Website and Internet Terminology

Website Basics
 

The following explanations will help you to speak knowledgeably about web design, websites and the Internet. It's helpful to understand what these terms mean before talking with your web designer.

Domain Name - An Internet address that you register, usually because you want to direct it to a website. Example:  www.YourWebsite.com

URL - The address to a website or to a page within a website or blog. Every web page has it's own unique URL.

www.YourWebsite.com is a domain name, and a URL.
www.YourWebsite.com/gallery.htm is the URL of a sub page on your site.

Domain Registrar - A company that sells domain names (actually, it's more like renting - your domain name can go to someone else if you stop paying the annual fees). 

Parked Domain Name - When you purchase a domain name, and before you redirect it to your site, the domain is 'parked'. Usually the domain registrar will do this for free and automatically when you register a new domain name. You can keep a domain name parked indefinitely, or until you're ready to change the name servers.

Name Servers - A new website built from scratch needs a domain name. To point a domain name to a website (or future website) on your sever you must change the domain's name servers to those of your server. Once you've set the name servers, your domain name is no longer parked, and now points to your website. You do this within your domain registrar account, using the name servers your hosting service gave you when you opened the account. Your domain name will appear in the address for every page on your website (the website may have a temporary URL provided by your host until you change the name servers to your domain name - then the page URLs will all be based on your domain name).

Redirected Domain Name - To 'redirect' a domain means to point a domain name to an existing website's URL.  Once that's done, both the original page URL and the redirected domain will take you to the same web page.

Let's say you've got a web site with a lot of pages, and there's one page you send people to a lot. It's inconvenient to keep giving out the URL because people never can remember it (and maybe you can't either!):

www.YourWebsite.com/gallery/newwork.htm

You may want to register another domain name and redirect it to that page so you can easily send people straight there:

www.YourGalleryPage.com

This is a good choice for attaching your domain name to an existing website or web page when you can't change the website's domain name, such as your Blogger blog. Redirect your domain name to the front page of your blog, which would be: http://yourusername.blogstpot.com

Host, Hosting Account - a company that sells space on their servers so your website can go online.

Server - think of a sever as an apartment building in the big city called the Internet.  Your hosting service essentially rents you a room where your website resides. Your domain name takes people to your room, where they can see your website.

Files - usually refers to images, web pages, documents, videos and other things you might put on a website.

File Name - is the name you give an image or document PLUS the file extension, which is the letters at the end after the dot. If you create your artist bio in Word, the file name might be: MyArtistBio.doc or MyArtistBio.docx

.jpg or .jpeg - the preferred file format for most website images. You would name your image and save it as a .jpg or .peg file: MyPainting.jpg

Image Size - can refer to either the actual outside dimensions of an image or the resolution or both.

Resolution - refers to the number of pixels, or dots, per inch in a digital image file. The fewer the pixels or dots, the lower the resolution and the smaller the file size. Resolutions of 300 dpi and higher are required for printing. Resolutions of 72 - 100 ppi are best for web sites.

DPI - dots per inch, typically used when talking about images for printing.

PPI - pixels per inch, typically used when discussing images for the Internet. DPI and PPI are often used interchangeably.

HTML - Hypertext Markup Language is the language that most websites use for defining their layout and structure.

CSS - Cascading Style Sheets are often used to define styles, such as colors, fonts and sizes, of elements on a blog or website. Changes made to a specific element on a stylesheet will apply to that element everywhere it appears on the site.

JavaScript - is a scripting language that allows applications hosted by other websites to work on yours. Many widgets and such that give you code to put on your website work via javascript.

FTP - using FTP software (noun) you FTP files (verb) to your server that you want to appear on your website. Website builder programs and software often include this function as part of their programming. If you build pages outside of a website builder program, you'll probably need FTP software.

CMS - when you want someone besides the web designer to be able to maintain a website, you might consider building it on a Content Management System. Our 'Website Editor' and 'Gallery Generator' turn a static website into a CMS without any special programming. This allows the website's owner to manage and update their site without having to go through the designer.