Are you new to tech and feeling like you sometimes can’t even follow what people are talking about? Or have you already broken into the industry but are feeling like a bit of a fake because there are still so many terms to tackle?
Tech phrases and expressions can be tough to decipher—even with the most frantic of Googling! Sometimes all you need is a short and simple explanation to get your head around a concept and remember it the next time it comes up when you’re learning to code or in a meeting at work.
And that’s exactly what I have for you here—jargon-free, plain-English definitions of the fundamental terms you need to know to make your way in tech.
I bet you’ll find more than a few you’ve always wondered about. So, you can scratch them off your “What the heck is that?” list right away. Plus, you can bookmark this list to come back to whenever you run across another word that has you baffled.
And, if you’re ready to go from understanding tech concepts to making a great career with them, join us for a Skillcrush Blueprint. It’s the perfect way to get the tech skills you need in everything from web design to web development or WordPress to Ruby on Rails.
Social Media
- CONTENT CURATION
Choosing online content to share
- ENGAGEMENT
How much people use and interact with social media
Example: liking posts on Facebook, tweeting on Twitter, viewing pins on Pinterest
- EMBEDDING
Putting social media content on a web page
Example: including a YouTube video in a blog post
- IMPRESSIONS
How many times a piece of social media content is seen
- INFLUENCER
Person who affects opinions and behavior through social media
- MENTION
Referring to a person or account on social media
Example: @mention on Twitter, +mention on Google+
- MICROBLOGGING
Using social media to share content like text, photos, videos, etc.
Example: Twitter, Facebook, Google+
- ORGANIC
Content that ranks highly because people have liked it or viewed it, not because companies have paid to promote the content
- REACH
How many people see social media content
- SOCIAL GRAPH
Network of relationships between Internet users
- USER-GENERATED CONTENT (UGC)
Social media content created by users—not by companies or organizations
Online marketing
- AFFILIATE MARKETING
Using other people or organizations to bring in customers via ads or content on their website
Marketing affiliates can get payments or discounts for the customers they bring in
- BOUNCE RATE
Percentage of website visitors who leave a website quickly without really looking at it
- CALL TO ACTION (CTA)
Text or image on a web page that asks a visitor to do something like read more content, join an email list, sign up for a webinar, buy a product, etc.
- CLICK-THROUGH RATE (CTR)
Percentage of people who click on links on web pages or in marketing emails
- FUNNEL
Series of events or actions a person takes in moving from being a potential customer to an actual customer
Example: visit a website, then sign up for a newsletter, then buy a product
- IMPRESSION
Number of times people see a certain piece of web content
- KEYWORD
Word or phrases used to search for online content
- MARKETING AUTOMATION
Using software or online services to automate and measure marketing efforts with things like marketing emails, customer relationship management, social media, reporting, and analytics
Example: HubSpot, MailChimp, Act-On
- MULTICHANNEL
Using different marketing platforms
Example: using website banner ads, Facebook ads, and marketing emails
- SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING (SEM)
Advertising on search engines
Example: AdWords, Bing Words
- SEO
Search Engine Optimization
Making a website or web page rank high in online search results
- TRAFFIC
Amount of people who visit a website
Growth hacking
- A/B TESTING
Presenting two different versions of online content, like a web page or marketing email, to see which one users respond to better
- CONTENT MARKETING
Using online content, like e-books, videos, blog posts, etc, to get more users or customers
- CONVERSION
Turning a potential customer into an actual customer
- DATA MINING
Going through large amounts of data to find new, useful information
- EMAIL MARKETING
Using direct emails to communicate with current and potential customers
- GROWTH HACKING
Creatively using technology, analytics, strategy in combination with product development to increase a company’s growth
- OPTIMIZATION
Developing a website to convert visitors to customers
Graphic Design
- COLOR VALUE
Way to define colors
Example: hexadecimal color code (#000000), color name (black), RGB code (0, 0, 0)
- COLOR THEORY
Characteristics of colors and the relationships between them
- GRID SYSTEM
Set of columns and rows that can be used as guidelines to arrange content on a web page
- PPI
Also called “density”
How many pixels per inch on a device display with higher PPI giving sharper images and text
Example: 326 ppi of iPhone 6
- RASTER
Image made of pixels so it can be styled more but loses quality when made bigger
Example: photo
- RESOLUTION
How many pixels can be shown on a device’s display with higher resolution meaning more information can be shown
Example: 1334 by 750 pixel resolution of iPhone 6
- RETINA DISPLAY
Term trademarked by Apple for an electronic device display with density so high (usually over 300 ppi) that people can’t see the individual pixels
- VECTOR
Image made up of lines calculated mathematically so it can’t be styled as much but doesn’t lose quality when it’s made bigger
Example: logo
User Experience
- MOOD BOARD
Collection of content showing the visual style for a website including color palette, images, icons, fonts, etc.
- SITEMAP
Outline, or map, of the pages needed for a website
- UI
User interface
How a website is laid out and how users interact with it
- USER FLOW
Map of the path users take from getting to a website through taking an action on the site
- USER PERSONA
Profile of an imaginary person who would use a website used to define who a site is for and what their needs are
- USER RESEARCH
Investigating how users act and what they need and want to design a better website for them
- UX
User experience
How people feel when they use a website
- WIREFRAME
Simple sketch of the key information that goes on each web page
Typography
- FONT
Typeface at a certain size and weight
Example: 14pt bold Arial
- KERNING
Adjusting the amount of space between characters
- LEADING (PRONOUNCED “LED-ING”)
Vertical distance between lines of text on a website
- TYPEFACE OR FONT FAMILY
Group of fonts
Example: Arial
- TYPE HIERARCHY
System of using different font sizes for text on a website to organize it and make it more visual appealing
- SERIF
Small line added to letters of “serif” font families that aren’t a characteristic san serif font families
Example of serif font: Times Roman
Example of san serif font: Arial
Frontend development
- FRONTEND
Part of a website that can be seen by users and includes HTML and CSS
HTML:
- ATTRIBUTE
More information about element contents that are in the opening tag and made up of the attribute name, an equal sign, and a value in double quotes
Example: alt=”My image”
- ELEMENT
HTML code made up of an opening tag, a closing tag, and information between them
Example:〈p〉This is my paragraph!〈/p〉
- HTML
HyperText Markup Language
Coding language used to put content on a web page and give it structure
- HTML5
The most current version of HTML
- META ELEMENTS
Elements that give the browser more information about the whole web page
Example: title, link, meta
- OPENING TAG & CLOSING TAG
Set of angle brackets with an HTML element character(s) that contains a piece of content or part of the structure for a web page
Example of opening tag: 〈p〉
Example of closing tag: 〈/p〉
- SELF-CLOSING TAG
Opening tag that doesn’t have a closing tag but instead “closes itself” with a forward slash before the right angle bracket
Example: 〈img src=”http://example.com/myimage.jpg” alt=”My image”/〉
- SEMANTIC ELEMENT
Element that gives the browser more information about the content in it
Example: em, abbr, s
- STRUCTURAL ELEMENT
Element that helps organize the content of a web page
Example: h1, p, div, span
CSS:
- CSS
Cascading Style Sheets
Code to tell browsers how to format and style HTML for a web page
- CSS3
The most current version of CSS
- DECLARATION
CSS code inside pair of curly brackets which has property and value for the selector
Example: {font-size: 1.5em;}
- PROPERTY
Characteristic of the HTML changed by CSS
Example: font size, color, margin
- SELECTOR
Part of CSS code that tells which HTML element the styling is for
Example with p as selector: p {font-size: 12px;}
- VALUE
Setting for a CSS property
Example: 1.5em, red, 20px
Backend development
- API
Application Programming Interface
How computers and web applications share information with each other
- APPLICATION
Type of software also called “app” and often used to refer to mobile device software
- BACKEND
Part of a website or web service that makes it work and includes applications, web servers, and databases
- BUG
Mistake or unwanted piece of code that keeps a website or program from working like it should
- DEVOPS
Way of working to help development, operations, and quality teams understand each other and collaborate better
- FRAMEWORK
Collection of programs and components used in software development
Example: Ruby on Rails, Bootstrap, AngularJS, Joomla
- OBJECT-ORIENTED PROGRAMMING (OOP)
Programming that allows the creation of objects that have specific and unique attributes and abilities
Example of OOP language: Ruby, PHP, Python
- SOFTWARE
Program or set of instructions that tells a computer, phone, or tablet what to do and includes applications and system software like operating systems, drivers, and utilities
- TEXT EDITOR
Software used to write plain text (with no formatting) that’s used for coding and programming
Example: SublimeText, TextEdit, TextWrangler, Notepad++
- VERSION CONTROL
System to keep track of changes to code and files and allows going back to earlier versions
Example: Git
- WEB SERVER
Computer that can be accessed through the internet or software that responds to server requests
Systems
- CACHING
When a web browser stores assets, like images and styles, so that the website will load faster on the next visit from the same user
- CLOUD COMPUTING
Storing and accessing information and services via the Internet
- FIREWALL
System to protect a trusted computer network, like a home network, from security risks from an external one, like the Internet
- ROUTER
Device used to connect personal computers to the Internet via a network like cable or DSL
- UPTIME & DOWNTIME
How long a website, computer, or system has been working (uptime) or not working (downtime)
- VIRTUAL MACHINE (VM)
Software that makes it possible to use one computer operating system on a computer running another system
Example: running Windows 8 on a MacBook Pro
- VPN – VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORK
Network that allows the Internet to be used like it was connected to a private network (instead of a public one) and so can improve security
Data
- BIG DATA
Massively large sets of digital information
- DATA ARCHITECTURE
How data is collected, stored, accessed, and used in companies and organizations
- DATABASE
Collection of electronic information, aka data
- DATA MODELLING
Determining what kind of data is needed and how it will be structured and organized
- DATA VISUALIZATION
Using graphs, charts, tables, infographics, etc. to better tell about data and findings from it
- RELATIONAL DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
System for handling digital information using tables
Example: SAP, MySQL
Mobile
- HYBRID APP
Application that will work on different platforms and is a combination of a native app and a web app
- IDE
Integrated development environment
Application used for software development
Example: Eclipse, Visual Studio, VIM
- NATIVE APP
Application that’s been made specifically for a certain device platform
Example: Mail for iOS; Ingress for Android
- NFC
Near Field Communication
Technology that lets mobile and other devices communicate using radio waves when they’re very close to each other (about 4 inches or less) and is used for services like sharing files, pairing with accessories, or wireless payments
- RESPONSIVE
Website that adapts gracefully to different-sized devices like phones, tablets, wearable devices, etc.
- SDK
Software Development Kit
Set of tools for creating certain kinds of software
- WEB APP
Website that looks and feels like an app
Also called “HTML5 app”
Image credit: CC by Josh MacDonald
