web terms glossary.
- terms, jargon, words that don't make sense.
"Access keys” – no, not your username and password! Access keys are an alternative method of navigating a website, especially if one can not use a mouse. Access keys can be developed in your website coding so that, menu items can be used via the keyboard. It is one method of helping to provide an ‘accessible website’.
"Alt text” – alt text means alternative text. This is recommended for any images you have on your website. Since search engines and some users can not read images well, you can let them know what it is by defining alt text to represent it. (Sometimes when you hover over an image you will see the alt text pop up near your mouse cursor).
"Blog” – a blog means, weblog. Or to make it clearer – web log. This refers to an area of a website (or an entire website) where periodic articles are published.
"Browser address bar” – the browser address bar is the section in your browser (eg. Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari) where you can see http:// followed by the website URL. It is located almost at the very top of the browser window. It is NOT the google search bar where you might type in some keywords to find a website. For example, if I asked you to go to "http://www.undesign.com.au/contact.php” you would type it in your browser address bar. This is very important to understand especially if your web developer is asking you to go to a URL that google does not know about yet (eg. a temporary or staging area for your web page).
"Domain name” – a domain name is part of the address one would type in to find your website. It is also used for your email addresses. For example, undesign.com.au is this website's domain name. If you want a website, you would purchase a domain name.
"Dynamic” – a dynamic website can interact with the user via forms and generate content from a database. It can also collect information from users and keep it in a database for further use.
"E-commerce” – e-commerce is basically buying and selling online. For example an e-commerce site might have a shopping cart, or buy-now paypal links.
"Flash website” – a flash website uses Flash technology, developed initially by Macromedia, now by Adobe. Flash is an application that is inserted into a web page. An entire website might be contained in Flash. For example visit, http://pouthair.com.au . Lately, Javascript technology has managed to replicate a lot of what Flash can offer. To test if you are looking at a Flash application, try right-clicking on it and you should see a Flash menu popup.
"Hyperlink” – a hyperlink is something you can click on to navigate to another web page or web site. A hyperlink may also be used to open a pop-up window.
"Inbound links” – inbound links means hyperlinks from other websites that are linking to your website.
"Keyphrases” – key phrases are groups of words that a user might search for in a search engine.
"Keywords” – key words are individual words that a user might search for in a search engine.
"Live” – Putting a website 'live' (as in alive) means your website will be able to be navigated to by typing in your web address (URL).
"Meta tags” – Meta tags are defined in the coding of your website and web pages. A developer would define your website title, description and keywords that show up in search engines and in the browser window (top).
"Not in spec” – you may find a web developer telling you a request is ‘not in spec’. In other words as part of the initial agreement on the project and costs, a newly requested function may cost extra as it was not originally specified.
"Outbound links” – outbound links are hyperlinks from your website, that link to other websites.
"Page Rank” or "Ranking” – your website is ranked by search engines according to the reputation your website has. It takes time to acquire a solid page rank. The theory is, the more page rank or ranking your website has, the higher your website will appear in search engine results for relevant key phrases or key words.
"Scope” – Scoping is the process where the ideas for the website are ‘scoped out’ or ‘fleshed out’ in detail. This may include for example, different functions you want to your website to perform.
"SEO” – Search Engine Optimisation
The analysis and implementation of techniques that enables your website to perform better in search engine result pages (see SERP).
"SERP” – Search Engine Results Page
The results page you get after you make a query using a search engine (such as google, yahoo, etc).
"Site Map”
A site map can refer to a page on your website that includes hyperlinks to ALL of your web pages, or it can refer to the sitemap one would send to google (or other search engine) that lets the search engine know of each page you have (sometimes referred to as an xml sitemmap).
"Static” – a static website has information only. It does not interact with a database, or website visitors. It can not perform many of today’s functions you see on websites such as user memberships.
"Website Address” – your website address is the URL (uniform resource locator) of your website. For example http://www.undesign.com.au is a website address (or website URL). You can use this address by typing it into your browser address bar (not in the google search bar).
If you would like a website term explained, feel free to contact me and I will add the explanation to this list!