Lots of people feel overwhelmed by the number of special terms they hear tossed around when they attempt to get their business on the Internet. At Animus, we try to keep this at a minimum so that our customers can make an informed decision. Here's some of the terms that you may have heard, and what they mean in plain English.

Bandwidth
Bandwidth is a measurement of how much data can flow through a given point. In practical terms, it's usually measured in how much data is transferred in a given amount of time, such as gigabytes per month.
Though more and more web hosts today allow unlimited bandwidth, it's not unheard of for some to charge extra if your site exceeeds a certain amount of data transfer. This can be prevented by optimizing the HTML and images that make up your site -- which will also make your page load quicker.

Client-Side Scripting
Client-side scripting is code that is run on your visitor's computer, as opposed to your server. Since it depends on your visitor's computer to run, some people may not see it -- as they may have turned off client-side scripting for security reasons. Client-side scripting is typically done to give a web site a little more automation, such as automatically filling out parts of a form for a client.

Comic Sans MS
Comic Sans MS is a sans serif font. If you have it installed on your computer, this definition is written in it. Like Papyrus, it is a very specific font, and has aquired a negative reputation due to its overuse.
Because of the stigma attached to it, it's generally best to avoid using Comic Sans. If you still feel the need to use it, bear in mind that it's meant as a light-hearted, childish font -- use it only in situations where you really want to say don't take me seriously.

Compiled Code
Compiled code is source code that has been translated into something that a computer can understand. It typically cannot be modified with the source code.

Cookie
Cookies are small pieces of data that are stored on a visitor's computer when they visit your web site. This can be used to remember a visitor.
Unfortunately, cookies have been used to track people's browsing habits on the Internet as well, and because of this some users turn off the ability to accept cookies. It's usually best to avoid using cookies unless you have a very good reason to do so.

CSS
CSS stands for cascading style sheets. CSS is what makes a web site look the way that it does.
In the early days of the web, pretty much everything that controlled what a web page looked like was done with HTML. Back then, the web was really thought of as nothing more than a way to present text information. Since it has evolved, CSS has in a way taken over the cosmetic functions of HTML, while HTML handles how things work. It's not a perfect analogy, but think of HTML as your auto mechanic (who makes your car work), and CSS as your car wash (which makes your car look nice).
HTML can still be used to change the appearance of a web site (in fact, there are many things that you can do in either CSS or HTML), but it's frowned upon, as many of the tags HTML uses to do so are being phased out.

Font
A font is a style of text. Different fonts have different levels of readability and can convey different things, so it's important to pick a font that works for your web site. Fonts can be further divided into sans serif fonts and serif fonts.

FTP
FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. It's a way to upload or download files. Most web sites are updated by FTP.

HTML
HTML is basically the language that the web is written in. It stands for hypertext markup language, and at its heart is really quite simple. HTML is not really a programming language, but rather a way to turn plane text into a web site by using tags.
HTML is very error forgiving -- if there is an error in a web page, your web browser will do its best to work around it and won't even tell you an error occured! Possibly because of this, the vast majority of web sites today contain at least a couple HTML errors.

JavaScript
JavaScript is a scripting language that runs on the client side, which can be used to add functionality to a web page. Some users turn JavaScript off for security and privacy, so it's important to only use JavaScript when necesarry, and when possible provide similar content for users who have JavaScript turned off.

Papyrus
Papyrus is a font. If you have it installed on your computer, this definition is written in Papyrus. Like Comic Sans, it is a very specific font, and has aquired a negative reputation due to its overuse.
Because of the stigma attached to it, it's generally best to avoid using Papyrus. If you still feel the need to use it, use it only in situations where you really want to say I'm quite pretentious.

Perl
Perl stands for Practical Extraction and Report Language. Like PHP, Perl is a server-side scripting language used to give functionality to a web site.
Although there is debate over which one is better between Perl and PHP, PHP is certainly more popular these days. There are, however, some situations where Perl has advantages.

PHP
PHP stands for PHP Hypertext Preprocessor (yes, the first P actually does stand for PHP). It's used as a server-side scripting language to add functionality to a web page, similar to Perl. While HTML and CSS can be used to change how a web page looks, PHP changes how a web page works.
PHP can be used to let your web site send e-mail, change its own content, keep track of who is viewing your web site, and much more. It's run on the server side, so your visitors never actually see the PHP code themselves -- only what that code creates.

Sans Serif
A sans-serif font is a font that does not have serifs, those little decorations at the ends of each letter. Most of this page, and this site as well, is written in a sans serif font.
Sans serif fonts are typically a little easier to read, especially when the letters are small. Though it's much less of an issue today, some older computers could have issues displaying serif fonts correctly.

Scripting Language
A scripting language is like a computer program, except that it is distributed as source code instead of compiled code. This allows the author to distribute a program to multiple people who can then customize the program as they need.

Serif
A serif is the small decoration that appears at the tips of letters, a serif font is a font that has serifs. This definition is written in Times New Roman, a popular serif font.
Serif fonts are typically more decorative than sans serif fonts, and can be a good choice when designing a logo.

Server-Side Scripting
Server-side scripting is code that is processed on the server before your visitor sees your web site. It runs on your server instead of your client's computer, which has a few advantages -- it works regardless of the browser or computer your visitor is using, your visitor does not sees only the results of the code and not the code itself, and it can save information generated by the script on your server.

Source Code
Source code is the actual written code that creates a program, web page, et cetera; as it was written by the author. Because of this, source code can be edited, unlike compiled code.

Tags
Tags are the very heart of HTML. They take the shape of a less than sign (<), the tag information, and a greater than sign (>). Most tags have both an opening and a closing part to them, with the closing part being the same as the opening but with a slash in front of the tag's name. For example, to start a table one would type <table>, then to close that same table one would type </table>.
Some tags, like the <br> tag (line break, makes the next thing appear on the next line like hitting return) have no closing tag. These should be self closed, which is done by putting a slash after the tag name, e.g. <br/>

W3C
W3C (frequently mispelled as WC3) is the World Wide Web Consortium. This is the organization that develops the standards that the web works from. They also run the W3C Markup Validation Service.

W3C Markup Validation Service
The W3C Markup Validation Service is a tool, located at http://validator.w3.org/ to check over HTML and tell you about any errors in your web page. Since it's run by the people that determine exactly what is an error in HTML, it tends to be extremely thorough.

Web Browser
Web browsers, often referred to as just browsers are software that people use to view web pages. The software that you are using to look at this page right now is your web browser.
There are many browsers out there, the most popular ones at the moment being MSIE (which comes with Windows), Firefox (which is frequently viewed as being more secure than MSIE), Safari (which comes with Macintosh), Google Chrome, and Opera. It's worth noting that even though all browsers hypothetically speak the same language, they can process some tags and errors slightly differently. It's important to test your web page on all browsers to make sure that it looks right regardless of what your customer is using to access it.

Web Hosting Service
A web hosting service is a company that will operate a server that serves your web page for a fee. Because maintaining a server can be fairly expensive and time consuming, many business choose to rent space from a web hosting service.
In addition to charging different amounts, different web hosts tend to offer different features, allow different levels of content, et cetera. When you hire Animus Programming to design your web page we would be happy to find a web host that is right for your business.

Web Server
A web server, often referred to as just a server, is the computer that holds your web page. It waits until someone tries to go to your web page, processes any server side code, and then sends your web page to your customer.
Servers can be very expensive to maintain, and as such nearly all but the largest web sites choose to rent space from a web hosting service rather than maintain their own server.