BBS - (Bulletin Board System) -- A dial-up computerized meeting and announcement system for carrying on discussions, uploading and downloading files, and generally obtaining online information and services.

clickable image map - A map or graphic where certain parts of it are associated with different hyperlinks. For example, users can click on cities on a map of a country and bring up linked pictures and other information about each place. For example, Honolulu Community College has developed an interactive campus map that lets you get information about each building, its hours of services, etc.

cookie - This is a request to acknowledge that a site wants to send you data. Often the end user is unaware what kind of "gift" they are getting. It is usually a gif in their harddrive that when you double click on it will re-launch you to the same vendor.

cross-post - To post a message to several newsgroups simultaneously - an action usually frowned on in Internet culture. Avoid using multiple unrelated categories when you post a message in order to avoid the inevitable flaming that will occur when people are getting message totally unrelated to their research.

cyberspace - A term coined by author William Gibson in his novel "Neuromancer". Cyberspace is currently used to refer to the digital world constructed by computer networks, in particular the Internet.

dedicated line - A telecommunications line that lets your computer have a direct, permanent connection to the Internet. For many workplaces that do a lot of research and/or downloads of fixes and patches from the Internet a dedicated line is absolutely necessary. For home use dedicated lines are too costly.

encryption - A way of making data unreadable to everyone except the receiver. An increasingly common way of sending credit card numbers over the Internet when conducting commercial transactions.

feedback form - Sections of html documents that accept user input. You can usually input comments, order products, or search for information with these forms.

form support - Not all browsers, nor all servers can handle the use of forms where the reader can give input, for instance his address, or a question. Browsers and servers that allow this, do have form support.

FTP - (File Transfer Protocol) -- A way of moving files across networks. With FTP you can login to another Internet site and download or send files. Some sites have public file archives that you can access by using FTP with the account name "anonymous" and your e-mail address as password. This type of access is called anonymous ftp.

Gateway - A computer system for exchanging information across incompatible networks that use different protocols. For example, many commercial services have e-mail gateways for sending messages to Internet addresses.

HTML - Hypertext Markup Language - the coded format used to create WWW documents. Html commands control how a piece of text will appear. Files in html format are viewed with a World Wide Web Client program.

hypermedia - The multimedia links on the Web that lead to sound, graphics, video, or text resources.

Intranet - This term is used to describe the connectivity of PC's within a single business or agency. The homepage at this site is usually partially blocked to the Internet at large in order to provide access to common historical, archival, displayed data that is owned by that business or agency.

IP address - The Internet Protocol address - the numeric address that is translated into a domain name by the DNS. Each domain has its own range of IP addresses and all addressed must be licensed in order to be unique. The trend is that a pool of dynamic IP addresses are assigned to a business or agencies and that as the user logs into the internet they are assigned a random IP - this helps prevent a hacker from gaining access to unauthorized files. Fixed IP's on the Internet such as http://204.46.196.50, which belongs to the Department of Energy have firewalls that allow users to see the site but not be able to change any code or access data beyond what the site allows.

Internet service provider - A company that provides various kinds of Internet accounts to organizations and individuals. The average price for full service from an Internet service provider in 1998-2000 ranges from $15.00 to $20.00 depending on how many services are needed. The minimal services include Internet access with a browser of your choice (i.e. Netscape or Microsoft Internet Explorer) and EMAIL. Other services such as USENET, newsgroups and TELNET are additive.

leased line - Refers to a dedicated phone line that is rented for exclusive 24-hour, 7-days-a-week use from your location to another location. The highest speed data connections require a leased line.

load - On the WWW, HTML documents and graphics are loaded into the browser whenever an URL is accessed.

login - The account name used to access a computer system or, used as a verb, the act of typing your username and password on a workstation.

logon - The process of connecting to a network or remote system.

logoff - To disconnect from a network or remote system. For dedicated lines the logoff automatically breaks the connection with the pool of dedicated modems. For home users the end user is prompted to break the connection. Logoff is also timed for the home user so that after a specific time (usually 10 minutes) the user is automatically disconnected.

mail-bomb - The flooding of an e-mail address with (usually angry) messages. Firewalls are set up to flag or catch these mail-bombs and shield them from the end-users. More stringent laws are being considered to declare this activity as illegal.

mail-filter - A program that allows a user to sort e-mail messages according to information contained in the header.

MIME - Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions - an extension to the traditional Internet mail protocol that allows binary, or non-text, files, (i.e. graphics, executables, audio files etc.) to be sent as attachments to regular e-mail messages.

modem - A device for translating the digital data of computers into analog signals. Two or more computers connected together over phone lines are therefore able to exchange files, and generally communicate with each other. Analog signals that go over the phone lines are re-translated back to digital signals for display on the monitors of the end users.

platform - The type of computer or operating system on which a software application runs. For example, some common platforms are PC, Macintosh, Unix, and NeXT. Within each of these there are operating systems with different versions. The end user is often prompted before downloading files to let the site they are connecting to know what platform and operating system they have because there are different fixes, patches and drivers for each platform.

POP (Point of Presence) - The nearest connection point at which a user may connect to a remote site - usually that of the ISP or telephone company. This is relevant when ordering a dedicated line, since you have to pay for mileage.