Internet Dictionary
Click on a letter to see the relevant terms: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W Z

Hacker Originally, this referred to a computer programmer working in lower-level languages who "hacked"out code. But now, it means a high-powered user who delights in learning the intricacies of a computer or network and solving its inscrutable riddles. In other words, a hacker is a very sophisticated technical programmer and problem solver. Hackers do not engage in malicious and illegal practices. Hackers are the good guys. On the other hand, crackers are the bad guys.

Hardware The electronic, magnetic, and mechanical devices of a computer and its peripherals are known as hardware. Programs are called software. Without software, the hardware is a pile of "dumb" metal.

Hawthorne effect The artificial increase in productivity at a New Jersey factory that occurred for psychological reasons. Here's what happened. A new method of production was being tried and studied to determine its effects. Initially, productivity increased significantly. But the reason was not the production changes but rather because the study was being done. After the initial excitement died down, the productivity increases disappear and the method was pronounced useless. Now, the Hawthorne effect refers to any temporary increase in interest in something new that's being widely hyped. According to Bob Metcalfe (Ethernet inventor, 3Com founder, and Internet visionary) the Internet may now be experiencing the Hawthorne effect. People are rushing to the Internet, surfing the web, putting up home pages, joining newsgroups, etc. When reality catches up with common sense, a lot of the initial excitement will disappear. Then, the Internet can continue its evolution on a more stable course.

Heuristics When detecting viruses, there are certain clues that indicate the presence of a virus. Heuristics is a set of rules used to detect these clues. It adds another dimension to virus detection because it can detect sophisticated viruses that are not yet included in a signature-scan database.

Hierarchy For a global network like the Internet to work efficiently, it has to be organized as a hierarchy or graded levels of communication. At this time, the Internet has three levels: stub (lowest), transit (middle), and backbone (highest). A network at the stub level carries traffic only for its own local computers. To communicate with an outside network, a stub network sends its traffic to the next level up, a transit network. The transit network is a network of at least two stub networks. This medium level network can send the traffic to any other stub network that it serves. If the target stub network is outside its service area, the transit network sends the traffic to the next higher level, the backbone network. Backbone networks communicate with each other and redistribute the traffic back down to the transit level, where it is redirected to the target stub network.

Home page This is the page you see when you enter a web site for the first time. For instance, to get to this web site, you used the URL of http://www.malvino.com. Your computer then downloaded the home page of this web site. You can always get back to the home page by clicking on the link labeled Home.

Hop The transmission of the TCP/IP packet between two routers is called a hop. We can say that the packets hop between routers as they move toward their final destination. The number of hops can be as few as 5 or as many as 15, depending on length of the transmission path between the client and the server.

Host A computer that makes its files accessible to other computers. Any host computer connected to the Internet has an IP address. This way, TCP/IP packets can be delivered to it.

HTML Hypertext Markup Language. This is a higher-level programming language used to create web pages. With HTML you can control the font, size, color, and format of text, as well as inserting graphic images. Especially important, you can create links to other web pages or to bookmarks on the same web page.

HTTP Hypertext Transfer Protocol. The set of communication rules used by computers when transmitting and receiving web pages. The protocol is the first part of a URL address for a web page. For instance, this web site has a URL of http://www.malvino.com.

HTTPS Some URLs have the format of https://www.hostname. The s after the http indicates a secure web site, one with a firewall or other security filters to prevent cracker infiltration.

Hub The center of a star network. Computers at the end points of the star network can communicate with the hub. In turn, the hub can communicate with other hubs on the Internet. In this way, messages from any computer at the end of one star network can communicate with any other computer on another star network.

Hypermedia This extends the idea of links used with hypertext to all kinds of nontextual data. Besides linking to bookmarks and pages, hypermedia means you can also link to graphical images, sounds, video, and animation.

Hypertext Text that contains underlined words, links to bookmarks or other pages. This allows you to follow a nonlinear path, reading just those topics and ideas that interest you. Think of it this way. An ordinary book is one-dimensional. You are expected to read it from page 1 onward. If the book has an index, you get a second dimension because you can jump to different pages. Hypertext is multidimensional because once you arrive at a each new page, you can use its links to take you to other pages.

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