Living in IT Era - The Web and the Internet

Vocabulary flashcards covering key definitions, features of Web generations, internet components, and technical terms from the Living in IT Era lecture notes.

The Web (World Wide Web)

A large collection of interconnected documents or content organized into Web pages containing text, graphic images, and hypertext links.

Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee

An English engineer and computer scientist best known as the inventor of the World Wide Web, who is a Professorial Fellow of Computer Science at the University of Oxford and a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Web 1.0

Read only Static Web that served as an information portal, allowing users only to read content put together on static pages.

Web 2.0

Dynamic Web; a new generation of Web services and applications focused on human collaboration, user-generated content, and read-write capabilities.

Dynamic Page

Web pages that are affected by user input or preference, allowing the user to interact with the page by commenting or creating a user account.

Social Networking

The use of Internet-based social media sites to stay connected with friends, family, colleagues, customers, or clients for social or business purposes.

Blogs

A discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts) displayed in reverse chronological order.

Wikis

A hypertext publication collaboratively edited and managed by its own audience directly using a web browser.

Video Sharing Sites

A website that lets people upload and share their video clips with the public at large or to invited guests.

Folksonomy

A key feature of Web 2.0 that allows users to categorize and classify or arrange information using freely chosen keywords, such as tagging.

Rich User Interface

A feature of Web 2.0 where website content is dynamic and responsive to user input, such as showing local content.

User Participation

A feature of Web 2.0 where website content is provided not only by the owner but also by users through comments, reviews, and evaluation.

Long Tail

A Web 2.0 feature where services are offered on demand rather than as a one-time purchase, such as subscribing to data plans based on time or bandwidth used.

Web 3.0

Read-write intelligent web; a web of data utilizing semantic web technologies, distributed databases, natural language processing, machine learning, machine reasoning, and autonomous agents.

Semantic Web

A technology in Web 3.0 that provides a framework allowing data to be shared and reused to deliver web content specifically targeting the user.

The Internet

The largest computer network in the world that connects billions of computer users, derived from the words interconnection and network.

Network

A collection of computers and devices connected via communication channels and transmission media that allow sharing of resources such as hardware, software, data, and information.

Server

A computer program that provides service to another computer program and its user.

IP Address (Internet Protocol)

A numerical label assigned to each device that provides identity to a network device.

Browser

An application program that provides a way to look for information on the web.

Domain Name System (DNS)

The phonebook of the Internet used to access online information through domain names.

Internet Service Provider (ISP)

An organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet.

National ISP

An ISP that provided internet access to a specific geographic area.

Regional ISP

A business that provides internet access in cities and towns nationwide.

HTML

Hypertext Markup Language; a coding language used to tell a browser how to place pictures, text, multimedia, and links to create a web page.

URL

Uniform Resource Locator; a web address used to connect to a remote resource on the World Wide Web.

Bit

A single digit in the binary numbering system (base $2$).

Byte

A unit of digital information that generally consists of $8$ bits.

Upload

To transfer data from your computer to another computer.

Download

To transfer data from another computer to your computer.

HTTP

Hypertext Transfer Protocol; the data communication standard of web pages.

HTTPS

Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure; indicates that a web page has a special layer of encryption added to hide personal information and passwords.

Router

The hardware device or router-modem combination that acts as the traffic cop for network signals arriving at your home or business from your ISP.

Encryption

The mathematical scrambling of data using complex math formulas so that private data is hidden from eavesdroppers as meaningless gobbledygook.

Web Bot

Programs or applets (macros and intelligent agents) used on the Internet to perform repetitive functions, such as posting messages to multiple newsgroups or searching for information.

Search Engine

Specialized software, such as Google and Yahoo, that lets web browser users search for information on the web using keywords or phrases.