Glossary of Terms

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W

WAIS - Wide Area Information Servers is a system that lets you search for documents that contain the information you're looking for.

WAN - (Wide Area Network) any Internet or network that covers an area larger than a single building or campus. See Also: Internet, LAN and Network.

Web Host - A company that will host your web page. Often web hosts or IPPs (Internet Presence Providers) will take on more complicated web hosting projects for business such as on-line catalogues, on-line databases and e-commerce applications that require server side programming. Besides hosting services, this company may also offer clients design services to create their online presence. Web design can range from simple HTML work, to online storefront set-ups, to full-blown database applications. Be sure to check with each individual company on the extent of their design capabilities.

Web Page - The basic building block of the World Wide Web. Information displayed on a Web page can include highly sophisticated graphics; audio and video, the locus of contemporary creativity Web pages are linked together to form the World Wide Web.

Web Trends - Web Trends Log analysis software. Also See: Log Files

Web - The World Wide Web. "The Web" is a term of endearment used by those intimate with the World Wide Web.

Web Server - An Internet host computer that stores web pages and responds to requests to see them. Web servers talk to web browsers by using a language named HTTP.

Web Site - A location on the World Wide Web. It means the same as a Web page or Web server, depending on whom you ask.

Whois - A command on some systems that tells you the actual name of someone, based on the person's username. You can use whois by way of the World Wide Web. Also See: Finger Windows 95 - An instance of an operating system for the PC that includes a graphical user interface. Introduced in the summer of 1995, it includes built-in support for TCP/IP, the lnternet's networking scheme.

Windows NT - Server operating Microsoft Windows NT. Also See NT Server

Windows - An operating system for the PC that includes a graphical user interface. WinSock WinSock (short for Windows Sockets) is a standard way for Windows programs to work with TCP/IP. You use it if you connect your Windows PC directly to the Internet, either with a permanent connection or with a modem by using SLIP or PPP.

WinWAIS - A Windows-based program that let's you use WAIS to search for information about the Internet.

WinZip - A Windows-based program for zipping and unzipping ZIP files in addition to other standard types of archive files. WinZip is shareware, so you can get it from the Net from http://www.winzip.com.

Workstation - Although this term gets bandied about in a bunch of different contexts, we generally mean high-powered microcomputers with big screens, somewhat overkill for the average PC user. We mean such things as SPARC stations and other typically single-user but very powerful machines, generally running UNIX.

World Wide Web (WWW) - After e-mail the most popular part of the Internet.