Glossary
239
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.
V
W
Web
— See
World Wide Web
.
Wi-Fi
— A trademarked term by the Wireless Capability Ethernet
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.