Guest Author - Sandra Eggers

With a major industry focus on e-commerce and internet-related technology, some conversations may sound like they're being spoken in a foreign language to you. If you're serious about making a career in the technology sector, you must be familiar with the common lingo and TLA's (three letter acronyms) used in everyday business. The following are some of the more common e-commerce definitions.

ActiveX
Software standard used in component based architecture. Series of APIs (Application Program Interfaces) that can activate Internet capabilities and let objects communicate with each other regardless of how they were built.

ASP (Active Server Pages)
Application development tool which allows developers to embed programs in HTML pages to create dynamic web pages.

CGI (Common Gateway Interface)
Set of application programming interfaces for linking a Web server to other systems. Allows a visitor on a Web page to access databases.

Cold Fusion
Application development tool used to build access to corporate databases over the web.

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)
Enable you to precisely control the position and appearance of all the elements on dozens or even hundreds of pages on your site. In addition to letting you apply a consistent look and feel to all your pages, CSS enables you to quickly change this aesthetic scheme in the future. Can manipulate and control the text, layout, and graphics of your pages so that they will look attractive in both Netscape Communicator and Microsoft Internet Explorer.

DHTML (Dynamic HyperText Markup Language)
An extended version of HTML and JavaScript with improved animation. Allows the content of a page to change each time the user clicks, drags, or points to elements on the page.

E-Commerce
Refers to the buying and selling of goods and services on the Internet. E-Commerce is a small part of the entire E-Business practice which also includes E-Tailing, supply chain management, secure credit card transactions (SET), purchasing and procurement, shopping cart and Web store technology.

E-Commerce Platforms
Software related to Web server and communications (such as Commerce Server), which lets users view documents. Also includes application software for E-Commerce (such as Net.Commerce), which includes tools for creating a virtual mall, and Internet software (such as Site Server) that allows the replication of content of sites across multiple Web servers.

EDI (Electronic Data Interchange)
Computer-to-computer exchange of commercial transactions between trading partners.

Electronic Payment
Communications protocol standards to exchange credit card information over the Internet.

HTML (HyperText Markup Language)
Development tool used to connect multimedia content (graphics, text, images) allowing files to appear as formatted pages on the Web.

IIS (Internet Information Server)
Manages Web sites with multiple Web servers. Used to deploy intra- and inter-net sites.

Java
Object-oriented language enables the creation of platform independent middleware and applications.

JavaScript
Scripting language used with web browsers allows Web page developers to incorporate GUI (Graphic User Interface) actions into Web pages. This is based on HTML and is used to develop CGI (Common Gateway Interface) scripts and interactive Web pages.

PERL (Practical Extraction and Report Language)
Scripting language used in Unix systems which combines elements of C language and Unix shell commands. Popular in creating CGI (Common Gateway Interface) scripts on the Internet.

VBScript (Visual Basic Scripting language)
Scripting language used to develop interactive applications for the Web.

Visual J++
Application development tool for converting C++ systems to Java for use on the Internet.

VRML (Virtual Reality Modeling Language)
Developers describe virtual worlds on the Web and users move through the worlds in the same manner as that used with computer games. Also used for 3-D “how to” demonstrations (how to assemble a product).

WAP (Wireless Application Protocol)
Allows for bringing Internet content and advanced services to digital cellular phones and other wireless terminals.

Web Servers
Operating System Software returns HTML pages to requesting browser. Also provides security and configuration functions, and CGI (Common Gateway Interface) tools to connect to corporate databases. Some common Web servers are Apache, O’Reilly, and Domino.

Webmaster
Application developer who does the graphic design, updates, and maintains Web sites.

XML (Extensible Markup Language)
An extension to HTML that gives more control of content by formating data using document tags to catalog information. Used in EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) Internet systems.