Glossary of Terms - A

Amount of time it takes for a hard drive to find and retrieve a piece of information. Also known as seek time.

The conditions needed to ensure that all users, including those with disabilities can access web pages.

Advanced Configuration and Power Interface. The latest standard that specifies how PC or laptop power can be efficiently managed. Features include activating devices only when required and reducing clock speed when full processing power is not needed.

Unlike Java, ActiveX is not a programming language, but a set of instructions on how an object should be used. ActiveX controls can be downloaded from the internet, and run just like Java applets. However, Java will only interact with your web browser, while ActiveX controls can access your Windows operating system.

Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line. A permanently on, broadband connection to the internet using conventional phonelines. Data is downloaded to the PC faster than it is uploaded from the PC - hence the term "asymmetric" is used to describe the connection.

Accelerated Graphics Port. An expansion slot linked directly to the motherboard's system bus, enabling high-performance graphics. AGP graphics cards can access system memory directly, as well as using their own video memory. AGP 2X has a peak transfer rate of 512MBps (megabytes per second), while AGP 4X runs at 1.1GBps (gigabytes per second).

One of the popular internet search engines. Reults for Alta Vista fed from Yahoo (see Yahoo)

American National Standards Institute

Refers to the brightness of a projector. The higher this figure, the brighter the image will be. Anything in excess of 800 Ansi lumens should be viewable in daylight.

Technique used to adjust jagged diagonal lines and curves in images caused by false frequencies (aliases) to make them look smoother. This process is commonly used to improve the appearance of fonts.

Application Program Interface. A common interface that allows programs to make use of services provided by the operating system or other applications. Winsock, for example, is an API that allows Windows and other programs to talk to TCP/IP for internet access.

Program designed to be executed from within another program. Applets cannot be activated from an operating system.

Software program, such as a word processor, spreadsheet or game, that is designed for a specific purpose.

American Standard Code for Information Interchange. Ascii is the most common format for text files in computers and on the internet.

attachment packet interface. This is an extension to the EIDE interface specification that additionally supports CD-ROM and tape drives.

AMD's processor, the Athlon XP, has a slower clock speed than its predecessors, but thanks to some clever tweaks of the architecture it is outperforming all the competition.

Audio Video Interleave. Designed by Microsoft to combine audio and video in a single track or frame to keep them synchronised. Files can be compressed using various audio and video coders (coder/decoder).