297
Glossary
5.375 x 8.375 ver 2.3
system disk
— A diskette that contains the operating system files needed
to start the computer. Any diskette can be formatted as a system
disk. A system disk is also called a “bootable disk” or a “startup
disk.” Compare
non-system disk.
system prompt
— The symbol (in
MS-DOS
®
, generally a drive letter
followed by a “greater than” sign) indicating where users are to
enter commands.
T
TFT display
— See
active-matrix display
.
U
universal serial bus (USB)
— A serial bus that supports a data transfer
rate of up to 480 Mbps (480 million bits per second). USB can
connect up to 127 peripheral devices through a single all-purpose
USB port. USB allows hot swapping of peripherals. See also
bus,
hot swapping, serial
.
upload
— To send a file to another computer through a modem or
network. See also
download
.
USB
— See
universal serial bus (USB).
utility
— A computer program designed to perform a narrowly focused
operation or solve a specific problem. Utilities are often related to
computer system management.
W
Web
— See
World Wide Web
.
Wi-Fi
— A trademarked term by the Wi-Fi Alliance which stands for
Wireless Fidelity, and is another term for the communication
protocol to permit an Ethernet connection using wireless
communication components.
World Wide Web (www)
— The worldwide network of Web sites
linked together over the Internet. A user of the Web can jump from
site to site regardless of the location of the computer hosting the site.
See also
Internet.