telephone line.

Disk Space - 
The amount of hard drive space on the server that is available to your websites.

DNS - 
Domain Name System. Internet service that maps Internet domains into corresponding IP addresses. DNS database is distributed and replicated among many DNS servers, so when you change your domain's IP address, the changes take a while to propagate.

Domain name - 
Domain name is an easy-to-remember address that can be translated by DNS into server's IP address. Domain names are hierarchical. Domain's suffix indicates which TLD (top level domain) it belongs to, for example .com, .gov, .org, .net, or .jp. Recently ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) added several new TLDs, like .biz, .pro., and .museum.

Domain Parking - 
Providing a nameserver for domains that do have their own hosting yet.

DSL - 
Digital Subscriber Line. A better way of connecting a computer to the Internet using the telephone line. It's faster than the dialup and doesn't block the telephone line. However, it is more expensive because the special equipment is required.

E-Business - 
Using web and Internet technologies in conducting the business activities. Also expanding end enhancing traditional business practices by means of the Internet.

E-Commerce - 
Electronic Commerce. Refers to the general exchange of goods and services via the Internet.

Ecommerce Hosting - 
A hosting plan option that allows a merchant to accept orders online.

E-mail - 
(Electronic Mail) -- Messages, usually text, sent from one person to another via computer. E-mail can also be sent automatically to a large number of addresses (Mailing List). See Also: Listserv, Maillist

Email Forwarding - 
Automatically sends email messages from one email address to another email address.

Email Hosting - 
Web hosting plan that allows users to send and store email, may or may not come with hosting for a website.

Encryption - 
Encryption means encoding data using a cryptographic cipher. Encrypted data can be read (decrypted) only by an authorized entity.

Ethernet - 
Local Area Network (LAN) protocol invented by Xerox Corporation. It is a broadcast protocol that uses CSMA/CD method and utilizes electrical cables. It can run at various speeds: 10Mbps, 100Mbps and even 1000Mbps. IEEE 802.3 standard describes Ethernet. Word Ethernet is also sometimes used to describe the implementation that runs at the speed of 10Mbps.

Extranet - 
A part of the company's network that is made accessible for some group of people. Sometimes protected by a password or some other kind of authentication. It allows users to access some of the non-public data, eg. a person's credit card balance.

FAQ (Frequently Asked Question) - 
(Link to Carpathia Hosts FAQ) Lists of frequently asked questions and answers to them are used as a way of sharing knowledge on the web. They are a very good way of finding solutions to different problems. Some companies include them in their websites to minimize the number of Customer Support inquiries.

Fast Ethernet - 
Fast Ethernet is the implementation of Ethernet standard that operates at the speed of 100Mbps.

Filename extension - 
Last three or four letters of a file name that appear after the dot. Used to designate the type of file and the format used.

Filtering - 
Screening network packets for certain properties, such as the source or destination address, protocol used or even a pattern in the data. It is used in firewalls in order to decide if the traffic is to be forwarded or rejected. Provides the basis for network security.

Firewall - 
Firewall refers to either software-only or separate software and hardware combination that serves to protect an internal network or a computer from attacks and unauthorized access by sitting between the Internet and the internal network.

Free Web Hosting - 
Web hosting offered without monetary cost.

FrontPage Extensions - 
Microsoft's server-side applications that lets users of FrontPage Web site creation tool to incorporate "web-bots" that perform pre-packaged function like full-text Web site searching or adding a hit counter. FrontPage extensions are also available for Unix-based operating systems but some hosts refuse to use them because of potential security holes.

FTP - 
File Transfer Protocol. The Internet protocol defining how to download and upload files between a client and an FTP server. Popular client FTP programs are CuteFTP and WS_FTP. Major browser also have FTP capability.

Gateway - 
The technical meaning is a hardware or software set-up that translates between two dissimilar protocols, for example Prodigy has a gateway that translates between its internal, proprietary e-mail format and Internet e-mail format.

GIF - 
(Graphics Interchange Format) A graphic file format invented by Compuserve. One of the most widely used formats for internet and web. Uses a lossless compression method, thus ensuring that the quality of the image is not lowered.

Gigabit Ethernet - 
Gigabit Ethernet is the Ethernet standard implementation that runs at 1000Mbps.

Gigabyte - 
1024 Megabytes See Also: Byte, Megabyte

Graphical User Interface (GUI) - 
A way of interacting with the computer that relies on graphical symbols. Most often requires a mouse. It is less powerful then the command-line interface, but is more user friendly and is easier to learn for users without technical background.

Hexadecimal color-notation system - 
A way of defining colors. Uses RGB scheme and associates a two digit hexadecimal number with each base color (red, green and blue).

High Bandwidth Hosting - 
Web hosting with capacity to handle higher-than-average traffic volumes.

hit - 
As used in reference to the World Wide Web, 'hit' means a single request from a web browser for a single item from a web server - thus in order for a web browser to display a page that contains 3 graphics, 4 'hits' would occur at the server: 1 for the HTML page, and one for each of the 3 graphics. 'hits' are often used as a very rough measure of load on a server, e.g. 'Our server has been getting 300,000 hits per month.' Because each 'hit' can represent anything from a request for a tiny document (or even a request for a missing document) all the way to a request that requires some significant extra processing (such as a complex search request), the actual load on a machine from 1 hit is almost impossible to define.

Home Page (or Homepage) - 
Several meanings. Originally, the web page that your browser is set to use when it starts up. The more common meaning refers to the main web page for a business, organization, person or simply the main page out of a collection of web pages, e.g. 'Check out so-and-so's new Home Page.' Another sloppier use of the term refers to practically any web page as a 'homepage,' e.g. 'That web site has 65 homepages and none of them are interesting.' See Also: Browser, Web

Host - 
A networked computer dedicated to providing a certain kind of service. Usually refers to a computer that stores the website files and has a web server running on it.

Hosting - 
This term can be used to refer to the housing of a web site, email or a domain. See Email hosting and Web Site hosting for more details.

HTML - 
(Hypertext Markup Language). It is the language in which web pages are written. It allows the images to be combined with text and offers wide range of formatting capabilities. One of the most important features of HTML is hypertext, that allows web pages to be liked one to each other.

HTTP - 
(HyperText Transport Protocol) -- The protocol for moving hypertext files across the Internet. Requires a HTTP client program on one end, and an HTTP server program on the other end. HTTP is the most important protocol used in the World Wide Web (WWW). See Also: Client, Server, WWW

Hyperlink - 
A part of the web page that links to another web page. By clicking on a hyperlink user redirects the browser to another page. The word hyperlink is sometimes shortened to just "link".

Hypertext - 
Generally, any text that contains links to other documents - words or phrases in the document that can be chosen by a reader and which cause another document to be retrieved and displayed.

Image Map - 
An image displayed on the webpage that has different areas that are hyperlinks. By clicking on different parts of the image browser can be redirected to another webpage, or can display modified version of the current one.

IMAP - 
Internet Message Access Protocol. A method allowing a client email program to access remote messages stored on a mail server. The protocol includes operations for creating, deleting, and renaming mailboxes, checking for new messages, message parsing, searching, and setting and clearing flags. IMAP was originally developed in 1986 at Stanford.

internet - 
(Lower case i) Any time you connect 2 or more networks together, you have an internet - as in inter-national or inter-state. See Also: Internet, Network

Internet - 
(Upper case I) The vast collection of inter-connected networks that all use the TCP/IP protocols and that evolved from the ARPANET of the late 60's and early 70's. The Internet now (July 1995) connects roughly 60,000 independent networks into a vast global internet. See Also: internet

Internet backbone - 
An extremely fast network that connects major cities. Most often it utilizes T3 circuits and provides the bandwidth of 45Mbps.

Internet Service Provider - 
An institution that provides access to the Internet in some form, usually for money. See Also: Internet

InterNIC - 
InterNIC (now known as Network Solutions) once held an exclusive contract with the U.S. government to assign domain names ending with a .com, net, and .org. Since their contract expired, the U.S. government has opened the monopoly once held by Network Solutions and now there are many different registrars who can register these domain names.

Intranet - 
A part of an organization's network that is private. Only authorized individuals have access to the intranet. Besides that an intranet is very similar to the Internet in a sense that it offers the same services and uses the same protocols.

IP - 
(Internet Protocol) is tha main protocol used on the Internet.

IP Address - 
Internet Protocol Address, a number used to uniquely identify a computer or device on an internal network or the Internet.

IP Number - 
(Internet Protocol Number) -- Sometimes called a dotted quad. A unique number consisting of 4 parts separated by dots, e.g.165.113.245.2 Every machine that is on the Internet has a unique IP number - if a machine does not have an IP number, it is not really on the Internet. Most machines also have one or more Domain Names that are easier for people to remember. See Also: Domain Name, Internet, TCP/IP

ISP - 
Internet Service Provider. A company that provides its subscribers with Internet access. Customers have a username and a password and can dial-up or use a cable or DSL line to connect to ISP's network which is connected to the Internet. The biggest ISP is AOL.

Java - 
Java is a network-oriented programming language invented by Sun Microsystems that is specifically designed for writing programs that can be safely downloaded to your computer through the Internet and immediately run without fear of viruses or other harm to your computer or files. Using small Java programs (called "applets"), Web pages can include functions such as animations, calculators, and other fancy tricks. We can expect to see a huge variety of features added to the web using Java, since you can write a Java program to do almost anything a regular computer program can do and then include that Java program in a web page.

Java Virtual Machine (JVM, Java Runtime Environment) - 
A set of programs that allow for Java applets to be run on a particular computer system.

JavaScript - 
Simple, client-side programming language created by Sun and Netscape. JavaScript can be embedded in HTML pages to create interactive effects and do tasks like validate form data. JavaScript is a separate language from Java. All popular modern browsers support JavaScript. A few hosts support server-side JavaScript.

JPEG - 
(Joint Photographic Experts Group) A image compression format designed for the Internet. Uses lossy compression, meaning that the quality of the image can be lowered.

JScript - 
Microsoft's implementation of ECMAScript standard based on JavaScript. Limited, object-based, interpreted scripting language. Here is the official JScript site. JScript is comparable to VBScript.

JSP - 
Java Server Pages. Extension of Java Servlet technology for combining Java server-side programs and HTML. JSP pages have an extension .jsp.

Kbps - 
Kilobits per second. 1Kbps = 1024bps.

Kilobyte - 
A thousand bytes. Actually, usually 1024 (210) bytes. See Also: Byte, Bit

Kilobyte (Kb) - 
1024 bytes.

LAN - 
(Local Area Network) -- A computer network limited to the immediate area, usually the same building or floor of a building. See Also: Ethernet

Link - 
Another name for a connection. Sometimes refers to a physical line.

Linux - 
A free UNIX-like operating system developed by Linus Torvalds. Linux and FreeBSD are very often used by hosting companies as their operating systems.

Linux Hosting - 
Web hosting that supports Linux, an open source operating system that was derived from Unix.

Load Balancing - 
Dividing the load of a single website or service over several web servers.

Log File - 
A file that records the activity of a web server.

Login - 
Noun or a verb. Noun: The account name used to gain access to a computer system. Not a secret (contrast with Password). Verb: The act of entering into a computer system, e.g. Login to the WELL and then go to the GBN conference. See Also: Password

LZW compression - 
Lempel Ziv Welch compression - a popular compression algorithm.

MAC Address - 
Media Access Control address (also hardware or physical address). Every device on the Local Area Network has an unique MAC address. It is used to identify devices and to control access to the network using MAC protocol.

Mailing List - 
A way of having a group discussion with list subscribers by email. Emails are sent to all list subscribers. Popular mailing list programs, like Listserv and Majordomo, allow for automated subscription and un-subscription from a mailing list. Some hosting plans allow creation of mailing lists.

Maillist - 
(or Mailing List) A (usually automated) system that allows people to send e-mail to one address, whereupon their message is copied and sent to all of the other subscribers to the maillist. In this way, people who have many different kinds of e-mail access can participate in discussions together.

Mailserver - 
The Internet host (together with the appropriate software) that is used to send, receive and forward email messages.

Mainframe Computer - 
A powerful computer used for computing-intensive tasks.

MBps - 
MegaBytes (MB) per second, 1 MB = 1,048,576 bytes

Megabyte - 
A million bytes. A thousand kilobytes. See Also: Byte, Bit, Kilobyte

Megabyte (MB) - 
1MB = 1024 KiloBytes = 1,048,576 bytes


MHz - 
MegaHertz = 1.000.000 Hertz

Microsoft Access - 
Microsoft's low-end relational database included with the MS Office suite. Here is the official site for Microsoft Access. Cheaper NT hosting plans sometimes include MS Access database.

Microsoft FoxPro - 
Microsoft's RAD tool for creating relational databases. FoxPro is a part of Microsoft's Visual Studio.

Microsoft SQL Server - 
Microsoft's high-end SQL database running on Windows systems. Here is the official Microsoft SQL Server site.

MIDI - 
Musical Instrument Digital Interface -- A network and accompanying protocol developed in the 1970's for transmitting various information between musical and other devices including keyboards, samplers, lights, controllers, etc.

MIME - 
(Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) -- The standard for attaching non-text files to standard Internet mail messages. Non-text files include graphics, spreadsheets, formatted word-processor documents, sound files, etc. An email program is said to be MIME Compliant if it can both send and receive files using the MIME standard. When non-text files are sent using the MIME standard they are converted (encoded) into text - although the resulting text is not really readable.

Mirror - 
Generally speaking, 'to mirror' is to maintain an exact copy of something. Probably the most common use of the term on the Internet refers to 'mirror sites' which are web sites, or FTP sites that maintain exact copies of material originated at another location, usually in order to provide more widespread access to the resource. Another common use of the term 'mirror' refers to an arrangement where information is written to more than one hard disk simultaneously, so that if one disk fails, the computer keeps on working without losing anything. See Also: FTP, Web

Mirror site - 
An FTP site that stores the exact content of some other site. Mirroring is done in order to minimize the load on a particular server and also to increase reliability.

Mirror Sites - 
They are web sites or FTP sites that maintain exact copies of material originated at another location, usually in order to provide more widespread access to the resource.

Miva Empressa - 
Miva's XML based server-side scripting language. Available for multiple platforms. Here is Miva Empressa home page.

Miva Merchant - 
Browser-based storefront development and management system for merchants. Here is Miva Merchant home page.

Modem - 
MOdulator-DEModulator. A device used to transform digital data sent by a computer to analog format suitable for transmission over a telephone line. It also transforms analog signals back to the digital form. A modem is required for the dial up connection to the Internet.

Modify (Domain Name) - 
The database that the TLD registries maintain need to be accurate in order for name resolution, billing, renewal notices and public records to be processed correctly. Typically modifications are required when name servers need to change or the contacts change email or postal address or phone number. The procedures for modifying records will depend on the registry.

Modify (Domain Name) - 
The database that the TLD registries maintain need to be accurate in order for name resolution, billing, renewal notices and public records to be processed correctly. Typically modifications are required when nameservers need to change or the contacts change email or postal address or phone number. The procedures for modifying records will depend on the registry.

Mosaic - 
The first WWW browser that was available for the Macintosh, Windows, and UNIX all with the same interface. Mosaic really started the popularity of the Web. The source-code to Mosaic has been licensed by several companies and there are several other pieces of software as good or better than Mosaic, most notably, Netscape. See Also: Browser, Client, WWW

MP3 - 
An extremely popular lossy audio compression format. Widely used over the Internet.

MPEG - 
(Motion Picture Experts Group) video compression format for movies or animations.

mSQL (Mini SQL) - 
Light-weight relational database. Here is mSQL home page.

Multi-Domain Plan - 
A web hosting plan option that allows multiple domain names to share the resources of the single hosting account.

MX Record: Mail Exchange - 
Mail Exchange record is part of the zone file and is used to designate which mail server machine should process email for a specific domain.

MySQL - 
Most popular open-source relational database. Many Unix-based plans allow MySQL databases. Here is MySQL home page.

Name Servers - 
A computer that performs the mapping of easily remembered domain names to IP addresses. Sometimes referred to as a host server.

Netiquette - 
Informal set of rules that should be followed when using internet services like email, message boards and newsgroups. Describes what it means to be "well behaved" while interacting with other people online.

Netscape - 
A WWW Browser and the name of a company. The Netscape (tm) browser was originally based on the Mosaic program developed at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA). Netscape has grown in features rapidly and is widely recognized as the best and most popular web browser. Netscape corporation also produces web server software. Netscape provided major improvements in speed and interface over other browsers, and has also engendered debate by creating new elements for the HTML language used by Web pages -- but the Netscape extensions to HTML are not universally supported. The main author of Netscape, Mark Andreessen, was hired away from the NCSA by Jim Clark, and they founded a company called Mosaic Communications and soon changed the name to Netscape Communications Corporation. See Also: Browser, Mosaic, Server, WWW

Netscape Communications - 
A company that developed one of the most popular web browsers: Netscape Navigator.

Network - 
Any time you connect 2 or more computers together so that they can share resources, you have a computer network. Connect 2 or more networks together and you have an internet. See Also: internet, Internet, Intranet

Network Management - 
Network management can be defined as a set of activities (e.g. network monitoring, gathering and analyzing the statistics, adjusting network configuration) performed in order to increase the network performance and availability.

Newsgroup - 
A virtual Internet place where people exchange thoughts, ideas and interests, amuse themselves and do a zillion other things, all by means of text messages.

Newsreader - 
An application that allows to use newsgroups.

NIC - 
(Networked Information Center) -- Generally, any office that handles information for a network. The most famous of these on the Internet is Network Solutions, which is where new domain names are registered. Another definition: NIC also refers to Network Interface Card which plugs into a computer and adapts the network interface to the appropriate standard.

NIC - 
Network Interface Card - a part of the computer hardware responsible for connecting a particular machine to the local area network.

OC1 - 
Fiber optic connection capable of transferring data at 51.85 Mbps.

OC-1, OC-3, OC-12, OC-24, OC-48 - 
Optical Carrier transmission speeds, used in fiber optic networks conforming to SONET standard. OC-1 is 51.85 Mbps. Higher levels are multiples of that speed.

ODBC - 
(Open Database Connectivity) A standard allowing applications to access different databases in an uniform way.

Offline - 
The state of the computer when it is not connected to the network (i.e. it is not online).

Operating system - 
A software heart of the computer. It is a set of programs that manage the hardware resources of a computer, provide the environment for application programs to run and provide the user interface. Most known operating systems are: different flavors of Unix (SunOs, HP-UX, Irix, FreeBSD, Linux,...), MacOS and Windows.

Packet Switching - 
The method used to move data around on the Internet. In packet switching, all the data coming out of a machine is broken up into chunks, each chunk has the address of where it came from and where it is going. This enables chunks of data from many different sources to co-mingle on the same lines, and be sorted and directed to different routes by special machines along the way. This way many people can use the same lines at the same time.

Page - 
Name for a basic web document. Websites usually consist of many (web) pages.

Parking (Domain Name) - 
Registries require the use of name servers or hosts for every domain registered. Parking is the process by which someone selects a domain name, and "parks" it by registering the domain name under someone's name servers.

Password - 
A code used to gain access to a locked system. Good passwords contain letters and non-letters and are not simple combinations such as virtue7. A good password might be: Hot-6 See Also: Login

Peer-to-Peer network - 
A peer-to-peer network is a collection of computers that can communicate and share information, but that don't have any kind of hierarchical structure. This is the opposite of the client/server model.

Perl - 
Open source CGI scripting programming language. Written in 1987. Still one of the most popular web programming languages mostly due to its powerful text-manipulation facilities. A huge number of Perl scripts are available for download.

PHP - 
PHP is an free, open-source server-side scripting language. PHP code can be embedded in HTML. PHP files usually have extensions like .php or .php3. PHP language style is similar to C and Java. Here is the PHP group web site. Other popular server-side scripting languages are ASP, Perl, ColdFusion, TCL, Python, and JSP.

PHP Hosting - 
Web hosting that supports PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor, an open source server-side scripting language.

PKZIP or PKUNZIP - 
Popular compression and decompression programs.

Plug-in - 
A piece of software that adds features to a larger piece of software. The idea behind plug-ins is that a small piece of software is loaded into memory by the larger program, adding a new feature, and that users need only install the few plug-ins that they need, out of a much larger pool of possibilities

POP - 
(Point of Presence, also Post Office Protocol) -- A Point of Presence usually means a city or location where a network can be connected to, often with dial up phone lines. So if an Internet company says they will soon have a POP in Belgrade, it means that they will soon have a local phone number in Belgrade and/or a place where leased lines can connect to their network. A second meaning, Post Office Protocol refers to the way e-mail software such as Eudora gets mail from a mail server. When you obtain a SLIP, PPP, or shell account you almost always get a POP account with it, and it is this POP account that you tell your e-mail software to use to get your mail. See Also: SLIP, PPP

POP - 
Point of Presence or Post Office Protocol. A Point of Presence usually means a location where a network can be connected to, often with dial up phone lines. A second meaning, Post Office Protocol refers to the way e-mail software such as Eudora gets mail from a mail server. When you obtain a SLIP, PPP or shell account you almost always get a POP account with it, and it is this POP account that you tell your e-mail software to use to get your mail.

POP - 
Post Office Protocol. Popular but inflexible email retrieval standard. All messages are downloaded at the name time and can only be manipulated on a client machine. Current version is POP3. Also see IMAP.

Port - 
A socket on the computer or other network device used to connect it to the network.

Posting - 
A single message entered into a network communications system. E.g. A single message posted to a newsgroup or message board. See Also: Newsgroup

PPP - 
Point to Point Protocol. Most known as a protocol that allows a computer to use a regular telephone line and a modem to make TCP/IP connections.

Propagation - 
The process whereby the name servers throughout the world have updated their records for a specific domain. For example, if you move your domain from one host to another, it will take around 24 hours or so for the new address to broadcast everywhere. During that 24 hour period, the traffic is decreasing at the old location and increasing at the new location.

Protocol - 
A set of rules by following which two parties can communicate. The TCP/IP protocol suite is the basis of todays Internet.

Python - 
Interpreted programming language, sometimes offered by hosts for server-side scripting. Here is the Python home page.

RAID - 
Redundant Array of Independent (or Inexpensive) Disks. Type of disk, often used on servers, where several physical disks are combined into an array for better speed and fault tolerance.

Raw Logs - 
Another name for a server's log files, the line-by-line activity of a server, not the summaries of this activity.

Real Audio / Real Video - 
Enables users of personal computers and other consumer electronic devices to send and receive audio, video and other multimedia services using the web.

Registrar (Domain Name) - 
Some registries don't provide the ability for end users to register domains with them directly. They might require end users to purchase the domain through an internet provider that is acting as the registrar.

Registry (Domain Name) - 
An organization responsible for assigning domain names for the TLD that they manage. Furthermore, it is their responsibility to update the global DNS tables that all nameservers use to resolve domain names. For example, InterNIC is the registry for .COM, .NET and .ORG domain names.

Renewal (Domain Name) - 
Most TLDs need to be renewed at some scheduled yearly interval. This is an opportunity for both the registrant and the registry to update their records as well as collect any applicable renewal fees.

Reseller - 
Resellers are usually smaller companies that usually don't own the server with user accounts but can perform most administrative functions.

Reseller Hosting - 
Arrangement whereby a company selling hosting to consumers uses the datacenter and equipment of another company.

Resolution (Domain Name) - 
The conversion of an internet address or domain name into the corresponding physical location.

RJ-11 - 
A standard connector that is used to connect to the telephone line.

RJ-45 - 
A standard connector that is used to connect to the Ethernet network.

Router - 
A special-purpose computer (or software package) that handles the connection between 2 or more networks. Routers spend all their time looking at the destination addresses of the packets passing through them and deciding which route to send them on. See Also: Network, Packet Switching

RSA - 
A public key cryptosystem developed by Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman. It can be used to encrypt session keys and to generate digital certificates.

S/MIME - 
Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions - a way of making email messages more secure. S/MIME uses digital certificates to attest the message origin and encryption to ensure that message could not be read while in transit.

Scripting Language - 
A programming language in which programs are the series of commands that are interpreted and then executed one by one. Doesn't require the compilation phase, for the price of lower performance.

Search engine - 
An Internet service that stores a vast number of web pages and allows for fast searching among them. Also, a piece of software that implements a website search functionality.

Search form - 
An online form in which a query to the webpages database is specified.

search indexer - 
A search engine uses search indexer to provide faster search.

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 SSL connection to be created both sides must have a valid Security Certificate.

Self-extracting Archive - 
An archived file that is also an executable program. The original archived file is decompressed when that program is run.

Serial Line Internet Protocol (SLIP) - 
Another network protocol used to connect computers to the networks. Similar to PPP.

Server - 
A computer, or a software package, that provides a specific kind of service to client software running on other computers. The term can refer to a particular piece of software, such as a WWW server, or to the machine on which the software is running, e.g.Our mail server is down today, that's why e-mail isn't getting out. A single server machine could have several different server software packages running on it, thus providing many different servers to clients on the network. See Also: Client, Network

Service Provider - 
A company that provides access to the Internet, usually for a fee.

Session - 
All the data exchange between two parties, starting when the connection is established and ending when connection terminates.

Setup Fee - 
A one-time fee paid by a hosting client to at the beginning of a new hosting contract.

Shared Hosting - 
Hosting option whereby several client websites are housed on and share the resources of a web server.

Shared IP - 
An IP address shared by multiple websites.

Shockwave - 
Shockwave, produced by Macromedia, allows you to view new forms of entertainment on the web, such as games, music, rich-media chat, interactive product demos and e-merchandising applications. More details here.

Shopping Cart - 
Software that allows users to select products from a Web catalog, modify their choices, calculate prices, review their choices, and order them. Many hosts with e-commerce plans offer installed shopping carts, but you can always get a shopping cart of your choice instead.

SHTTP - 
Secure HTTP. A version of HTTP protocol that uses encryption to assure that the traffic between the server and the browser cannot be eveasdropped on. Should be considered mandatory for all e-commerce applications.

Signature - 
A few lines of text that are automatically attached at the end of each email message by the email client. Usually it's some personal identification or an (un)interesting quote.

Signed applet - 
An applet that has a digital signature to confirm that it originates from the legitimate server.

Site Monitoring - 
A service that regularly checks a site and alerts the administrator in the event of a problem.

Smileys - 
Characters used in text-only communications to convey emotions. Example :) :-) :O :(

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. Almost all Internet email is sent and received by clients and servers using SMTP, thus if one wanted to set up an email server on the Internet one would look for email server software that supports SMTP. See Also: Client, Server

Snail Mail - 
A normal paper mail delivered by the Post Office.

Spam (or Spamming) - 
An inappropriate attempt to use a mailing list, or USENET 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 probably comes from a famous Monty Python skit which featured the word spam repeated over and over. The term may also have come from someone's low opinion of the food product with the same name, which is generally perceived as a generic content-free waste of resources. (Spam is a registered trademark of Hormel Corporation, for its processed meat product.) See Also: Maillist, USENET

Spider - 
An automated software that retrieves webpages and follows the hyperlinks contained in them. Used to generate indexes used by search engines.

SQL - 
(Structured Query Language) -- A 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. SSL used mostly (but not exclusively) in communications between web browsers and web servers. URL's that begin with 'https' indicate that an SSL connection will be used. SSL provides 3 important things: Privacy, Authentication, and Message Integrity.

Static (or dedicated) IP - 
If a host offers a static IP, it means that your site will be assigned a unique and unchanging IP address.

STP - 
Shielded Twisted Pair. Cabling consisting of pairs of insulated wires wrapped in metal to minimize interference.

Streaming - 
Playing multimedia files (audio and video) without requiring a full download. Audio and video are compressed but they still may require a lot of bandwidth. Most popular streaming media formats are Real Audio/Video.

Subdomain - 
Subdomain is a way to divide your site into sections with short and easy to remember names. For example, a section of this site for new users could be at newbies.webhostingratings.com. Other use of subdomains might be to let somebody else use your account (but this may not be allowed by your host's terms of use). Large websites might make their subdomains point to another server to reduce load on the main www site.

Surfing - 
Using world wide web is often referred to as "surfing the web".

Switch - 
A switch is a network device that forwards packets. Switches are more intelligent than hubs in a sense that they forward packets only to the necessary ports and not to all the ports.

T-1 - 
A leased-line connection capable of carrying data at 1,544,000 bits per second. At maximum theoretical capacity, a T-1 line could move a megabyte in less than 10 seconds. That is still not fast enough for full-screen, full-motion video, for which you need at least 10,000,000 bits per second. T-1 is the fastest speed commonly used to connect networks to the Internet.

T-3 - 
A leased-line connection capable of carrying data at 44,736,000 bits-per-second. This is more than enough to do full-screen, full-motion video. See Also: Bandwidth, Bit, Byte, Ethernet, T-1

TCP - 
(Transmission Control Protocol) is the most important of the network protocols used in the Internet.

TCP/IP - 
(Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) -- This is the suite of protocols that defines the Internet. Originally designed for the UNIX operating system, TCP/IP software is now available for every major kind of computer operating system. To be truly on the Internet, your computer must have TCP/IP software. See Also: IP Number, Internet, UNIX

Telnet - 
Character-based protocol for connecting with remote systems. Still popular among hosts, but it is being replaced by much more secure SSH access.

Terabyte - 
1024 gigabytes.

Terabyte - 
1024 gigabytes. See Also: Byte, Kilobyte

Terabyte (TB) - 
1024 gigabytes

Terminal - 
A device that allows you to send commands to a computer somewhere else. At a minimum, this usually means a keyboard and a display screen and some simple circuitry. Usually you will use terminal software in a personal computer - the software pretends to be (emulates) a physical terminal and allows you to type commands to a computer somewhere else.

Terminal Server - 
A special purpose computer that has places to plug in many modems on one side, and a connection to a LAN or host machine on the other side. Thus the terminal server does the work of answering the calls and passes the connections on to the appropriate node. Most terminal servers can provide PPP or SLIP services if connected to the Internet.

TLD - 
Top Level Domain. A TLD is the uppermost in the hierarchy of domain names. For example, simplythebest.net is our domain name. The "net" is considered the TLD and the "simplythebest.net" is considered the second level domain. Together they form a domain name which is unique. There are two types of TLDs. The most common type is the Generic or Global TLDs which include .COM, .NET, .ORG, .MIL, .INT and .EDU. There is a possibility that new gTLDs will be introduced in the near future.

Traceroute - 
A computer program that lists network hosts visited by a packed on the way to its destination. Very useful for network debugging.

Trademark - 
As it relates to domain names... a word, phrase or slogan used to identify and distinguish the source of the goods or services.

Traffic - 
Data packets being transmitted over a network.

Transfer (Domain Name) - 
On occasion, domains are sold to another organization or sometimes the name of a company might change. Most registries require a letter of permission from the old owner to hand over control to the new owner. The procedures for Transfer of ownership will depend on the registry.

Unicode - 
A 16 bit ISO 10646 character set. It can accommodate way more characters that ASCII, thus allowing for easier internationalization.

UNIX - 
A computer operating system. UNIX is designed to be used by many people at the same time (it is multi-user) and has TCP/IP built-in. It is the most common operating system for servers on the Internet. More details here.

Unix Hosting - 
Web hosting that supports Unix, an operating system that comes in several proprietary versions.

Unlimited Bandwidth - 
A claim that users of a hosting plan will not be charged extra fees for very high levels of data transfer. *

UPS - 
Uninterruptible Power Supply. UPS keeps the server running on a battery for several minutes after a power outage, allowing for a clean shutdown without loss of data. UPS can also shield the server from line voltage spikes and drops.

Uptime Guarantee - 
An assurance that a hosting company's uptime will meet an agreed-upon percentage.

URL - 
(Uniform Resource Locator) -- The standard way to give the address of any resource on the Internet that is part of the World Wide Web (WWW). A URL looks like this: (http://www.1001resources.com) or (telnet://anywhere.you.want) or (news:new.newusers.questions) etc. The most common way to use a URL is to enter into a WWW browser program, such as Netscape, or Lynx. See Also: Browser, WWW

USENET - 
A world-wide system of discussion groups, with comments passed among hundreds of thousands of machines. Not all USENET machines are on the Internet, maybe half. USENET is completely decentralized, with over 10,000 discussion areas, called newsgroups. See Also: Newsgroup

VBScript - 
Microsoft Visual Basic Scripting Edition. Interpreted scripting language (subset of MS Visual Basic language) for creating scripts that can be embedded in HTML pages or for creating ActiveX Controls. Meant as an alternative to JavaScript. Here is the official VBScript site. VBScript is comparable to JScript.

viewer - 
An stand-alone application used to display files of different formats. For example a QuickTime move viewer or a JPG file viewer.

Virus - 
A virus is a malicious program written to do as much harm as possible. Viruses can spread themselves over the network.

VPN - 
(Virtual Private Network). A virtual private network is a method of accessing the private network in a secure way over public communication lines and networks.

W3C - 
World Wide Web Consortium. An international industry consortium that develops standards for the world wide web.

WAN - 
(Wide Area Network) -- Any internet or network that covers an area larger than a single building or campus. See Also: Internet, internet, LAN, Network

WAN - 
Wide Area Network. Any internet or network that covers an area larger than a single building or campus.

WAV - 
An audio file format. Very accurate, but offers no compression, thus resulting in very large files.

Web - 
See: WWW

Web Hosting - 
The business of providing the storage, connectivity, and services necessary to serve files for a website.

Web Hosting Control Panel - 
A web interface offered by hosting companies so customers can administer their account.

Web Mail - 
Email that is accessed via a web browser.

Web Server - 
A computer that stores web pages and delivers them on request to the web browsers of client computers.

Webmaster - 
A person responsible for the maintenance of a particular website.