Over the next few weeks, I’ll be adding to this list of (the most) common Internet terms — so that you know what FTP, GIF, WYSIWYG, ETC (as in et cetera :P) are.

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ASCII
(pronounced “Ask-ee”) An acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange. Easily transferred over networks, ASCII is plain, unadorned text without style or font specifications.

Bandwidth
The amount of data you are allowed to send via an Internet connection. When you view a web page, you are using that site’s allocated bandwidth to display the files.

DNS (Domain Name Service/System/Servers)
A web server database that translates domain names into IP addresses.

The Internet’s machines are concerned with IP addresses. If you type in the shared IP address for Dragonsinn.net, you will arrive at the machine that contains the web server for the site (along with a whole bunch of other websites, because mine isn’t a dedicated IP).

Domain names are actually a human convenience.

External Viewer
A program used for presenting graphics, audio and video files. The program allows the viewing of GIF and JPEG files and the hearing of AU files.

FTP (File Transfer Protocol)
The sending of files between two computers.

FTP Server
A web server you log onto, and upload files to (or download from). Anonymous FTP allows files to be downloaded from an FTP server without a user account.

I use Core FTP.

Hotlink
A pointer to another document. This differs from a hyperlink/normal link, in the sense that you directly link to another website’s image/video files.

This is very bad because you are stealing the bandwidth of the other website. You should always upload your own files onto your own server.

Better still, disable hotlinking by adding a .htaccess file to your main directory, ha ha.

IP Address (Internet Protocol Address)
A unique number that identifies every computer on the Internet (like 123.654.22.240). Hackers galore. More on that another time.

MFA
In Internet terms, “Made For AdSense”. Blog/sites that mainly consist of affiliate links and/or not much unique content.

WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get)
Basically, this means that a web page editor displays in exactly the same way as it would appear on the web. In simpler terms, the “compose” feature when writing a blog post (as opposed to HTML mode).

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References & More Reading:

W3C - Online Web Tutorials

How Stuff Works - DNS

What Is Hotlinking and Bandwidth Theft?

A Beginner’s Web Glossary

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