ASCII

American Standard Code for Information Interchange
A standard for character encoding representing text in computers. Is the character-encoding scheme supported by most computers.

BMP

BitMaP
Windows Bitmap is a two-dimensional raster graphics file format developed for Microsoft Windows and introduced in Windows 3.0. Usually named with the file extension .bmp.

CGI

Common Gateway Interface
A standard for interfacing external application software with a web server. A CGI script defines the interaction between browser requests and server output.

DHCP

Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol
A protocol for automatic, static or dynamic IP address allocation and administration. IP addresses assigned to a client computer are not based on a locally stored table but are assigned to the client by a network server.

DNS

Domain Name Server
A hierarchical naming system for assigning names to computers with a connection to the Internet.

FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions
A list of frequently asked questions and their answers.

GIF

Graphics Interchange Format
An important image format used for storing images in a web-friendly format. Supported by virtually every web browser.

HTML

Hyper Text Markup Language
An encoding scheme for web pages.

HTTPS

Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure
A request-response protocol for web pages which provides encryption.

IMAP

Internet Mail Access Protocol
A standard protocol for email retrieval. A copy of every email remains on the server.

JPEG

Joint Photographic Experts Group
In 1992, this group developed a standardized method of compression for digital images with or without loss in image quality, which was named after the group. JPEG or JPG is the most widely used image format for photos on the web.

LAN

Local Area Network
A computer network covering a small physical area for sharing printers and other devices.

MIME

Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions
An Internet standard for decoding email messages.

OPAC

Online Public Access Catalog
A publicly accessible online database of materials held by a library. Users can enter a number of search terms to search the library catalog.

PDF

Portable Document Format
A platform-independent file format created by Adobe Systems. PDF files can be opened and viewed for example with the Adobe Acrobat Reader.

RFC

Request for Comments
A memorandum describing Internet protocols and systems connected to the Internet.

SMPP

Short Message Peer-to-Peer
A protocol for exchanging SMS text messages.

SMTP

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol
A protocol for email transmission.

SSL

Secure Socket Layer
A protocol for encrypted upload of web pages.

TCP/IP

Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol
A set of communications protocols used for data transmission on the Internet.

URL

Uniform Resource Locator
A unique address used to identify a resource (documents, images and other objects) on the Internet.

VPN

Virtual Private Network
A VPN connection gives you remote access to WU services even while using a different Internet provider.

WWW

World Wide Web
A system of interlinked documents accessed via the Internet which are connected through hyperlinks contained in these documents.

XML

eXtensible Markup Language
A language – like HTML – for encoding documents electronically.