Glossary: Common Terms
AAAA record
AAAA Records store a 128-bit Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) address, which do not fit the standard A Record format. It maps the hostname to an address associated with a domain name and specifies that AAAA Records must be processed.
Admin Contact
The Admin Contact represents the domain registrant and domain name. This contact is authorized to initiate changes with the domain registrar.
Admin email
The Admin Email is listed for the administrative contact for the domain. During the transfer process, the Admin Email receives information relevant to the completion of the transfer.
Affiliate Program
An Affiliate Program gives individuals access to their site to provide their products or services.
Aliased Nameserver
An Aliased Nameserver is owned by a hosting provider that can be labeled by an individual.
Apache
The Apache program is a well known open source web server. It supports Perl and PHP scripts.
Applet
An Applet is a java application that can run inside a web page and is independent of the operating systems on which it runs.
Application Service Provider
An Application Service Provider offers software application abilities to users over the Internet from a centralized data center.
Archives
An Archive displays a collection of all of a blogger's posts on one page categorized by date or category.
A Record
An A Record is the part of the zone file that directs the domain name to a specific IP address. A Records are modified routinely when users want to point their domain name to the IP assigned to their hosting account.
Assisted Server
An Assisted Server has admin capabilities managed by the hosting account and generally include additional technical support for the server.
ASP
The Microsoft scripting language, ASP or ASP.NET is used in building dynamic websites. Typically sites with ASP are compatible with Windows accounts.
Audio Streaming
A widely used feature, Audio Streaming provides audio content or music on a website. Audio Streaming increases a Web site's bandwidth usage significantly.
Authentication
Authentication identifies an individual usually with a username and password.
Authorization Code
The Authorization Code grants authority or permission for the completion of the transfer to the customer's new domain provider.
Auto Responder
The Auto Responder sends a preprogrammed response automatically to emails received. This service provides a brief response that alerts customers that you are on vacation and will respond when you are back in the office.
Backbone
The high speed line or series of connections known as the Backbone forms a major pathway inside of a network.
Backorder
A Backorder puts a user in line to capture a domain name before it expires and is released to the market.
Backups
Most web hosts offer Backups of data on their servers every twenty four hours to prevent lost information.
Bandwidth
The Bandwidth is the capacity of a site or connection to carry information. Bandwidth plays an important role in how many visitors can download a site at a time with efficiency.
Blog
A Blog is the abbreviation for Weblog. Blogs represent opinions or thoughts of the website author and are updated on a consistent basis for viewing by the general public.
Blogcast
A Blogcast is a blog and a podcast both merged into a single website.
Blogger
A Blogger is the author of a Weblog.
Blogging
Blogging is the act of writing and posting to a blog.
Blogosphere
A Blogosphere is the Internet blogging community.
Blogroll
A Blogroll is a list of links to other blogs located in the sidebar.
Browser
Browsers are applications used to view and work on the Internet. Popular Browsers include Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Safari.
Browser Report
A Browser Report provides a thorough breakdown of popular web browsers each time they visit a user's website.
Business Registration
Business Registration provides customers with additional information on the whois directory results in regards to business hours and other company specific information.
Captcha
An image known as a Captcha contains a numerical or alphabetic code used on web pages to prevent accounts from being created by spiders or programs.
Carbon Copy
The Carbon Copy option sends a second copy of each email to the address the account owner indicates.
Cash Parking
Cash Parking is an online monetization system for domains that uses parked pages with commercial listings. Each time a pay per click ad is visited from the page it generates revenue for the domain owner.
Catch-all
A Catch-all is an email account for a domain that catches all of the email addressed to the domain name is known as a Catch-all. These accounts ensure businesses that they won't miss any email by sending any email message ending in their domain name to the Catch-all account, whether or not the first portion of the address is spelled correctly.
Certified Domain
A Certified domain provides the owner's Web site with a certified seal that alerts customers that the owner is the legal originator of the domain. This feature eases customer concerns and assures them that vendors are who they say they are.
CGI
The CGI program is used for translating data from a web server to display in on a web page or in an email. The transfer of data between the script and the server allows html pages to interact with other applications.
CGI bin
The CGI Bin stores CGI scripts on the server.
Click-through
Click-through describes the ratio of clicks on a specific advertisement or banner ad.
Clustered Hosting
Clustered Hosting eliminates issues typical of shared hosting by providing customers with a way of handling security, balancing loads and vital site resources.
Cname
A Cname contains the name of the client's principal identifier.
Co-location
Co-location entails renting a secure space with reliable network connectivity in a data center while maintaining personal user equipment.
Co-location Center
A Co-location Center is a kind of data center where multiple customers locate networks.
Commentator
Commentators leave remarks in relation to a blog entry.
Comments
Comments enable readers to leave their feedback to blog posts.
Cookie
A Cookie is a message that the Web server sends to the Web browser. The browser stores the messages in text files. These messages are sent back to the server each time the browser requests a page and help to identify users and prepare customized logins for them.
Country Code
A Country Code is a two letter abbreviation for a country after the dot in a domain name.
Cron Jobs
The Cron Jobs are a tool used to schedule commands to be executed periodically.
CSS
A style sheet language used to describe the presentation (look and formatting) of a document written in a markup language. It is commonly used to style web pages written in HTML and XHTML, but the language can be applied to any kind of XML document, inclduing SVG and XUL.
Custom MX records
Custom MX records are created when a user's hosting is active through one provider and their email service is active through another.
Data transfer
Data transfer is the amount of data transferred from an account as site viewers visit pages on the website. Sites with an abundance of audio, video and images that generates a large amount of traffic should consider selecting a hosting plan and provider that allows for a high range of data transfer.
Data transfer
Data transfer is the amount of data transferred from an account as site viewers visit pages on the website. Sites with an abundance of audio, video and images that generates a large amount of traffic should consider selecting a hosting plan and provider that allows for a high range of data transfer.
DBA
A DBA or Database Administrator is in charge of the physical aspect of the data warehouse including design, performance and maintenance work like backups.
Dedicated Hosting
Dedicated Hosting is generally reserved for one Web site and is used by individual clients.
Dedicated IP
A Dedicated IP is used to preview a site before publishing to the world wide web.
Digital Signature
A Digital Signature is an encrypted message that ensures a message was sent by the person who claims to have sent it.
DNS
The Domain Name System or DNS stores information on domain names and host names.
Domain
A Domain is the part of the URL that locates a group or entity on the Internet.
Domain Transfer
A Domain Transfer moves the domain from one registrar to another. Customers have to wait 60 days to transfer domains after a purchase, a renewal or a change to the domain information.
File Manager
The File Manager helps you to easily sort, rename and upload files from your hosting account.
FTP
File transfer protocol, or FTP is a way to transfer files across the Internet.
FTP Client
Our FTP Client provides you with an easy way to upload your website straight from your hosting account.
Forwarding
The Forwarding process directs a domain to another web address to view the content of another site using the original domain name.
Favicon
A Favicon is a small graphic that appears to the left of the web address in the address bar.
Firewall
A Firewall secures a network and protects it from access by unauthorized viewers.
Footer
The Footer is the bottom portion of the blog that lists navigation and copyright information.
Flash
Macromedia's widely known animation software, Flash, requires little bandwidth and displays a moving or changing sequence of graphics. Flash is commonly used to provide Web sites with graphically driven introductions.
Forum
A Forum is a Web site where users post messages and replies on topics of interest.
Google Sitemap
Google Sitemap allows a webmaster to tell Google about URLs on a site that are available for crawling.
Header
The Header is the top portion of the blog that lists the blog title.
Hosting
Hosting is the storage space or capacity for a Web site on the Internet.
Host Name
The Host Name is the name given to a machine which is the part of the Internet address located just to the left of the dot.
Host Report
A Host Report identifies the fifty ISPs or computers that visit the site most frequently.
HTML
HTML (HyperText Markup Language) is a simple markup language used in writing website documents.
HTTP
HTTP or Hypertext Transfer Protocol is the set of regulations for making the transfer of files on the World Wide Web.
Hypertext
Hyper Text is a collection of documents containing links that allow the reader to move easily from one document to another.
IANA
IANA or the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority oversees registration for different Internet Protocol parameters, including port numbers, protocol and enterprise numbers, options, codes and types.
ICANN
ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) is a non-profit corporation given responsibility from the US Government to manage the Internet domain name system.
IIS
IIS is an informational web server used for Windows operating systems. Some site building programs are only compatible with specific IIS versions.
IMAP
IMAP or Internet message Access Protocol retrieves mail and views or manipulates it on the server.
Index Page
An Index Page is a default page displaying automatically when the top level of a web site is accessed by a user. Most Index Pages are named index.htm or index.html.
Intranet
An Intranet is a large internal network usually established by companies to improve communication efficiency. The access to Intranets is restricted to authorized users.
Internationalized Domains
Internationalized Domains are domains that contain characters with diacritics from non-English languages or characters from non-Latin scripts.
IP Address
An IP Address is a set of numbers divided by periods that specifies a location for the TCP/IP Protocol.
Ip Banning
IP Banning prevents abusive users from posting to websites.
IRC
IRC or Internet Relay Chat is a real-time service that enables people from all over the world to communicate through a chat system on the Internet.
ISDN
ISDN or Internet Services Digital Network is a service providing WAN combined transmission analog and digital services.
ISP
The ISP or Internet Service Provider provides the user with Internet services.
Masking
Masking a domain name keeps the original domain in the address bar after the domain is directed or forwarded to another domain name.
Meta Tag
A Meta Tag is an html tag that contains information for search engines about a specific web site. Meta tags contain key words or phrases alerting search engines on what a site is about so that it generates beneficial traffic from users requesting related information.
Meta Title
The Meta Title is the title for a web site that is inserted with meta coding. Meta Titles help search engines to direct appropriate results to web sites from searches.
MIME
Multipurpose Internet Email Extensions, or Mimes, allow users to transfer audio, video and image files through email.
Mirror Sites
A Mirror Site is an exact copy of another site that balances and spreads traffic load on busy web sites.
Mx Records
Mx Records are part of the DNS that include information about the mailservers and priorities for a specific domain name.
Name server
A Name Server is a host or computer server that has the software and the data (zone files) necessary to resolve domain names to Internet Protocol (IP) numbers. Domain names require a minimum of two name servers hosted on separate networks.
Off-site DNS Server
An Off-site DNS Server backs the data in the event that the first server goes down.
Operating System
An Operating System shares a computer system's resources including the processor, memory, disk space, network and bandwidth.
Packet Switching
Packet Switching is a method of breaking data down into smaller packets before transferring and then reassembling at the final destination.
Parked Page
A Parked Page is a temporary web page that reserves the domain till the Web site or hosting is active. Domain owners are able to reserve their domains with a Parked Page for any time frame necessary without a penalty.
Parking
Parking reserves a domain that is inactive. Parked domains will display a temporary Web Page until the site is active.
Perl
Practical Extraction and Reporting Language, or Perl is a script that processes text.
Permalink
A Permalink links to a specific article in the archives of a blog and remains valid after the article is no longer listed on the front page of the blog.
Phishing
Phishing is a form of Internet fraud used to steal personal and payment information. To avoid Phishing, make sure an ssl certificate is enabled before making a payment or submitting valuable information to a website. If an ssl certificate is installed on the site the address will start with an https. This will make the chances of third party viewing less likely.
Ping
A Ping or Packet Internet Groper is a utility that determines if another computer is presently connected to the Internet.
Podcast
A Podcast is an audio or video production posted to a web page.Podcasts allow users to subscribe to a feed and receive new files automatically.
Pop3 Server
A POP 3 Server is a server that connects email clients like Outlook and Apple Mail with mail servers.
Post
A Post is an entry posted to a blog that includes an individual article or an audio or video file.
Propagation
Propagation is the time frame a process undergoes while the request or modification is being completed.
Ram
Ram or Random Access of Memory is used by programs in performing system tasks.
Registrant
The Registrant is the individual or organization that registers a domain name and holds the right to use it. The Registrant is considered the legal owner of a domain name.
Registrar
A Registrar has access to a domain registry and the ability to provide domain names to individuals and companies.
Registry
A Registry is a database associating DNS information with an individual, a legal entity or operational entity.
Remote Connection
A Remote Connection is a link between a modem and a network through a dial-up connection.
Robots
Robots (search engine robots) read text and follow links to gather information for search engine databases.
Root
The Root is the top of the domain name System hierarchy usually known as the “dot”.
Root Server
The Root Server is the portion of the hosting account or server that has privileges to access all of the places or documents on that computer.
RSS
RSS or Rich Site Summary is a method of subscribing to news sites and blogs that will display the updates from that source on your webpage.
RSS Feed
An RSS Feed provides items containing short descriptions of web content or articles with a link to the full version of the content.
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