Glossary

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 FTP

This is an acronym for File Transfer Protocol -- a very common method of transferring one or more files from one computer to another. FTP is a specific way to connect to another Internet site to retrieve and send files. FTP was developed in the early days of the Internet to copy files from computer to computer. With the advent of the World Wide Web, and web browser software, you no longer need to know arcane FTP commands to copy to and from other computers. In your browser, you can use FTP by typing the URL into the location box at the top of your screen. For example, typing ftp://name.of.site/directory/filename.zip transfers the file filename.zip to your computer's hard disk. Typing ftp://name.of.site/directory/ gives you a listing of all the files available in that directory. There are also many FTP programs that you can use like FileZilla or Transmit.

 Favorites

Favorites are used in Internet Explorer to organize websites and allow you to make a quick reference to sites that are visited often without having to remember the URL.

 File Compression

File compression is a way of reducing the size of one or more files, so that they don't take up a lot of space on a server or hard drive and can travel faster over a network. Zip files are the standard for file compression.

 Firewall

A firewall is a combination hardware and software buffer that many companies or organizations have in place between their internal networks and the Internet. A firewall allows only specific kinds of messages from the Internet to flow in and out of the internal network. This protects the internal network from intruders or hackers who might try to use the Internet to break into those systems

 Floppy Disk

Also called a diskette, a floppy disk is the magnetic storage medium used to store and transfer data, usually between personal computers that are not networked.

 Forms

Forms are web pages comprised of text and "fields" for a user to fill in with information. They are an excellent way of collecting and processing information from people visiting a website, as well as allowing them to interact with web pages. Forms are written in HTML and processed by CGI programs. The output can be sent as an e-mail form, stored online, printed, and/or returned to the user as an HTML page. When you enter a keyword in the search field of an Internet directory, you are filling in a form. It is then processed by a CGI program, returning a list of possible matches with your keyword. Forms are also used for online catalogs, surveys, requests for information, and conferencing.