IT Jargon explained in English (TechSpeak to NormalSpeak)

Objectives
There are many tools, technologies and concepts emerging in IT on almost a daily basis. We do not have time to learn all these in detail. What we need is a brief and simple explanation of a given term for understanding it without spending too much time. There are dictionaries available for this purpose. However, these dictionaries are best used for isolated referencing. By referring to different terms randomly, you will get the complete picture.
Therefore, I am providing an easy to understand glossary of important terms. I have kept the language simple in order to ensure that while explaining one term, another difficult term is not required.
This article is useful for
Novices (Everyone is a novice in the topic you are new to!)
Anyone new to the term(s) mentioned here is obviously the target audience. However, that does not mean existing IT professionals are excluded. Everyone can not know everything. An expert in VB may still start with ASP For Dummies!
For explaining complex terms to Decision makers or End users
Even if you know what is the meaning of the term extremely well, there is a catch! You can typically explain it in Technical Language. NOT in ENGLISH! Most technical persons find it difficult to explain technical terms in simple language. As a part of your job you will invariably need to do this. Your end users, clients, less experienced colleagues will need to be explained complex things in simple terms. This glossary will come in handy for this purpose.
Incidentally, this coverage is by no means complete. However, it is a good starting point.
This glossary is NOT in alphabetical order
The items are not mentioned in alphabetical order. The coverage is more in some kind of logical order. Some apparently non-technical terms are also included in order to maintain the continuity.

Information Technology (IT)
This is a collective term. It includes various tools, technologies, products, machines and accessories that are used for various tasks related to computing and automation.
The basic purpose of using all these things is to improve something which was earlier being done in some tedious, cumbersome, costly or inefficient way so that your company objectives or personal goals can be achieved more easily.
There are literally thousands of technologies and tools under this global term. Some categories include hardware (actual computers and accessories), operating systems (Windows NT, Unix, Novell), Application Software (Microsoft Office, Lotus Notes), Utilities (Media Player), Browsers (Internet Explorer, Netscape Navigator), peripherals (printers, mouse), case tools (Erwin Logic Works), ActiveX Components (Sheridan Data Widgets, Leadtools Imaging Control), and so on.

End User
The person(s) who finally use and benefit from a particular IT product. For example, developers use Visual Basic. Thus developers are the end users of Visual Basic. If a developer creates a Payroll system using Visual Basic, the employees from the Payroll department are the end users. The important issue is that typically end users are NOT aware of the complexity of the technology they are using. Therefore, it is important for developers to ensure that the end users can use the applications without learning complex concepts or jargon. A product, which is technically brilliant, is practically useless if the end user does not comprehend how to use it. If end users did not exist, IT professionals would be extinct!
IT professional (ITP)
A person who is a middleman between end user needs and Information Technology. IT professionals come in many flavors. System analysts, IT auditors, Trainers, Developers, Administrators, etc. However, the basic functionality remains the same. ITPs are expected to understand the pros and cons of various technologies as well as the user needs. Finally they are expected to select and utilize the right kind of technology for the user needs. This sounds simple. However, typically both user needs and technology keeps changing at an alarming pace. Thus keeping the balance between utilizing the correct tool for the appropriate need is a very challenging task. How well you can handle this challenge , on a long term basis, determines your success in IT.
Competitive Advantage
As mentioned above users have needs. These needs typically arise out of competition. Better service, integrated and automated business processes, better speed, faster processing, immediate availability of data and similar end user ambitions are basically because of the core desire to face the competition better. Thus the basic purpose of the existence of IT professionals is to ensure that the desired competitive advantage is available to end users using the right type of tool.
Operating System
This is a piece of software which provides basic infrastructure for developing and using various automation tasks. Operating system manages baseline functions like user interaction, input from mouse/keyboard, graphics, memory management, security, etc.
Application
This is a program created using some development language. Application automates or simplifies some user need(s). For example, Windows Calculator is a simple application. Erwin Logic Works is a specialized application which helps the end users ( database designers, in this case) to optimize database structure. Various types of IT persons manage different aspects application lifespan.
Functional Specifications
This is a document, which specifies the content and behavior of the application being developed. This document forms the base upon which the developers create the application. This document typically contains the user requirements, user interface details, business processes and validations and the application architecture.
Executable File
The final form of an application is a file, which can be run from the Operating System. Executable files are typically shown as icons on the desktop or in the Start menu of Windows.

Dynamic Link Library
These are programs that are not directly executable. Executable programs use the DLLs, whenever required. If multiple executable applications require some common functionality, DLLs are used. DLLs use less memory and are easier to upgrade if the functionality changes.
Suppose we have three independent applications. These use a function to check time. This function is actually the same but each of the applications contains a separate copy of it.

Instead of using this approach, we can use DLL concept by allowing all these application to share the Check Time part of the application.

As you can see the size of individual applications has reduced. In addition, changes to the Check Time function need to be done only once. We will cover DLLs in more detail in later articles.
Database
Any application requires some information. This is called data. For example, clock will need to know what the starting current time is. A large collection of such information is called database. Database management system is an application, which allows you to store and manipulate data in simple or complex ways.
Relational Database Management System
This is a sophisticated version of database management system, which offers many high-end features. It ensures that the information is always accurate, secure and available speedily. There are many RDBMS today like Oracle, SQL Server, Sybase, Informix, Ingress and so on. These applications typically handle very large amount of data. Therefore, these are installed on high performance computers or servers.
Database Driver
When data from the server needs to be viewed at a terminal, we require a method of communication from the client terminal and the database server. This purpose is served by an application called database driver. This driver moves data between client and server.
Open Database Connectivity
When your application uses data from a particular RDBMS, it becomes tied to it. If the RDBMS changes you will need to rewrite your application. This is a major constraint. In order to overcome this problem, the concept of ODBC was propagated. Using ODBC you can write one application which can work with many RDBMS packages without having to rewrite code. ODBC drivers are like database drivers and are typically supplied by the database vendor. Using ODBC you can manipulate, merge and analyze data from different sources.
DAO and RDO
Data Access Objects and Remote Data access Objects are two ways of handling data. DAO is typically used to handle local data (on the same machine). RDO is used to handle data from the server. DAO and RDO provide simple commands for information management.
OLE DB
This is a more enhanced and feature rich version of ODBC. OLE DB allows developers of database to access information from complex types of data applications.
Active Data Objects
This is a newer type of technology for accessing data. It is similar to RDO but has lesser complexity of programming. It works with a special type of database driver called OLD DB
Visual Interface
This is the visible part of the application. Menus, forms, report, buttons, etc are called the interface. The end user interacts with the interface to perform various tasks.
Business Logic
Rules /policies /methodologies of how data is to be manipulated is called the business logic. For example, in a clock application, you can not display a number more than 59 minutes. Similarly in a banking application you can not withdraw more money than your current balance.
Monolithic (Single Tier) Application
This method of making applications puts the business logic, data and visual interface in a single executable. This runs on a computer like a self-contained entity. The problem with this approach is that if the data, logic or interface changes you have to keep making the application again. If this application is being used by lots of users, you have to physically replace the older application with the newer one.
Two Tier (Client Server) Application
Here the data is stored on the server and the client application contains business logic along with visual interface. Large Data handling is performed very speedily because server is a more powerful computer. Some business logic is also stored along with data whenever feasible. For example business logic which says that age can be between 0 to 100 is better stored on the server than duplicating this validation on hundreds of client applications.
Three Tier Application
This type of application stores data on the server, business logic either on server or client and visual interface on the client. The main difference is the executable application does not contain the business logic. The logic is a separate application. Typically it is a special type of DLL (see above). This arrangement makes it easier to change the application. It also improves the speed of operations. Business logic can now be run on powerful servers rather than modest clients. Similar Business logic can be shared by many applications, using this approach.

Multi-tier application
This is a more sophisticated version of three-tier application. Here the business layer is split into multiple layers. This provides higher performance and better manageability if designed properly.
COM Component
In three-tier application, business logic was available as a shared resource. One way of implementing this shared resource is using a component. Each component behaves in a predictable, predetermined way. Its behavior can be manipulated using some characteristics and commands. For example if there was a component called stopwatch, it would have characteristics like Elapsed Time, Lap Time, etc. Similarly it would understand commands like Reset Stopwatch, Start, Stop. The characteristics are called Properties and the commands are called Methods.
Dynamic Data Exchange
When two applications want to exchange pure text information, this method of communication is used. This allows one application to talk to another application without these needing to know details about each other. For example if a word processor needed to pickup the name and address from a spreadsheet, DDE could be used. Apart from data, you can give some commands to the other application using DDE. Currently DDE is not used often because more usable and flexible methods of inter-application communication are now available.
Document
This is a conceptual representation of similar type of information. A spreadsheet, a letter written in a wordprocessor, a picture drawn in some image editor, a page on Internet are all examples of documents.
Compound Document
This is a special type of document, which allows another type of document to be mixed with it. For example within a letter you can add a picture.
Object Linking and Embedding
This is a technology by which part of one type of document can be attached or inserted into another type of document. The base document does not need to know how to handle the inserted document. For example a wordprocessor does not know how to draw and edit pictures. But when you embed a picture in a wordprocessor, the picture is displayed along with the text. Moreover, OLE allows you to edit the picture while it is inside another document. In short, OLE allows you to create compound documents. Although this jargon is very heavy and difficult, most of us use compound documents quite frequently.
ActiveX Technology
This is another way of providing reusable applications. Suppose you are an expert in drawing various types of graphs. You want to make money using this skill. You will typically create a separate application where users can enter data and draw various graphs. Now there are thousands of types of users who may want to draw different graphs. Doctors, architects, engineers, planners, scientists all want to draw graphs using for their own special needs.
To satisfy all of them you will have to understand a little about the needs of each profession and create a special application optimized for each one of them. This is not very easy to achieve because your skill lies in graph drawing and not in metallurgy or geography. Thus you will waste your time trying to capture all the market potential while spending lesser and lesser time on perfecting your graph drawing skills.
Instead there is a better approach. All that you do is create a component called Graph Component. This has all the features you can provide for drawing all types of graphs. Any developer to create a custom graph package for any type of end user can use this component. Now there are two immediate advantages. The developers do not need to reinvent the wheel because they are directly using your expertise in graph drawing. They won’t mind paying a small sum for this. On the other hand, you can fully concentrate on your core skill and not attempt to learn other unrelated disciplines. You can create upgraded versions of your component and add more features. This is reuse of technology. Components made in this way are called ActiveX components.
OLE Automation
This is a methodology by which one application can control other application using programming. For example, you have a large document containing 50 headings. You want to make a slide show in with each slide containing only the heading. Normally you would have to cut paste 50 times.
Data Warehouse
It is a large store of information derived from data within your organization. The data warehouse allows you to analyze information based upon various parameters, geographical locations, time periods, etc. The information can be easily rearranged to perform detailed analysis.
Data Mining
Mining is the process of using a warehouse database to derive business-related conclusions, trends, forecasts, etc using various tools including statistical methods.
Dumb Terminal
Typical UNIX terminals which were popular few years back. It is called dumb because the terminal does not perform any processing or calculations. It simply displays information on the screen. It also understands the keys pressed by you and sends the keys to the server, which interprets the keys and converts it into actions.
EDI
Electronic Data Interchange is a worldwide standard method of communicating business information between two companies. The information could be a purchase order, invoice, bill, etc. The information is exchanged in a predetermined format so that each company understands what the other company has sent. EDI can then talk to your order processing or accounts system internally and perform further actions like dispatch of material and billing.
Internet
Internet is a large network of computers across the world, which is accessible to any subscriber. The Internet was initially used for publishing information and content. Nowadays, the technology is also being used for actual business transactions, email, subscription-based services and numerous more functionality.
The most important advantage of internet is that is allows you to connect to any place from any other place at a very low cost. In addition, the Internet provides a simple but effective method of interacting with the target audience in a very quick and efficient manner.
Internet is becoming more and more popular as the preferred method of developing standard line of business type of applications.
The internet consists of one or more web servers connected together and many browsers.
Web server
Web server is software, which allows you to publish content, information, multimedia, etc on the Internet. Clients (users of the web site) connect to the web server using special protocols. The web server manages the client connections, security, application loading and display of information. Web servers, which participate in business applications, can also be configured to access data in external databases.
IP Address
A web server is identified by its web address like www.webserver.com. Internally, it is actually a four-part number like 202.33.1.19, which identifies any internet server in the world. This number is called the IP address.
Worldwide, an international body called InterNic allocates these IP addresses. This ensures that no two servers have the same IP address.
Intranet
It is a web server, which is used only within your organization. It is not listed on the Internet. This Intranet is typically used for automating internal tasks like disseminating information, sending and receiving group messages, publishing documents on the web, line of business applications, workflow and so on. External persons like the customers, vendors, etc can not access the Intranet.
Extranet
Extranet is a proper web server. However, apart from your employees and business associates (vendors, marketing staff, customers), nobody has access rights in Extranet. However, extranet is accessible from anywhere the same way as any other internet server. Therefore, you can cover all your key contacts using Extranet without having to spend for a large wide area network.
Extranets are used for applications like external vendor procurement, vendor queries, customer queries, etc.
E-commerce
All of us use some software for tasks like financial accounting, invoicing, order processing, dispatch, etc. All this software is typically loaded on machines within your office premises. The customers, vendors or other related parties may require information from this software. For example, the customer may want to know the dispatch details of a consignment or the progress of the manufactured item. Similarly Vendors may want to know your inventory levels and the projected consumption so that they can keep their material ready.
To answer such queries, traditionally, you had to talk to the customers on phone and then use the in-house software. This is cumbersome and inconvenient. If there are thousands of customers, it is difficult to have dedicated staff for just answering queries.
E-commerce is a method of making software, which enables your business functionality to be available to a target audience outside your organization. This means, potential customers can directly use any browser and look at products on sale using internet connection. They can even place orders, track order dispatch status and provide feedback.
This can occur without any person manning this service in your office. In addition, this service would be available 24 hours a day.
Thus E-commerce is a new method of software development which bridges the gap between the supplier and the consumer.
Business to Business Application
A software application, which automates the process of one organization performing business transactions with another organization. Manufacturer and supplier, vendor and dealers, agents and primary supplier, manufacturer and transporter are different types business to business relationships.
Even today there is lot of communication between these entities. For example, when a manufacturer wants to procure some raw material, a fax or document has to be sent as purchase order. The vendor will then enter the details of the purchase order into his own internal order processing system. After this is done, the status of the order execution, dispatch will be faxed back to the manufacturer. At each stage there is manual intervention required and at each stage there is delay and bottlenecks.
Using latest tools and technologies like COM and web programming, it is possible to automate these tasks. The manufacturer can directly place an order electronically to the vendor. The order will be automatically transferred into the order processing system of the vendor. The manufacturer will automatically get relevant progress information. At any point of time, if the manufacturer wants to know the status of the pending order, he can simply go to the vendor web site and using an Ecommerce application perform various queries.
Order amendment, cancellation, etc. can be implemented using the same methodology.
This method of developing and integrating applications provides a very simple but efficient mechanism of improving the response times, productivity, minimizing inventory and increasing competitiveness.
Site Server
A specialized web server which allows you to create business – to- business applications which integrate well with in-house systems. It also provides you facilities for creating a membership-based authentication for accessing information on your web site.
Site Server provides sophisticated methods of providing online purchase store functionality for consumer goods and services.
HTML
HyperText Markup Language. This language is used to publish and display information on the web. The web browser understands this language and acts accordingly.
This language specifies the display formats like the placement, colors, fonts, size, special effects, buttons, captions, images, etc.
For example
Sample Text
This HTML code specifies that the text “Sample Text” should be displayed in Bold font. Thus the browser will display as follows.
Sample Text
This language is used for creating web pages containing any kind of information, pictures, diagrams, audio, video and animation.
Hyperlink
Web pages contain links to other related information. When you click on a link, your browser displays the page referred to by the link.
The links look like this
More information about this subject.
Hyperlinks make the web very powerful medium for publishing complex amount of information with cross-linkages.
Knowledge management
A system which allows an organization to document the subject knowledge, experiences, troubleshooting and preventive information and any other reference material which is useful. On many occasions, such information is either not captured or is available only to a few selected persons. Thus the organizational knowledge is very poorly utilized. Knowledge management system is a structured method of capturing, tagging, storing, searching and retrieving organizational experience and skill sets.
Using KM ensures that mistakes done once will not be repeated, skill acquired by one person will not be re-learnt by another person.
KM is a concept. It can be implemented by various means. Simplest would be a shared directory containing well-created documents with proper keywords. You can use a structured public folder in the Messaging system for the same purpose. Higher end systems can also use Site Server, Office 2000 and the workgroup editing features to create dynamic web based knowledgebase.
Knowledge Worker
Employees whose job profiles requires them to analyze and manipulate information to manage business in a more effective manner. Personal productivity tools are very important for this group of people. In addition, data from multitude of sources must be made available to these persons in an easy-to-use manner. The complexity of handling data should be hidden from them. Searching for the right piece of information is important. Therefore, end user level powerful search tools must be used in case of Knowledge workers.
OLAP
Online Analytical Processing. A database, which is capable of handling complex ad-hoc queries, typically used by Knowledge Workers. It also provides complex calculations, multidimensional viewing of data and faster indexing techniques.
EIS
Executive Information System is a set of tools designed to organize information into categories and reports for senior executives. Nowadays, it is known as Enterprise Information System.
Internet Portal
A web site which is the starting point of the web surfer. This typically provides extensive search, lot of consumer services, latest news, customizable layout and many more features, which simplify your web browsing experience. MSN, Yahoo, AOL are some examples. There are general-purpose portals or special portals. People of specific interests or professions use special portals. For example there are portals for music, medicine, sports, technology, etc.
ERP
Enterprise Resource Planning is a software used in an organizations to coordinate sales and order information with the manufacturing process in order to perform accurate scheduling, inventory management and utilize full capacity.
ERP requires integration across all functions relating to the manufacturing process. ERP is typically available as an off-the-shelf product. Thus it minimizes the time required for installing a fully functional application. However, ERP is typically costlier than developing a custom solution locally.
XML
This is an updated version of HTML. HTML is primarily used for describing how things are to be displayed on a web page. XML describes the information contained in the page rather than its appearance.
For example if you view the following on a web page,

Age : 30


Age is just a text and 30 is a number which can be edited by the user. You know that the number 30 pertain to age because it is visually next to it. However if there was just the number shown

30
In this case you had no way of knowing what this number represents.
XML allows you to internally specify that this 30 is the age. You can then use this information for formatting, searching, and sending understandable information between to companies and so on.
Thus XML describes data on the Web. XML is the most important method of exchanging information over the web from any source to destination. This will simplify transactions between different companies and entities.
Y2K Problem
Inability of some software and hardware to understand that year “00” means 2000 and not 1900. This simple omission can make many systems misbehave, calculate wrong results or completely stop operating. Each company needs to ensure that the computers, software, network equipment and other electronic gadgets in use by them are Y2K compliant. Some packaged software products provide free patches for making them Y2K compliant. Software written in-house must be tested and modified to ensure that the above-mentioned problem does not hamper the business processes.
Euro Symbol
Recently the European union introduced a uniform currency called Euro in the Europe. Earlier each country had its own currency. This change requires drastic changes to be made to any kind of software, which deals with European currency so that it understands the new currency. Some keyboards do not even support the Euro symbol. Many banking and financial systems need to be thoroughly checked and modified to accommodate this change.
GroupWare
A type of software or system, which allows multiple members of a project, team or group to work together, even though they are physically working at different locations. GroupWare makes it simple to manage your time, fix appointments, collect information from many team members, and perform online or offline meetings, share documents and other content and share knowledge.
Workflow
A method of developing software where business processes are converted into automated work modules. The software works in a serial manner, similar to manual business processes. However, completion of one step automatically leads to the initiation of the next step. The person(s) responsible for taking action on a specific process are notified using Email so that the response time can be minimized. Workflow systems typically require integration between messaging, database and web systems.
Messaging System
This type of software provides you with Email functionality within as well as outside the organization.
Email
A method of communicating information between each-other using a messaging system. Messages can contain text, graphics and files. More advanced method of communications contain formatted text, embedded objects and source code.
Mailbox
A place in the messaging system where the mail received and sent by you is stored. Mailbox can contain multiple folders created by you. Mailbox stores your mail till you file it in folders or delete it. Mailboxes can be stored on the main server or your local computer. If you are not in a position to connect to the mail server because you are away from office, you can create an offline mailbox. Now you can make any type of changes to your mailbox copy on local computer. When you connect to the main server later, changes made by you are reflected onto the main mailbox. This is called synchronization.
Public Folder
Is a folder, which is accessible to all members having access rights. Public folder is similar to the private mailbox based folders. However, it has one additional feature called replication. If you have many offices containing Exchange in multiple cities. You will want circulars and other bulletins created in HO to be sent automatically to branch offices. This can be done by creating a public folder called “circulars: and make this folder replicate itself automatically to all other sites.
Discussion Group
A feature where many persons from a group can conduct discussion on a given topic in an offline manner. Which means, it is possible for one person to create a topic for discussion and others can post their replies in the folder. More persons can even reply to the replies. This can continue as long as necessary. A new member joining the team can quickly understand what discussion has taken place till now by just browsing through the folder.
This discussion can occur even across multiple sites.