Haycroft Media Glossary

Glossary

Haycroft Media's client list ranges from contracted work from the tech-savvy through to those with very limited tech-knowledge. We are happy to work with any client irrespective of what they do and don't know, and have been complimented in the past for our patience in dealing with clients with limited knowledge in our field. Below is a list of the day-to-day terminology used in the field of web development along with brief definitions. Simply click on the term, and a definition will appear.

blogging

A blog (a contraction of the term "web log") is a type of website, usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog. Wikipedia

browser

A Web browser is a software application for retrieving, presenting, and traversing information resources on the World Wide Web. The major web browsers are Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, Opera and Google Chrome. Wikipedia

Content Management System (CMS)

A content management system is software that keeps track of every piece of content on your Web site, much like your local public library keeps track of books and stores them. Content can be simple text, photos, music, video, documents, or just about anything you can think of. A major advantage of using a CMS is that it requires almost no technical skill or knowledge to manage. Since the CMS manages all your content, you don't have to. www.joomla.org/about-joomla.html

ecommerce

Electronic commerce, commonly known as (electronic marketing) e-commerce or eCommerce, consists of the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. Wikipedia

flash

Flash has become a popular method for adding animation and interactivity to web pages. Flash is commonly used to create animation, advertisements, and various web page Flash components, to integrate video into web pages, and more recently, to develop rich Internet applications. Wikipedia

html

HTML, which stands for HyperText Markup Language, is the predominant markup language for web pages. It provides a means to create structured documents by denoting structural semantics for text such as headings, paragraphs, lists etc as well as for links, quotes, and other items. It allows images and objects to be embedded and can be used to create interactive forms. Wikipedia

javascript

JavaScript is an object-oriented[2] scripting language used to enable programmatic access to objects within both the client application and other applications. It is primarily used in the form of client-side JavaScript, implemented as an integrated component of the web browser, allowing the development of enhanced user interfaces and dynamic websites. JavaScript is a dialect of the ECMAScript standard and is characterized as a dynamic, weakly typed, prototype-based language with first-class functions. JavaScript was influenced by many languages and was designed to look like Java, but to be easier for non-programmers to work with. Wikipedia

joomla

Joomla is an award-winning content management system (CMS), which enables you to build Web sites and powerful online applications. Joomla is an open source solution that is freely available to everyone. www.joomla.org/about-joomla.html

mySQL

MySQL is the world's most popular open source database software, with over 100 million copies of its software downloaded or distributed throughout its history. With its superior speed, reliability, and ease of use, MySQL has become the preferred choice for Web, Web 2.0, SaaS, ISV, Telecom companies and forward-thinking corporate IT Managers because it eliminates the major problems associated with downtime, maintenance and administration for modern, online applications.

Many of the world's largest and fastest-growing organizations use MySQL to save time and money powering their high-volume Web sites, critical business systems, and packaged software — including industry leaders such as Yahoo!, Alcatel-Lucent, Google, Nokia, YouTube, Wikipedia, and Booking.com. mysql.com

php

PHP is a widely-used general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited for Web development and can be embedded into HTML. php.net.

rss

RSS (Rich Site Summary) is a format for delivering regularly changing web content. Many news-related sites, weblogs and other online publishers syndicate their content as an RSS Feed to whoever wants it.

RSS allows you to easily stay informed by retrieving the latest content from the sites you are interested in. You save time by not needing to visit each site individually.

A variety of RSS Readers are available for different platforms. Some popular feed readers include Amphetadesk (Windows, Linux, Mac), FeedReader (Windows), and NewsGator (Windows - integrates with Outlook). There are also a number of web-based feed readers available. My Yahoo, Bloglines, and Google Reader are popular web-based feed readers.

Once you have your Feed Reader, it is a matter of finding sites that syndicate content and adding their RSS feed to the list of feeds your Feed Reader checks. Many sites display a small icon with the acronyms RSS, XML, or RDF to let you know a feed is available. whatisrss.com

web design

Web design is the skill of creating presentations of content (usually hypertext or hypermedia) that is delivered to an end-user through the World Wide Web, by way of a Web browser or other Web-enabled software like Internet television clients, microblogging clients and RSS readers. Wikipedia

wordpress

WordPress is a state-of-the-art publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability. WordPress is both free and priceless at the same time.

More simply, WordPress is what you use when you want to work with your blogging software, not fight it. wordpress.org

Wordpress Multi User

Wordpress Multiuser (MU) makes it as easy to create a thousand blogs as it is to create a single blog with WordPress. By building on the base of WordPress and syncing development, you can still get the benefit of the huge ecosystem in plugins and themes that has developed around the project.

Development on MU is spearheaded by Automattic, since they use MU to power WordPress.com a great deal of the companies resources are poured into improving the code, and it all goes back into the open source world via MU. mu.wordpress.org/about

xml

XML’s design goals emphasize simplicity, generality, and usability over the Internet. It is a textual data format, with strong support via Unicode for the languages of the world. Although XML’s design focuses on documents, it is widely used for the representation of arbitrary data structures, for example in web services. Wikipedia