A | B | C | D
| E | F | G | H
| I | J | K | L
| M | N | O | P
| Q | R | S | T
| U | V | W | Y
| Z |
A
Apache - Apache is a free,
open-source web server software system that is pervasive on UNIX, Linux, and
similar operating system types. It is also available for Windows and other
operating systems. For more information, see Apache.org
.
Authentication - Technique by which access
to Internet or intranet resources requires the user to enter a username and
password.
Average Page Depth - The average number of
pages on a site that visitors view during a single session.
Average Response Value - The average
revenue value of each click, calculated as total revenue divided by total
clicks.
B
Bandwidth - The amount of data that can be
transmitted along a communications channel in a fixed amount of time. For
digital devices, the bandwidth is usually expressed in bits per second (bps) or
bytes per second, where 1 byte = 8 bits.
Browsers - A browser, or more accurately, user
agent, is the software used to access a website. Examples of user agents are
"Explorer" (for Microsoft Internet Explorer), "Netscape" (for Netscape
Navigator), and "Googlebot" (an automated robot that scours the web for website
content to include in its search engine).
Bytes - A byte is a unit of information transferred
over a network (or stored on a hard drive or in memory). Every web page, image,
or other type of file is composed of some number of bytes. Large files, such as
video clips, may be composed of millions of bytes ("megabytes"). Since website
and server performance is heavily affected by the amount of bytes transferred,
and web hosting providers often charge according to this measure, it is very
important for site owners to be aware of and understand. One byte is equal to 8
bits where each bit is either a one or zero. Common terms incorporating the
word "byte" are:
-
Kilobytes - 1,024 bytes
-
Megabyte - 1,048,576 bytes
-
Gigabyte - 1,073,741,824 bytes
C
CGI Script - A CGI script is a program written in
one of several popular languages such as Perl, PHP, Python, etc., that can take
input from a web page, do something with the data, and produce a customized
result (among many other possible uses). CGI scripts are widely used to add
dynamic behavior to websites and to process forms.
Cache - A temporary storage area that a web browser
or service provider uses to store common pages and graphics that have been
recently opened. The cache enables the browser to quickly reload pages and
images that were recently viewed.
Click Through Rate (CTR)
- The percentage of known impressions that result in clicks.
Code - Anything written in a language intended for
computers to interpret.
Content (A/B) Testing
- Testing the relative effectiveness of multiple versions of the same
advertisement, or other content, in referring visitors to a site. Multiple
versions of content can be uniquely identified by using a utm_content variable
in the URL tag.
Content (Campaign Tracking) -
Content is the label for each version of an advertisement. The UTM variable for
content, utm_content, indicates which version of a link the visitor clicked on
to reach a web site - for example, utm_content=graphic_version1a.
Content is one of the five dimensions of campaign tracking; the other four are
source, medium, campaign, and term.
Content-targeted advertising -
An advertising model in which the publisher displays related advertising and
content together.
Cookie - A small amount of
text data given to a web browser by a web server. The data is stored and
returned to the specific web server each time the browser requests a page from
that server. The main purpose of cookies is to pass a unique identifier to the
website so that the website can keep track of the user as they step through a
website. For example, a protected site may store a temporary identifier in a
cookie after you successfully log in, indicating that you are an authorized
user.
The name cookie derives from UNIX objects called magic cookies. These are tokens
that are attached to a user or program and change depending on the areas
entered by the user or program. Cookies are also sometimes called persistent
cookies because they typically stay in the browser for long periods of time.
Cost-per-click (CPC) - An advertising
model in which the advertiser (sponsor) pays the publisher a certain amount
each time the sponsor's ad is clicked. Also sometimes referred to as PPC
(pay-per-click).
Cron Job - A "cron job" is a scheduled task under a
UNIX-type operating system. "cron" is a daemon, or program that is always
running. Its function is similar to the Windows Scheduler.
D
DNS Lookup - (Reverse DNS Lookup) The process of
converting a numeric IP address into a text name,
Daemon - A daemon is any program under a UNIX-type
operating system that runs at all times. Common daemons are servers (such as
Apache or an FTP server) and schedulers (such as "cron").
Directory
- A directory is a virtual container for holding computer files. It is not
merely a list of items, as the name would imply, but rather a key building
block of a computer's storage architecture that actually contains files or
other directories.
Domain - A domain is a specific virtual area within
the Internet, defined by the "top level" of the address or URL (Uniform
Resource Locator). The top level is the end of the address; example:
"whitehouse.gov". In this example, the top-level part of the domain is ".gov",
indicating a US government entity. The "whitehouse" part is the second-level
domain, indicating where within the ".gov" domain the information in question
is to be found. Other common top-level domains include ".com", ".net", ".uk",
etc.
DRM Digital rights management (DRM) is an umbrella term that refers to access control technologies used by publishers and copyright holders to limit usage of digital media or devices. It may also refer to restrictions associated with specific instances of digital works or devices. DRM overlaps with software copy protection to some extent, however the term "DRM" is usually applied to creative media (music, films, etc.) whereas the term "copy protection" tends to refer to copy protection mechanisms in computer software.
DRM-X DRM-X is the new DRM technology developed by Haihaisoft. It provides the unique, cost-effective and highly
secure on-demand DRM service that you can easily protect, publish, and sell
Audio/Video and documents. It gives you total control over who accesses your
digital content and under what terms, enabling you to increase revenue, bring
products to market faster, and attract new customers.
Domain Name System - (DNS) An Internet
addressing system that uses a group of names that are listed with dots (.)
between them, working from the most specific to the most general group. In the
United States , the top (most general) domains are network categories such as
edu (education), com (commercial), and gov (government). In other countries, a
two-letter abbreviation for the country is used, such as ca ( Canada ) and au (
Australia ).
Download - To retrieve a file or files from a
remote machine to your local machine.
E
E-commerce - The buying and selling of goods and
services, and the transfer of funds, through digital communications. Buying and
selling over the internet, etc.
Encryption - The process of encoding information
so that it is secure from other Internet users.
End User - The final user of the computer software.
The end user is the individual who uses the product after it has been fully
developed and marketed.
Error - Errors are defined as pages that visitors
attempted to view, but that returned an error message instead. Often these
errors occur because of broken links (links to pages that do not exist anymore)
or when an unauthorized visitor attempts to access restricted pages (for
example, if the visitor does not have a password to access the page).
F
FTP - (File Transfer Protocol) The basic method for
copying a file from one computer to another through the Internet.
File Type - A File Type is a designation, usually
in the form of an extension (such as .gif or .jpeg), given to a file to
describe its function or the software that is required to act upon it. More
generally, file types can be grouped into image file types (such as .gif, .png,
.jpeg), text file types (such as .doc or .txt), and many others.
Filter Field - A filter
field is the number of the field on which to apply a filter. In a log file
line, or hit, there are several distinct fields, each one holding a different
piece of data. To apply a filter to a log file, you must first identify which
field you wish to apply the filter to. This is the filter field.
Filter Name - The Filter Name is intended to be
a descriptive title for a filter. It is used only as an organizational aid, and
may contain spaces.
Filter
to Apply - The filter to apply is the actual text string to be used to
either filter in or filter out content. The Filter to Apply can be either a
plain text string or a regular expression.
Firewall - A security device placed on a LAN
(local area network) to protect it from Internet intruders. This can be a
special kind of hardware router, a piece of software, or both.
First Time Sessions - The number of times
unique visitors came to your website during a specified time period, not having
visited before that period. These visitors are identified by cookies.
First Time Unique Visitor - The
number of Unique Visitors to your website that had not visited prior to the
time frame being analyzed.
Form - In the context of the web, a form is a
data-entry mechanism generally created out of HTML in conjunction with a CGI
script. A form is usually a static HTML page that presents the visitor with
blanks, or fields . Upon entering data into the fields, the form is
submitted and a script of some sort performs some type of action on the data,
such as writing it to a file.
Frame - A rectangular region within the browser
window that displays a web page alongside other pages in other frames.
G
GET Method
- The GET method is a way of passing parameters of an HTTP request from the
browser to the server. This method puts the parameters, usually separated by
special characters such as ampersands ("&"), in the URL itself, which is
viewable to the person using the browser. The other method is POST, which is
used when the site does not want to pass the parameters in the URL. This is
desirable when there is a large quantity of text to send to the server or the
information is sensitive.
GIF - A graphics file type -- Graphics Interchange
Format -- a compressed, bitmapped format often used on the web because of its
good quality/compression ratio when used on certain image types, particularly
those with large flat areas of color.
Goal Conversion Rate - In the context of
Campaign Tracking, the percentage of sessions on a site that result in a
conversion goal being reached on that site.
Graphic User Interface - (GUI)
Pronounced "gooey". A method of controlling software using on-screen icons,
menus, dialog boxes, and objects that can be moved or resized, usually with a
pointing device such as a mouse.
H
HTML - Hyper Text Markup Language is used to write
documents for the World Wide Web and to specify hypertext links between related
objects and documents.
HTTP - Hyper Text Transfer Protocol is a standard
method of transferring data between a web server and a web browser.
Hardware - A computer and the associated physical
equipment directly involved in the performance of data-processing or
communication functions.
Hit - A hit is simply any request to the web server for
any type of file. This can be an HTML page, an image (jpeg, gif, png, etc.), a
sound clip, a cgi script, and many other file types. An HTML page can account
for several hits: the page itself, each image on the page, and any embedded
sound or video clips. Therefore, the number of hits a website receives is not a
valid popularity gauge, but rather is an indication of server use and loading.
I
IIS - Microsoft Internet Information Server, or IIS as
it's commonly called, is a popular web server software system for Windows
operating systems. It is currently unavailable for other operating systems. For
more information, see Microsoft.com .
IP Address - An identifier for a computer or
device on a TCP/IP network. Networks using the TCP/IP protocol route messages
based on the IP address of the destination. The format of an IP address is a
numeric address written as four numbers separated by periods. Each number
ranges from 0 to 255.
ISP - Internet Service Provider. A company which
provides other companies or individuals with access to, or presence on, the
Internet. Most ISPs are also Internet Access Providers -- extra services
include help with design, creation and administration of WWW sites, etc.
Impression - A display, on a search engine or
other source, of a referral link or advertisement.
Initial Session - This is the first Session
conducted by a trackable Unique Visitor during the current Date Range . This
value is equal to the total number of Unique Visitors during the same Date
Range (each Unique Visitor has at least one session). This value is provided in
contrast to Repeat Sessions.
J
Java - An object-oriented programming language
invented by Sun Microsystems. Java is designed to run on any type of computer
hardware through an intermediary layer called a virtual machine, which
translates Java instructions into native code for that particular computer.
JavaScript - Small element of code embedded on
web pages and executed by the browser when the page is viewed by a visitor.
K
Keyword - A keyword is a database index entry that
identifies a specific record or document. Keyword searching is the most common
form of text search on the web. Most search engines do their text query and
retrieval using keywords. Unless the author of the web document specifies the
keywords for her document (this is possible by using meta tags), it's up to the
search engine to determine them. Essentially, this means that search engines
pull out and index words that are believed to be significant. Words that are
mentioned towards the top of a document and words that are repeated several
times throughout the document are more likely to be deemed important.
L
Last Run - This is the time the task in question
last ran, whether successfully or not. As soon as the same task is run again,
this value will change to the new start time.
Log file - A file created by a web or proxy server
which contains all of the access information regarding the activity on that
server. Each line in a log file generated by web server software is a hit, or
request for a file. Therefore, the number of lines in a log file will be equal
to the number of hits in the file, not counting any field definitions line(s)
that may be present.
M
Medium (Campaign Tracking) - In
the context of campaign tracking, medium indicates the means by which a visitor
to a site received the link to that site. Examples of mediums are "organic" and
"cost-per-click" in the case of search engine links, and "email" and "print" in
the case of newsletters. The UTM variable for medium is utm_medium.
Medium is one of the five dimensions of campaign tracking; the other four
dimensions are source, campaign, term, and content.
Meta Tag - A special HTML tag that provides
information about a web page. Unlike normal HTML tags, meta tags do not affect
how the page is displayed. Instead, they provide information such as who
created the page, how often it is updated, what the page is about, and which
keywords represent the page's content. Many search engines use this information
when building their indices.
Multihome - A multihome, or load balanced,
network means distributing processing and communications activity evenly across
a computer network so that no single device is overwhelmed. Load balancing is
especially important for networks where it's difficult to predict the number of
requests that will be issued to a server. Busy websites typically employ two or
more web servers in a load balancing scheme. If one server starts to get
swamped, requests are forwarded to another server with more capacity.
N
NCSA - NCSA stands for the National Center for
Supercomputing Applications. The NCSA developed several imporant web protocols
and software systems, including the standard logging type used by Apache --
NCSA Extended Combined.
Navigation - Describes the movement of a user
through a website or other application interface. This term also indicates the
system of available links and buttons that the user can use to navigate through
the website.
Network - A set of computers connected so that they
can communicate and share information. Most major networks are connected to the
global network-of-networks, called the Internet.
No Referral - The "(no referral)" entry appears
in various Referrals reports in the cases when the visitor to the site got
there by typing the URL directly into the browser window or using a
bookmark/favorite. In other words, the visitor did not click on a link to get
to the site, so there was no referral, technically speaking.
O
OS - (Operating System) Software designed to control the
hardware of a specific data-processing system in order to allow users and
application programs to employ it easily. (MacOS, Windows 95)
Online - A general term referring to anything
connected to or conveyed through a communication network.
Organization - The classification to which a
Domain Name belongs. Typical Suffixes are: .com = Commercial, .org =
Organization, .edu = Educational, .int = International, .gov = Government, .mil
= Military, net = Network
P
PDF - Portable Document Format. File format developed
by Adobe Systems to allow for display and printing of formatted documents
across platforms and systems. PDF files can be read on any system equipped with
the Acrobat Reader software, regardless of whether or not your computer has the
software that the document was created in.
Page - Also known as a web page, a page is defined as
a single file delivered by a web server that contains HTML or similar content.
Any file that is not specifically a GIF, JPEG, PING, JS (javascript), or CSS
(style sheet) is considered a page.
Pageview - A page is defined as any file or
content delivered by a web server that would generally be considered a web
document. This includes HTML pages (.html, .htm, .shtml), script-generated
pages (.cgi, .asp, .cfm, etc.), and plain-text pages. It also includes sound
files (.wav, .aiff, etc.), video files (.mov, etc.), and other non-document
files. Only image files (.jpeg, .gif, .png), javascript (.js) and style sheets
(.css) are excluded from this definition.
Path - A Path is defined as a
series of clicks resulting in distinct pageviews. A Path cannot contain
non-pages, such as image files. Each step in a path will have a name, such as
"index.html".
Pay-per-click - An advertising model in which
the sponsor (advertiser) pays a certain amount to the publisher each time the
sponsor's ad is clicked. Also referred to as cost-per-click.
Platform - A platform is a specific computer
hardware and software operating system combination that represents a specific
user's configuration and method of accessing the Internet. Common platforms
include Windows NT/x86 (Microsoft Windows NT on a standard Intel-type PC), Mac
PPC (Macintosh with Power PC processor), Red Hat Linux 6.1 x86 (Linux on a
standard Intel-type PC).
Post - There are two methods to send HTML form data to
a server. GET, the default, will send the form input in an URL, whereas POST
sends it in the body of the submission. The latter method means you can send
larger amounts of data, and that the URL of the form results doesn't show the
encoded form.
Prior Unique Visitor - A Prior Unique
Visitor is defined as a unique visitor to the website that returned during the
specified Date Range after previously visiting your site, as identified by
tracking devices such as cookies.
Protocol - An established
method of exchanging data over the Internet.
Q
Query Token - A query token is a special
character in URL that differentiates the main URL from the specific query.
R
ROI (Return on Investment) -
(Revenue - Cost)/ Cost, expressed as a percentage.
Referral Errors - A referral error occurs
whenever someone clicks on a link that points to your site but that contains a
reference to a non-existent page or file. This action usually results in a "404
Not Found"-type error.
Referrals - A referral occurs when any hyperlink
is clicked on that takes a web surfer to any page or file in another website;
it could be text, an image, or any other type of link. When a web surfer
arrives at your site from another site, the server records the referral
information in the hit log for every file requested by that surfer. If a search
engine was used to obtain the link, the search engine name and any keywords
used are recorded as well.
Referrer - The URL of an HTML page that refers
visitors to a site.
Regular Expressions - Regular
Expressions are tools defined by the POSIX specification used to match text
strings based on rules invoked by special characters, such as asterisks ("*").
Regular Expressions are powerful tools and should be fully understood before
use. For more information, please see the IEEE
site .
Repeat Session - This is a session for which
the visitor could be tracked as unique and as having been to the site before
this session during the current Date Range .
Returning Sessions -
Returning Sessions represents the number of times unique visitors returned to
your website during a specified time period.
Reverse DNS - Name
resolution software that looks up an IP address to obtain a domain name. It
performs the opposite function of the DNS server, which turns names into IP
addresses.
S
Scalable - Quality of an implementation that
allows it to grow as the usage of the service increases.
Script - A short computer program written in a
simplified programming language, such as JavaScript, VBScript, or Perl.
Search Engine - A Search Engine is a program
that searches documents for specified keywords and returns a list of the
documents where the keywords were found, ranked according to relevance (or at
least that's the intent). Although a search engine is really a general class of
programs, the term is often used to specifically describe systems like Google
and AltaVista that enable users to search for documents on the World Wide Web.
Session - A Session is a defined quantity of
visitor interaction with a website.
By default in Analytics, a session is defined as the period of time during which
visitors are interacting with your site and there has been inactivity for less
than 30 minutes. After 30 minutes of inactivity, any further page views will be
treated as a new session. Users that leave your site and return within 30
minutes will be counted as part of the original session.
The 30 minute default timeout can be changed
with an addition to the tracking code.
Shell Archive - A shell archive is a
collection of files that can be unpacked by using the Unix Bourne shell command
interpreter /bin/sh.
Site Domains - Site Domains are all the valid
domains (URLs) that point to a given websites.
Software - The programs, routines, and symbolic
languages that control the functioning of the hardware and direct its
operation. Written programs or procedures or rules and associated documentation
pertaining to the operation of a computer system and that are stored in
read/write memory.
Source - Also know as source code. The actual text
and commands stored in an HTML file (including tags, comments, and scripts)
that may not be visible when the page is viewed with a web browser.
Source is one of the five dimensions of
campaign tracking; the other four dimensions are campaign, medium, term, and
content.
Status Code - A status code, also known as an
error code, is a 3-digit code number assigned to every request (hit) received
by the server. Most valid hits will have a status code of 200 ("ok"). "Page not
found" errors will generate a 404 error. Some commonly seen codes are in shown
below in bold .
100 Continue
101 Switching Protocols
200 OK
201 Created
202 Accepted
203 Non-Authoritative Information
204 No Content
205 Reset Content
206 Partial Content
300 Multiple Choices
301 Moved Permanently
302 Moved Temporarily
303 See Other
304 Not Modified
305 Use Proxy
400 Bad Request
401 Authorization Required
402 Payment Required
403 Forbidden
404 Not Found
405 Method Not Allowed
406 Not Acceptable
407 Proxy Authentication Required
408 Request Time-Out
409 Conflict
410 Gone
411 Length Required
412 Precondition Failed
413 Request Entity Too Large
414 Request-URL Too Large
415 Unsupported Media Type
500 Server Error
501 Not Implemented
502 Bad Gateway
503 Out of Resources
504 Gateway Time-Out
505 HTTP Version not supported
T
Task - A Task is a log-processing event of any type
programmed into the Scheduler. Tasks can be set to execute at virtually any
frequency desired, but are generally set to run at a daily interval.
Term (Campaign Tracking) - In the
context of campaign tracking, term refers to the keyword(s) that a visitor
types into a search engine. The UTM variable for term is utm_term. Term is one
of the five campaign dimensions; the other four are source, medium, content,
and campaign.
Top-Level Domain - A Top-Level Domain (TLD)
is the last part of a URL or domain name.
Total Unique Visitor Sessions -
The total number of Sessions from identified Unique Visitors during the time
period ( Date Range ) being analyzed.
U
URL - Uniform Resource Locator is a means of
identifying an exact location on the Internet.
Unique Visitor Session - A Unique
Visitor Session is a quantity of visitor interaction with a website for which
the visitor can be tracked and declared with a high degree of confidence as
being unique for the time period being analyzed.
Unique Visitors - Unique Visitors represents
the number of unduplicated (counted only once) visitors to your website over
the course of a specified time period. A Unique Visitor is determined using
cookies.
Untrackable Session - A period of
visitor interaction with a website for which the visitor cannot necessarily be
distinguished as unique or not.
User Agent - A user agent is a
generic term for any program used for accessing a website. This includes
browsers (such as Internet Explorer or Netscape), robots and spiders, and any
other software program that acts as an "agent" for a someone or something
seeking information from a website.
Username - A Username is name used to gain access
to a computer system. Usernames, and usually passwords, are required in
multi-user systems. In most such systems, users can choose their own usernames
and passwords.
V
View Total - The View Total is the tally of items
currently shown in the report. This total does not include items that are not
shown. For example, if the report in question is showing 10 items out of 45,
the View Total number represents the total for only the 10 items shown. Below
the View Total listing is the Total, which represents the tally of all items in
this report for this Date Range .
Visit - See Session .
Visitor - A Visitor is a construct designed to come
as close as possible to defining the number of actual, distinct people who
visited a website. There is of course no way to know if two people are sharing
a computer from the website's perspective, but a good visitor-tracking system
can come close to the actual number. The most accurate visitor-tracking systems
generally employ cookies to maintain tallies of distinct visitors.
Visitor Session - A Visitor Session is a
defined period of interaction between a Visitor (both unique and untrackable
visitor types) and a website. The definition of a Session
varies depending on the type of visitor tracking employed.
Visitor Sessions - Visitor Sessions
represents the number of times individual users visited your website over the
course of a specified time period. This is a sum of First-time, Returning, and
Unknown Sessions.
Visitors Total - Visitors is the number of
Total Unique Visitors plus the number of Untrackable IP-based Visitors, which
represents all individual visitors to your website over the course of a
specified time period.
W
W3C - The W3C, or World Wide Web Consortium, is a
standards body dedicated to ensuring interoperability between all the varied
system and network types that comprise the World Wide Web part of the Internet.
The W3C log format is commonly used by several web server software systems,
such as Microsoft IIS. For more information, see the W3C
website .
Web Server - This is a vague term whose meaning
must be determined by the context in which it's used. It will mean one of two
things: The physical computer that acts as a server. This is a computer just
like any other. It is called a server because its main function is to deliver
web pages. Often there is nothing particularly special about a server's
hardware, it's only a server because of the software.
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