Anyone who hasn’t made a career out of the inner workings of computer technology can sometimes get a little confused and annoyed by some of the jargon they use. The thing is, most of the time they don’t need fancy words, they just make some up because they want to. Here are some fancy computer words that have really simple meanings.
1) Dongle: It’s a fun sounding word. The dongle was originally a very short cable that plugged into a USB port and had a card reader on the other end. Now it means anything that plugs into a USB port. A dongle is a flash drive.
2) Bootstrapping: You’ve heard of the phrase “rise by means” or Bootstrap Bill from Pirates of the Caribbean. In computing terms, it means a system that is self-sufficient, but a fully self-sufficient computer is a paradox. A human must initiate the process before a computer can take over. Bootstrapping is really just the catch 22 of a computer.
3) Hot-Swappable: This term specifically refers to servers. It means the ability of a server to physically change hard drives without first shutting it down. Believe it or not, most servers can’t do this, only certain types of blade servers.
4) Java: Most people know that Java is a programming language. The confusion here comes from the name itself. Most people assume that Java is an acronym. But the people who created it simply chose a name from a random list. They later assigned the letters to an acronym, just to please (and possibly annoy) the public: Just Another Vague Acronym.
5) Liveware: If you have a computer guy check out your system and he or she says something about a liveware problem, you’re being mocked. Most computer problems are software or hardware problems. Liveware refers to a computer problem that is neither hardware nor software, but user error.
6) Nerd: Okay, this one isn’t confusing. It just has a very interesting story. The original spelling of this word was “knurd” and referred to college kids who never partyed and always studied, as opposed to the opposite kids who were called “drunks.” In case you haven’t noticed already, spell “drunk” backwards.
7) Wiki: We all know this word in context; Leaks from Wikipedia or Wiki. But what does the word itself mean? Wiki is based on a Hawaiian term meaning very fast and is named after the Wiki Wiki buses at the Honolulu airport. The name refers to the speed of information available in collaborative software.
8) Chassis – This is a super fancy word with a not so fancy meaning. It’s literally just the case, the frame for the guts of the computer. The word is used a lot when talking about servers. But it’s actually something like HP’s blade server enclosure. The skin around the head.