Internet Tech Terms, Facts and Trivia that You May NOT Know

Most of you know what a modem is, but did you know that it stands for MOdulator/DEModulator?

The Internet was originally developed to serve the Department of Defense; it was used only for that and for communications between educational institutions. It didn’t have any of the fancy pictures and designs that we have now.

The formation of ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, in 1969), the government agency that started the Internet, was part of the U.S. reaction to Russia’s launch of Sputnik in 1957.

Handshake-The screeching sounds you hear when modems connect

There’s actually a big difference between hi-speed Internet and hi-speed dial-up. Hi-speed Internet uses a faster broadband connection, while hi-speed dial-up offers a slightly faster dial-up connection (Software can be attained to speed up transmissions).

Firewall-A security measure that protects a computer or a computer network from unauthorized accesss. A firewall can be software, hardware, or a combination of both.

The term “Internet” first came to be in 1974.

Al Gore (yes, THE one) is widely acknowledged as probably doing more than any other elected official to support the growth and development of the Internet from the 1970s to the 21^st century (He did NOT invent the Internet, however).

A file can take one hour to download over a dial-up connection using a standard 56K modem. It’ll take between 2.2 and 13 minutes on a cable connection and between 2.2 and 26 minutes on a DSL connection.

T1 and T3 lines are special hi-speed lines used by large institutions and businesses. They generally use fiber-optic cable and can carry a number of phone and Internet connections at the same time. A typical T1 line has 24 individual channels; a T3 line has 672 (You don’t need these for home use).

ISDN stands for Integrated Services Digital Network. This Internet connection requires a special type of dedicated digital phone line and a special ISDN adapter, also called an ISDN modem. Transmission speed is much faster than dial-up because the signals received are already in a digital format. ISDN works like most broadband connections, but it’s slower and more costly than most of them. Consider this only if there are no otherbroadband connections available.

Get recommendations for Internet Service Providers from friends and family. There’s nothing like first-hand experience to determine service quality!

The average computer owner uses less than 10% of their computer’s capabilities.

In 1994, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), a group dedicated to the Web’s full potential, promoted and developed standards for it.

If you decide to use a browser other than Internet Explorer, don’t uninstall or ever delete Explorer. Just let it remain intact. You may need it as a backup.

Toolbar-A strip of words or small pictures called icons in a software program. The

toolbar is usually located near the top of the screen below the Menu Bar.

“grayed out“-This is when the Back and Forward icons are a pale gray in color right after you open your browser. Both of these functions will be unavailable because you haven’t visited any other web page yet.

Charley Kline at UCLA was the first to use the Internet. He used ARPANET as he tried to connect from UCLA to Stanford Research Institute on Oct. 29^th, 1969. The system crashed when he reached the “G” in “LOGIN”.

Hot links-Just another name for hyperlinks

The older operating system DOS (Disk Operating System) used the backslash (). The Internet’s based on the UNIX system and uses the forward slash (/). UNIX stands for UNIpleX information and computer services. It’s pronounced yoo-niks.

Extension-The category of the domain name, which is all simply this:

www.associatedcontent.com

domain name extension

Other common extensions are .net, .org., and .gov; a country code is also an extension, such as: .au-Australia, .us-USA, and .ca-Canada, among others.

Not all web pages are part of the World Wide Web. www. is not part of every web address.

HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol. This is the set of rules and standards that enable computers to exchange information. It defines how web pages are formatted and transmitted.

If you see a web address that reads https://, the “s” means that this web page is secure.

There was a time when computers and Internet browers couldn’t translate capital letters in web addresses. That’s why all URLs (Uniform Resource Locators-or web addresses) are traditionally written in lowercase.

In the Internet’s early days, people were hired to browse the Web and catalog information they found for use in search engines.

Amazon.com started as a Web-based bookseller in 1995.

Click-through-When one clicks on an ad in a website .

A click-through rate is the number of times that an ad is clicked versus the number of times that it’s viewed.

When the Internet first became popular, just about everything offered on it was for free. Many still are, but now you may be charged for “premium content”.

“tip boxes”-The online equivalent to the jar on the bar for the bartender or on the piano for the pianist. If you have read or used a site’s content and are supportive of the site’s creators’ efforts, you’re asked to leave a tip or donation. Some websites still use them.

“Gatored“-The practice (By several online companies) of using software programs that position ads exactly where advertisers want them most-right in front of you as you’re visiting another site. This was named after Gator, one of the most popular applications underlying it.

Hijackware-Applications that whisk consumers from a point of sale at one site to a competitor’s site.

Online hijacking-When you are taken to a website that you didn’t intend to go to (Don’t you just hate it when this happens?)

Home page hijacking-When your home page had been changed without your knowledge or permission (If your home page has been hijacked, enter the name of the website you now see as your home page into any search engine. You will find information about the hijacking and how to correct it.

Web bug-A graphic on a web page or in an e-mail message that is designed to monitor you as you view the web page (They’re only 1 x 1 pixel in size, which means they’re virtually invisible to the website visitor. They don’t steal personal information; they can only gather it. Not all web bugs are bad, but you are being traced.)

Stationery-For e-mail, it’s used the same as for letters. It can look like colored paper, logos, icons, pictures, and other customized graphics.

The @ sign has become so popular that in Feb. 2004, a unique Morse code for “@” was started:

:..–.-..

(Dit-Dah-Dah-Dit-Dah-Dit)

It’s the first addition to the Morse code since World War I.

Did you know that typing in all capital letters is considered SHOUTING online?

Have you ever noticed when composing an e-mail that in addition to the “To:” and “From:” lines, you have “CC:” and “BCC:” lines?

The CC line goes back to the days of typewriters and means “Carbon Copy“; the address or addresses in this line are not those of the primary receiver, but rather additional people who would be interested in receiving this particular e-mail.

BCC stands for “Blind Carbon Copy“. This means that the people whose e-mail addresses appear in this line will receive copies of the e-mail, but their names and e-mail addresses will not be visible to the other recipients of the e-mail.

Never send an e-mail with no subject line. It can easily be mistaken for spam and be trashed.

Queue-A temporary holding plan for data

Pope John Paul II became the first e-savvy pontiff; he started using e-mail back in 1978.

If you mistakenly delete an e-mail that you want to get back, you can often find it in the Trash or Deleted Items folder. Just make sure you do this ASAP, for many e-mail programs are set to automatically “empty the trash” within a certain time frame.

You can only see e-mail stationery if your e-mail program is set up to send and receive HTML format.

200 known spammers are responsible for 80% of spam.

Spit-Spam received through Internet telephone

Spim-Spam received through instant messaging

Between 40 and 50% of all e-mail is spam.

Zombie-A computer attached to the Internet that has been infiltrated with a hidden software program, allowing the computer to be remotely controlled by others.

White or Safe list-A list of approved e-mail addresses

In a message board, a thread is a sequence of messages usually related to the same topic.

Message boards and Internet groups developed from the bulletin board systems (BBS) that were operated by online hobbyists in the late 1970s and ’80s.

The first BBS went online on Feb. 16^th, 1978 in Chicago.

Did you know that all message board conversations and many chat room postings are archived and might be able to be read for years to come? You do now.

ICQ (“I Seek You“) was the first instant messaging service. It was started in Nov. 1996.

XML (Extensible Markup Language)-A type of Web language similar to HTML, but a little more advanced.

Users of most older versions of the Mac operating system do not have to worry about viruses, for the most part, because very few were aimed at these computers. There’s been a few viruses aimed at the newer Macs OS X, so if you use OS, look into a good anti-virus program.

Security hole-An entry point through which hackers and virus creators can infiltrate a computer, steal personal information, and perform other devious tasks.

The first computer bug was a real one, a moth that was found in a Mark II computer in 1945.

Patch-A piece of computer code that is inserted or patched into the executable program to repair the bug and enable the software to function as it was intended.

Source code-A computer program that’s written in a programming language such as C++ or Cobol. This code is run through a compiler, which translates that language into a set of instructions called object code. Then the object code is passed through a link editor, which changes it into machine code.

Service pack-A collection of patches

Bots-Spyware programs

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