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Active Content
Material on a Web page that changes with time or in response to user action, such as a weather map or a stock ticker. Active content is implemented through ActiveX controls, VB Scripts, Java scripts, and Java applets in the HTML code that defines the page.

Active Controls
Programs that are designed to run over the Internet. Because ActiveX controls don't run in a restricted environment (unlike Java applets), they have the potential to take control of your computer. Malicious hackers can use this capability to steal or destroy your data or system software.

Address Mask
A technique that is used to select bits from an Internet address for subnet addressing. Masks are often used to help identify a range of addresses.

Adware
Adware programs gather information from your computer for marketing purposes. The information is used to decide, for instance, which advertisements to display when you are on a specific Web site or which advertisements to download to your computer for display on your desktop.

Attack
Attacks occur by means of a virus, Trojan Horse, worm, or other intrusion. An attack on your computer is an attempt by a hacker to damage the files on your computer, copy information from your computer without your consent, use your computer to damage another computer or computer service, or to perform other actions on your computer without your consent.

Affiliate Marketing
A method to increase sales by offering a referral fee or commission to websites that drive traffic to your website. The affiliate markets products and services that are offered by another company, and receives commissions or fees.

Alexa
A free service that measures a website's traffic and offers a ranking (Alexa ranking). The ranking is in order of amount of traffic, with 1 being the most traffic on the web. Alexa offers a free toolbar available for download.

Algorithm
In reference to SEO, a complicated formula or program used by search engines to determine what results to display in searches, and in what order. A search engines algorithm is not publicly shared and a closely guarded secret, though some theories behind their logic are public knowledge.

Aliased Name Server
An aliased name server is one that has been labeled as your own except that it is actually owned by your web hosting provider. This allows domains hosted on your server are listed as "ns.your-domain.com" rather than "ns.your-providers-domain.com". Aliased nameservers are often offered with reseller accounts.

ALT Text
An HTML tag (ALT tag) used to associate a text description with an image. This text is visible when mouse is hovered over the image. It is used by the visually impaired as a description, as well as read by search engine spiders.

Analytics
Software used to track various aspects of traffic to a website, including page views, conversion statistics, time spent on page, search queries, etc. Google Analytics is a popular and free tool.

Anchor Text
The words that are used to link to another page. In HTML code below, the words in red are considered the anchor text:

Authority Site
a site with a high amount of trust given by a search engine, typically a site with many incoming links, older domain, high page rank, extensive unique content. Wikipedia or DMOZ for example are considered authority sites.

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Backlink (Inbound Link, Incoming Link, Inlink)
Any link pointing to a website. Backlinks are considered votes by search engines in determining a site's relevancy, and are a key part of SEO.

Banner Ad
An advertising graphic that appears across the top of a Web page and usually contains a link to the advertiser's Web site.

Blackhat (Blackhat SEO)
SEO methods that are not in congruence with Google's Webmaster Guidelines.

Block
To prevent information or communications from being sent. Firewall rules may prevent a Trojan horse from an Internet website from being saved to your computer's hard drive.

Blog
Short for Weblog. A log or journal of content given chronologically. Blogs can be personal or business oriented, on any topic. Some common platforms for blogging are Wordpress, Movable Type, and Blogger.

Bot (Robot, Crawler, Spider)
A automated program, typically employed by search engines, to visit and 'read' the information on a site.

Bounce rate
The percentage of site visitors that leave without viewing any other pages.

Breadcrumbs
Navigation that shows users location
Example: Main → Hardware → Routers → Belkin
Breadcrumbs should be clickable. Useful to search engines as well as users.

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Cache
A location on your hard disk in which data is stored for reuse. A Web browser cache stores Web pages and files (such as graphics) as you view them.

Closed Port
A port that is blocked by a firewall. If a computer receives incoming communication on a closed port, it responds to the sender by refusing the connection. See also port, open port, port scan, and stealth port.

CMS
Content Management System, a program used to simplify the addition of content to a website such as Wordpress for blogging.

Confidential Information
Confidential information typically includes your name, address, telephone number, credit card information, bank account number, personal identification number, social security number, and similar personal information.

Connection
A method of data exchange that allows transfer of data between two computers.

Connection Attempt
The data transfer that requests the opening of a connection.

Connection-based Protocol
A protocol, such as TCP, that requires a connection before information is transmitted.

Connectionless Protocol
A protocol, such as UDP, that sends a transmission to a destination address on a network without establishing a connection.

Colocated
This type of hosting gives complete control over their server. You are responsible for supplying the physical hardware, the software that runs on the hardware and the administration of the server, the web hosting provider wil supply you with the Internet connection and rack space to house your server.

Cookie
Cookies are small files that Web sites store on your computer. A Web site may place a cookie on your computer in order to store information about your visits to that Web site. The Web server reads the cookie when you revisit the site.

Cracker
A person who attempts unauthorized access of other people's computers for the purpose of obtaining information on those computers or to do damage to those computers.

CSS
Cascading Style Sheet, a search engine friendly web design element which is used to control various design factors across multiple pages, such as font, color, etc.

CPC
Cost Per Click: amount paid in a PPC campaign whenever a link is clicked.

CTR
Click Through Rate: percentage of clicks per impressions in a PPC campaign.

Canonical Issues
Duplicate content. A URL that a search engine determines to be the most relevant or valuable is referred to as the canonical URL.

Cloaking
Displaying different content to users than what is read by search engines. Negative Cloaking: showing content or keywords to spiders that is invisible on the page.

Content
The informational text on a site.

Contextual Advertising
Advertising that is place on a webpage automatically based on the pages relative content. Google's AdSense is the most popular contextual advertising program.

Conversion Rate
A conversion is typically a sale or other intended goal of the website (a signup, contact form, etc.) The conversion rate is the percentage of visitors that make a conversion. 8 out of 100 visitors that buy an item (or fill a webform) is an 8% conversion rate.

Crawl Depth
How thoroughly a site is indexed, or how many internal pages of a site are indexed.

Crawl Frequency
How often a search engine crawler visits a site

Crawler (Bot, Spider)
A automated program, typically employed by search engines, to visit and 'read' the information on a site.

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Deep Link
a link which points to a relevant internal page in a site. Deep links are seen commonly on sites with a natural pattern of links.

Denial of Service (DoS) attack
A Denial of Service (DoS) attack occurs when an excessively large number of communications are purposely sent to a computer to overload that computer's ability to handle them. When the computer is overloaded, it may slow down to the point at which it appears to stop responding, and programs running in memory may become corrupt. A simple DoS attack originates from a single computer. That is, all the communications that overload the target computer are sent from one computer.

A more complicated type of DoS attack, called a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack, originates from many computers. Computer hackers typically use other people's computers to conduct a DDoS attack without the knowledge or permission of the computer's owner. A computer that is used in this way is sometimes called a zombie or a drone.

Description Tag
The meta tag used to describe the web page it is on. The wording included in this tag is what is typically displayed below the main link in search results, so should be worded to encourage clicking.

Del.icio.us
Popular social bookmarking site where users store and share bookmarks with others.

DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol)
A service that automatically assigns a temporary IP address to each device on a network.

Digg
Social bookmarking site where users vote on news stories.

DMOZ (Open Directory Project)
Traditionally one of the most popular and important directory or catalog of websites, along with Yahoo Directory. Search engines place significant weight to links from DMOZ. DMOZ is manually edited, meaning that an inclusion is the decision of humans and not automated, which adds to the value of an inclusion in search engine's eyes. DMOZ is an AOL product. DMOZ stands for Directory Mozilla. Inclusion is free.

DNS (Domain Name System)
A hierarchical naming system that correlates domain names such as google.com with an IP address of 209.85.171.99.

DNS Server
A computer that keeps a database of domain names and their corresponding IP addresses. When a computer sends a domain name to a DNS server, the server returns the IP address for that domain.

Domain
The common address for a single company or organization on the Internet.

Domain Name
Locates an organization or other entity on the Internet.

Doorway Page (Gateway Page)
This is a page that is created to drive traffic to another page, usually a page filled with keywords. It redirects visitors but not spiders to another page, a form of cloaking. Using doorway pages is against Google's Webmaster Guidelines.

Duplicate Content
Content which is identical to content that is already located somewhere else on the web. Google considers the first page visited to be the trusted site regarding this content, and any site that it recognizes the same content, it will give less or no trust for that content.

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Echo
To transmit each character that a computer receives back to the source immediately, serving as a confirmation of receipt. TCP and UDP use port 7 for echo.

Email
A method of exchanging messages and files with other people via computer networks. A popular protocol for sending email is SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol). Popular protocols for receiving email are POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3) and IMAP4 (Internet Message Access Protocol 4). Web-based email services send and receive email using standard protocols, but then use HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) for delivering email to the recipient, by displaying the email as a Web page.

Encryption
The process of encoding electronic transaction information, to allow secure transmission of data over the Internet. Method of encoding data to prevent others from being able to interpret the information.

End User
In the context of Web Sites, an end user is the person that a Web Site is designed for. The person who will be using it when it's done. A person who uses a computer as part of their daily life or daily work, but is not interested in computer programming, design or engineering.

Entry Page
The most widely used LAN access method, which is defined by the IEEE 802.3 standard. Ethernet is normally a shared media LAN meaning that all devices on the network segment share total bandwidth. Ethernet networks operate at 10 Mbps using CSMA/CD to run over 10BaseT cables.

EPS (Encapsulated PostScript)
EPS is a PostScript image file format that is compatible with PostScript printers and is often used for transferring files between various graphics applications. EPS files will print identically on all PostScript-compatible printers and will appear the same in all applications that can read the PostScript format.

Ethernet
A method of exchanging messages and files with other people via computer networks. A popular protocol for sending email is SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol). Popular protocols for receiving email are POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3) and IMAP4 (Internet Message Access Protocol 4). Web-based email services send and receive email using standard protocols, but then use HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) for delivering email to the recipient, by displaying the email as a Web page.

Everflux
Google's term for the continuous refresh, the constant updating of its index. Before everflux, Google performed monthly updates, known as the Google Dance.

Extranet
Extranets are often used by companies that need to share selective information with other businesses or individuals. For example, a supplier may use an extranet to provide inventory data to certain clients, while not making the information available to the general public. The extranet may also include a secure means of communication for the company and its clients, such as a support ticket system or Web-based forum.

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Feed
Subscribing to content updates via notifications. Commonly used feeds are RSS or XML feeds.

FFA
Free for All.

File and Printer Sharing
A service that allows sharing of files and printers through a network connection. File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks uses UDP ports 137 and 138, and TCP port 139. If you block TCP port 139, no shared resources are allowed.

Filter
A program or process that intercepts information, processes it, and then sends it to its intended destination. During processing, the filter identifies information that meets a set of previously specified criteria, and prevents that information from being sent. Filters are typically used when blocking inappropriate content from a Web site.

Finger
A command in some operating systems that requests network user account information.

Firefox
A popular open source web browser for PCs, alternative to Internet Explorer.

Firewall
A security system that uses rules to block or allow connections and data transmissions between your computer and the Internet.

Firewall Rule
A set of parameters that specifies a type of data packet or network communication and an action to perform (permit it or block it) when it is found.

Fragment or IP Fragment
An IP packet that has been split into two or more parts, or fragments. When the size of an IP packet exceeds the maximum frame size of a network that it crosses, the packet must be divided into smaller packets, or fragments.

FTP (File Transfer Protocol)
A standard protocol for copying files to and from remote computers over TCP/IP networks, such as the Internet. FTP uses ports 20 and 21. FTP is commonly used to download programs and other files to your computer from other servers. It is also used to upload Web page files to your own Web site.

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Gateway
A gateway is either hardware or software that acts as a bridge between two networks so that data can be transferred between a number of computers. For example, when you send an e-mail to a friend or when you log in to a Web site, there is a gateway that allows the connection take place. Often, your connection to a Web site will involve many smaller connections to other servers along the way. In these cases, a number of gateways are used.

Gateway Page (Doorway Page)
This is a page that is created to drive traffic to another page, usually a page filled with keywords.

Gigahertz - GHz
One gigahertz is equal to 1,000 megahertz (MHz) or 1,000,000,000 Hz. It is commonly used to measure computer processing speeds. For many years, computer CPU speeds were measured in megahertz, but after personal computers eclipsed the 1,000 Mhz mark around the year 2000, gigahertz became the standard measurement unit. After all, it is easier to say "2.4 Gigahertz" than "2,400 Megahertz."

While gigahertz is most commonly used to measure processor speed, it can also measure the speed of other parts of the computer, such as the RAM and backside cache. The speed of these components, along with other parts of the computer, also impact the computer's overall performance. Therefore, when comparing computers, remember the number of gigahertz is not the only thing that matters.

GIGO (Garbage In, Garbage Out)
Stands for "Garbage In, Garbage Out." It means that if invalid data is entered in a computer program, the resulting output will also be invalid. So if a program asked you to enter a letter of the alphabet and you decided to be funny and enter "3.14159", there's a good chance the results you would get back would be pretty messed up, or "garbage." Because we computer users aren't always smart enough to enter valid data, programmers have to take extensive mesaures to prevent GIGO errors.

GIS (Geographic Information Systems)
Stands for "Geographic Information Systems." GIS tools are used to gather and analyze data about the surface of the earth. The data can be used to create charts, maps, and 3D models of the earth's surface. This includes hills, mountains, trees, buildings, streets, rivers, and pretty much anything else. Sounds fun, but how is it used? Well, organizations such as the police and fire department can use the data to develop emergency routes. The government can use the data to measure the growth and expansion of cities or the depletion of forests. Most importantly, however, GIS can assist with special effects by simulating landscapes and terrain in action movies.

Gnutella
Gnutella is a file sharing network that allows users to send and receive files over the Internet. The first part of its name comes from the GNU General Public License, which originally allowed the source of the program to be made available to the public. The second part of the name comes from Nutella, a chocolate hazelnut spread, which apparently the developers ate a lot of while working on the project.

Google Bomb
A group effort to manipulate the search results for a particular term to generate either humorous or damaging results.

Googlebot
Google's search engine spider or crawler.

Google Bowling
A malicious negative SEO tactic a competitor would use to knock someone out of search results by pointing thousands of bad low quality links at their site.

Google Dance
Unpredictable change in search results that previously occurred during an update to Google's index.

Gopher
The Gopher technology was invented at the University of Minnesota, whose mascot is, not surprisingly, the Golden Gopher. The gopher system allows people to search for and retrieve information using a text interface. The technology is based on a client-server structure, where a gopher client program is used to search gopher servers. These servers can store documents, articles, programs, and other information. Instead of hyperlinks, the gopher interface uses menus of links to other documents and programs.

GPS (Global Positioning System)
Stands for "Global Positioning System." GPS is a satellite navigation system used to determine ground position and velocity (location, speed, and direction). Though it was created and originally used by the U.S. military, GPS is now available to the general public all over the world. GPS navigation systems are currently installed in a number of luxury cars, complete with an LCD map that shows the driver exactly where in the world he is. Advanced car GPS units can actually speak the directions to a certain destination and tell the driver when to turn.

GPU (Graphics Processing Unit)
Stands for "Graphics Processing Unit." Like the CPU (Central Processing Unit), it is a single-chip processor. However, the GPU is used primarily for computing 3D functions. This includes things such as lighting effects, object transformations, and 3D motion. Because these types of calculations are rather taxing on the CPU, the GPU can help the computer run more effienciently.

GUI (Graphical User Interface)
Stands for "Graphical User Interface," and is pronounced "gooey." It refers to the graphical interface of a computer that allows users to click and drag objects with a mouse instead of entering text at a command line. Two of the most popular operating systems, Windows and the Mac OS, are GUI-based. The graphical user interface was first introduced to the public by Apple with the Macintosh in 1984. However, the idea was actually taken from an earlier user interface developed by Xerox.

GUID (Globally Unique Identifier)
Stands for "Globally Unique Identifier." A GUID is a 128-bit (16 byte) number used by software programs to uniquely identify the location of a data object. Some examples of data that include GUIDs are streaming media files, Windows registry entries, database keys, and various file types. GUIDs are typically written in hexadecimal notation, containing 32 digits, and may look something like this: {12345678-9012-3456-7890-123456789012}.

GWM Google Webmaster Tools
A robust and free suite of tools provided by Google to get information about your site, find problems in Google's eyes, view link traffic.

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Hacker
A person who attempts unauthorized access of other people's computers for the purpose of obtaining information on those computers or to do damage to those computers.

Headings
Tags used in the source code in HTML to indicate the subject of a particular section.

Hidden Text
Invisible text, text that is colored the same as the background, so is not visible to visitors.

Host Name
The name that identifies a computer on a network. For example, www.Symantec.com is the host name for the Symantec Web site. Host names are translated to IP addresses by the DNS.

HTML
Hypertext Markup Language. A standard language for documents on the World Wide Web. Codes inserted in a text file instruct the Web browser on how to display a Web page's words and images for the user, and defines hypertext links between documents.

HTML Tags
The pieces of the code that give direction as to how standard text will be displayed on a web page.

HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol)
A set of rules for requesting pages from a Web server and transmitting pages (including text, graphic images, sound, video, and other multimedia files) to the requesting Web browser. HTTP is the most widely used application protocol on the World Wide Web. HTTP uses TCP port 80.

HTTPS (HyperText Transfer Protocol Secure)
A variation of HTTP that uses encryption to transmit data securely. HTTPS uses TCP port 443.

Hyperlink
A hyperlink is a word, phrase, or image that you can click on to jump to a new document or a new section within the current document. Hyperlinks are found in nearly all Web pages, allowing users to click their way from page to page. Text hyperlinks are often blue and underlined, but don't have to be. When you move the cursor over a hyperlink, whether it is text or an image, the arrow should change to a small hand pointing at the link. When you click it, a new page or place in the current page will open.

Hyper-Threading
Hyper-threading is a technology developed by Intel Corporation. It is used in certain Pentium 4 processors and all Intel Xeon processors. Hyper-threading technology, commonly referred to as "HT Technology," enables the processor to execute two threads, or sets of instructions, at the same time. Since hyper-threading allows two streams to be executed in parallel, it is almost like having two separate processors working together.

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Impression
One view by a user of a page or ad. Used to measure traffic, number of times an ad or listing was seen by someone (whether or not it was clicked)

Inbound Link (IBL) (also backlink)
A link pointing at a site from a separate domain. Google and other search engines use the number and quality of IBLs to determine a site's authority on keyword searches.

Index
As a noun, the data a search engine has visited and read and collected. As a verb, a search engine indexes a page when it visits and reads the page. The storage of this data is called the cache.

IP Address
Internet Protocol address. The identifying and trackable information assigned to a particular computer (or electronic device) that accesses the internet. A user's IP address will give their location.

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Joomla
A popular open source content management system designed to assist users in building websites.

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Keyword
A word or phrase that searchers might use in performing a search.

Keyword Density
The ratio of words on a web page and the number of times a particular keyword is used on the page.

Keyword Stemming
Creating additional variations of keywords by adding prefixes, suffixes, plurals, related words, etc.

Keyword Stuffing/Spamming
Placing an unnatural amount of keywords into a document or web page, in an obvious way and detracting from the natural flow or the wording as read by humans.

Keyword Tag
The HTML tag that lists keywords that are important for the particular page.

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Landing page
The web page that a searcher will first see when they click on an ad or listing. A site owner should put thought into what page a client sees in relation to the words that they click.

LSI Latent Semantic Indexing
This is the way search engines index groups of associated words that they see on a page. For example, just seeing the word 'windows' on a page, LSI is looking for other words about an operating system or computers to attribute the word 'windows' to Microsoft or to an opening in a wall.

Link Bait
Compelling, useful content added to a web page to compel users to link to it.

Link Churn
the rate at which a site loses its incoming links.

Link exchange (Reciprocal Link)
Putting a link on your site in exchange for receiving a link on another site. Commonly seen in directories where sites can submit themselves without approval and must include a directory link on their site.

Link Farm
A network of sites created to link to each other to build links artificially.

Link Juice
Slang for the trust and authority passed from a link.

Link Profile
An overview or snapshot of all of a site's inbound links and their qualities.

Link popularity
A description of a site's overall link value based on the number and quality of inbound links it has.

Link Rot
Dead or broken links

Link Spam
Unwanted links such as links posted in comments

Long Tail Keywords
Keyword phrases that are more specific, typically 3+ words. Long Tail searches result in qualified clicks and are easier to rank for when appropriate to your site.

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Managed Hosting
A dedicated server that is supplied with a full suite of technical support, setup, maintenance and monitoring services. Managed Hosting differs from Dedicated Hosting where customers are provided with their own server but still have to take care of all the administrative duties related to the server.

Meta tags
In the HTML code on a page, these are informational tags that do not show up on the page. They are used to describe a page to search engines or offer other direction. The description tag is what typically shows in search results.

Mirror site
A site which duplicates (or mirrors) the contents of another site.

Movable Type
One of the most popular blogging software options, along with Wordpress.

Mod Rewrite
When a webmaster reorganizes a site, for example to rename URLs to be more search engine friendly or to improve user experience.