ISP Glossary, Glossary ISP |
| G.Lite - G.Lite is a form of ADSL that does not require a splitter to separate voice and Internet traffic. It can operate at speeds of up to 1.5Mbps (like a T1)... |
| Game Console - A consumer gaming system that is usually sold in retail stores and toy stores. It differs from a standard computer in that it is designed from the ground... |
| Game Port - A 15-pin analog port on a PC used specifically for game controllers like a joystick. It also doubles as a MIDI connector. Usually you find one on the back... |
| Gamma - In computer graphics and digital video, this refers to a numerical parameter that describes the nonlinearity of intensity reproduction. Basically, as colors... |
| Gamma Correction - The process of altering the gamma of computer graphics, pictures, or video in order to make the picture show up properly and enable the proper recognition... |
| Garbage Collection - A process where dynamically allocated blocks of memory are reclaimed while a program executes. Garbage collection is normally performed by the garbage... |
| Gas Plasma Display - A type of monitor technology that was initially used to create small monochrome displays for early portable computers. Now it is typically used to create... |
| Gate - A gate is a tiny electronic switch. These switches, when linked together, can perform logical functions. Basically, gate is the logical term for transistor.... |
| Gateway - The computer or device onto which the first hop needs to go to get out of your network and onto another network or the Internet. The gateway, as it relates... |
| Gbit - This refers to approximately one billion bits. More exactly, it is 2^30, or 1,073,741,824 bits. |
| Gbps - A rate of data transfer of one gigabit of data per second. |
| GDI - A standard set of programming functions provided by Microsoft for the production of graphic output in Windows. Microsoft provides these functions in its... |
| Geek - (1) A formerly derogatory term given to the outcast elite, usually lacking in social graces. The term has been used so liberally by the masses of people... |
| General Packet Radio Service - A mobile phone 2.5G technology that allows short bursts of data between a phone and a network such as the Internet. The short transmissions allow for less... |
| General Protection Fault - An error that is caused in a Microsoft Windows operating system when a program tries to access a protected section of memory that it should not be accessing.... |
| Genetic Algorithm - An algorithm that uses fuzzy logic and can refine itself based on its ability to select proper answers. Often, a human must tell the algorithm what it... |
| Geographic Information System - A system for capturing and manipulating data relating to the Earth. A common use of GIS is to overlay several types of maps (for example, train routes,... |
| Gflop - The ability of a system to compute one billion floating point operations in one second. AMD's K6-2 processor and Motorola's G4 processor can achieve speeds... |
| GIF - Invented by CompuServe for efficient transmission of graphics, this format can only support 256 colors, or 8 bits. The newer revision, 89a, allows for... |
| Gig - This refers to approximately one billion bytes. To be specific, it is 2^30, or 1,073,741,824 bytes. |
| Gigabit - This refers to approximately one billion bits. More exactly, it is 2^30, or 1,073,741,824 bits. |
| Gigabyte - This refers to approximately one billion bytes. To be specific, it is 2^30, or 1,073,741,824 bytes. |
| GigaFlop - The ability of a system to compute one billion floating point operations in one second. AMD's K6-2 processor and Motorola's G4 processor can achieve speeds... |
| Gigapixel - 1,073,741,824 pixels. This is a measure of how fast data can be moved through a graphics accelerator, as in gigapixels/second. See also megapixel. |
| GIMP - A free, Open Source program designed for creation or manipulation of images, much like Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, but for use on Linux/UNIX platforms.... |
| GIS - A system for capturing and manipulating data relating to the Earth. A common use of GIS is to overlay several types of maps (for example, train routes,... |
| GlidePad - A touch-sensitive pad about 2" x 2" that will track the touch of a finger. It is not a pressure sensor, so there is no need to press down, only to touch.... |
| Glitch - This often refers to a bug in a program that is somewhat different than a freeze or a crash, usually causing erroneous or garbage results to be displayed.... |
| Global Positioning System - A system of satellites around the Earth that broadcast the time via radio signals based on an internal atomic clock. GPS devices can receive the signals... |
| Global System for Mobile Communications - A 2G digital standard for cellular phone communications that is used in many countries. GSM communications bands range from 900-1800MHz. The GSM initials... |
| GMT - Greenwich Mean Time, often used as a standard time zone. In e-mail headers, you will often see references to the hours offset from GMT. For example, Eastern... |
| gmta - Chat shorthand for "great minds think alike". |
| GNU - A free software movement whose acronym stands recursively for "GNU's Not Unix." GNU was started in 1984 as a means to create an entire system of software,... |
| GNU Public License - The short of it is quite simple: if you based anything on GPLed software, you MUST provide the source code to your software upon request. The legalities... |
| Gnutella - This is a distributed file swapping program developed by Nullsoft, which is owned by AOL. AOL attempted to shut down Gnutella, but once it was released... |
| Gold Master - The final beta version of a program that is ready to be released to the public. The entire goal of the beta process is to arrive at the gold master candidate.... |
| Goldfinger - One of the generic terms used to describe the group of gold connectors inside the AMD Athlon Slot A cartridge. The connector allows you to plug devices... |
| Googol - This stands for the number 10 raised to the power of 100 (10^100), or a one followed by 100 zeros. |
| Googolplex - The number 10 raised to the power of 1 google, or (10^(10^100)), which is the number 1 followed by 10^100 zeros. |
| gopher - A friendly menu system for exploring the Internet developed at the |
| Gouraud Shading - This method analyzes the color at each corner of the triangle and takes an average of the colors where the corners meet. This causes the triangles to "bleed"... |
| GPF - General Protection Fault. The curse of Windows! See our GPF Guide, How to Avoid GPF's While Browsing the Nets. |
| GPL - The short of it is quite simple: if you based anything on GPLed software, you MUST provide the source code to your software upon request. The legalities... |
| GPRS - A mobile phone 2.5G technology that allows short bursts of data between a phone and a network such as the Internet. The short transmissions allow for less... |
| GPS - A system of satellites around the Earth that broadcast the time via radio signals based on an internal atomic clock. GPS devices can receive the signals... |
| GPU - A microprocessor specifically designed for processing 3D graphics data. This term was first coined by NVIDIA to describe its GeForce 256 chip. NVIDIA justified... |
| Graphical Interchange Format - Invented by CompuServe for efficient transmission of graphics, this format can only support 256 colors, or 8 bits. The newer revision, 89a, allows for... |
| Graphical User Interface - Any system that uses graphics to represent the functions of a program. All Windows operating systems are GUIs. |
| Graphics - The pictures that computers display. Not text, but just about everything else. |
| Graphics card - The graphics card is an add-in board that plugs into the motherboard and sends signals out to the monitor to represent what should be shown on the screen.... |
| Graphics Device Interface - A standard set of programming functions provided by Microsoft for the production of graphic output in Windows. Microsoft provides these functions in its... |
| Graphics Processing Unit - A microprocessor specifically designed for processing 3D graphics data. This term was first coined by NVIDIA to describe its GeForce 256 chip. NVIDIA justified... |
| Gray Market - The market where goods are sold in an unauthorized manner, or before their expected release date. Sometimes gray market goods have been stolen from the... |
| Greenie - A slang term for a CD-Recordable disk. The media was originally green on the recording side, thus the term. Nowadays CD-R media may be green, blue, or... |
| grep - A unix search command that will search for matching text or a "regular experession" ( regexp) in a file. It derives from the intial characters of Global... |
| griefer - An online game role player who sabotages the game by harassing, deceiving, cheating, robbing or killing newer players. |
| Ground - Electrically speaking, this is a neutral point that can absorb excess electricity. Often it is the ground itself (as in the ground you stand on), but it... |
| GroupWare - This term is used to describe any form of software designed to allow a group of people to easily share ideas and data. Examples include Lotus Notes, Novell... |
| GSM - A 2G digital standard for cellular phone communications that is used in many countries. GSM communications bands range from 900-1800MHz. The GSM initials... |
| GTL+ - This is an improvement to the GTL standard that allows for bus operation at speeds of between 60 and 125MHz typically. It remains a parallel signaling... |
| GTLP - This is an improvement to the GTL standard that allows for bus operation at speeds of between 60 and 125MHz typically. It remains a parallel signaling... |
| GUI - Graphical User Interface. Pronounced "gooey". An operating system interace between the user and the computer based on graphics. GUIs typically use a mouse... |
| GUID - Globally Unique Identifier. A controversial 16-byte number generated by Microsoft programs that uniquely identifies a network or user or computer or document.... |
| Gunning Transceiver Logic - A low-power standard for electrical signals used in CMOS circuits which allows for low electromagnetic interference at high speeds of transfer. GTL requires... |
| Gunning Transceiver Logic Plus - This is an improvement to the GTL standard that allows for bus operation at speeds of between 60 and 125MHz typically. It remains a parallel signaling... |
| Gustafson's Law - In response to Amdahl's Law on limitation of effectiveness of parallel computing due to a serial (non-parallelizable) component of code, Gustafson's Law... |
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