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Term
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Description
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C:
|
A
letter followed by a colon is used to designate a drive (physical
or virtual) on your computer. C: drive is usually the hard drive
inside the case that your computer boots from (contains the operating
system files). |
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Cab File
|
A
cabinet file contains several or many compressed files. These
files are generally used to distribute software on disk and have
a .cab file extension. Most of the files for Windows95/98 are
in Cab files on the Setup Disk. The Extract command is used to
extract one or more files from the cabinet file. |
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Cable
|
Wires
or a bundle of wires in a protective plastic or rubber covering,
with connectors used to join the different components, peripherals
and resources associated with your computer system. |
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Cache
|
An
area of high speed memory set aside to store frequently accessed
data. When data is accessed, a copy (and its address in memory)
is stored in cache memory. The next time the CPU looks for information,
it first checks the cache. If the data is there (called a hit),
it can retrieve it from the much faster cache memory. If it is
not, then it accesses system memory, puts a copy of the new data
in the cache, and processes the information. Disk caching and
memory caching significantly improves the overall speed of the
computer but there are limits. |
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CAD
|
Computer
Aided Design - See CAD/CAM. |
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CAD/CAM
|
Computer
Aided Design/Computer Aided Manufacturing. The use of computers
to design and manufacture a product. The product is designed on
a computer (using a CAD program) and then built or assembled using
computers designed specifically for that process. |
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Calibrate
|
The
process of testing a measuring device (such as a joystick) and
then manipulating or changing its settings to conform to a set
standard ensuring the device is working accurately. |
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Cancel
|
A
button in most dialogue boxes in a graphical user interface that
will exit the box without making any changes. Any settings that
were changed will return to what they were before the box was
open. |
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Capacitor
|
An
electronic component that can store and maintain an electrical
charge for a period of time, releasing it cleanly and evenly.
Capacitors are used to smooth out the flow of electricity. |
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CAPS LOCK
Key
|
A
key on the left side of your keyboard. When pressed it changes
all typed letters to capitals until it is pressed again. It only
affects letters; not punctuation, symbols or numbers. |
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Card
|
Refers
to a printed circuit board (adapter board or expansion card) that
installs into one of the expansion slots in your computer, expanding
the capabilities of your system, allowing it to communicate with
external devices such as monitors or speakers. |
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Case
|
The
format of a letter. It can be uppercase (capitalized) or lowercase
(not capitalized). |
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Case Sensitive
|
A
program or function that differentiates between capital and non-capitalized
letters or words. Something that is not case sensitive would view
'target' and 'TARGET' as the same word. A case sensitive program
would see two different words. |
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Cathode
Ray Tube
|
The
display screen used in most monitors and television sets. An electron
gun, at the back of the tube, shoots electrons at a phosphor coated
screen, scanning from top to bottom, left to right. This causes
the phosphor pixels to glow which creates the picture you see
on the screen. |
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CD-R
|
A
Compact Disk (CD) device that can write data to a CD. Once written,
this data cannot be erased or written over. |
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CD-RW
|
A
Compact Disk (CD) device that can write or record data to a CD.
This CD device can then erase or write over (re-write) the data
previously recorded. |
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Cell
|
Spreadsheets
and tables can be broken up into individual columns and rows which
intersect forming smaller boxes or cells. Cell C8 would be the
box at the intersection of column B and row 8. These boxes can
hold different formulas, text or numbers. |
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Central
Processing Unit
|
The
central processing unit (CPU) is an integrated circuit chip (IC)
that controls and directs the activities of the computer. Considered
the 'brain' of your computer, it is identified by manufacturer,
model, and processing speed in megahertz (MHz). Major manufacturers
include Intel, Motorola, Cyrix, AMD(Advanced Micro Devices), and
IBM. Intel is considered to be the #1 manufacturer and sets the
standards for processors. |
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Centronics
Connector
|
Named
after the company that originally developed the standard, this
connector can be found on the back of many of today's printers
(36 pins). It's a parallel interface that has eight data lines
and lines for control and status information. It can also be found
on scanners and SCSI devices (50 pins). |
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CGA
|
Color
Graphics Adapter. One of the first color display adapter cards.
It had a palette of 16 colors but could only display 4 at a resolution
of 320 X 200 pixels. Even in monochrome (one color) it had poor
resolution for graphics (640 X 200 pixels). |
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Chain
|
A
chain is a group of clusters on a storage disk, linked together
to contain a single file. |
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Chipset
|
A
group of microchips that actually control the flow of information
on your computer. They are the controllers for the memory, cache,
hard drive, keyboard, etc.. These groups of chips direct traffic
along the bus and can allow devices to talk to each other without
having to go through the CPU. |
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Circuit
Board
|
Boards
used in electronic devices that are made from an insulating material
and contain electronic components that are interconnected to form
a circuit or group of circuits that perform a specific function. |
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Client
|
A
computer hooked to a network, that uses data or programs that
are located on another computer (server). |
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Clock
Speed
|
The
clock speed is the frequency which determines how fast devices
that are connected to the system bus operate. The speed is measured
in millions of cycles per second (MHz or megahertz) and is generated
by a quartz crystal on the motherboard which acts as a kind of
metronome. Devices that are synchronized with the clock may run
faster or slower but their speed is determined by multiplying
or dividing a factor by the clock speed. |
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Cluster
|
A
cluster is made up of one or more sectors and is the smallest
allocation unit that your computer can write to a disk. Cluster
size (number of sectors/cluster) depends on type and size of your
hard drive and the Operating System that you are using. If you
write a very small file, it is still going to take up a full cluster
on your hard drive. If your file is large then it will be written
to a group of clusters that are linked together to form a cluster
chain. |
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CMOS
|
Complimentary
Metal-Oxide Semiconductor. This is one of two technologies used
to produce or manufacture microchips. The other is TTL or Transistor
Transistor Logic. Although CMOS is a little slower and much more
susceptible to ESD or static electricity, it uses less power and
generates a lot less heat and has replaced the bulkier chips in
PCs. All of today's CPUs and memory chips are CMOS chips. Because
your computer's configuration or setup is stored in a CMOS chip,
it has sometimes been labeled CMOS setup, or just plain CMOS.
So if someone suggests you check your CMOS, they mean you should
look in your setup program. |
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COAST
|
Cache
memory is generally hard-wired to the system board. However, you
can often add to or upgrade your systems cache by inserting a
cache memory module into a socket on the motherboard. These modules
are called Cache On A Stick, or COAST modules. |
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Cold Boot
|
Starting
the computer from a power-off status. If your computer is off,
and you turn the switch on, you're performing a Cold Boot. |
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COM Port
|
See
communications port. |
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COMMAND.COM
|
This
is the command interpreter that interprets the commands received
from the operator (or an application) into something the computer
can understand. It can accept commands from the user, launch programs
and pass this information to the computer, or the other operating
system files. |
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Communications
Port
|
Serial
ports used to connect modems, serial printers and other peripherals
to your computer. Each port is assigned its own individual number,
IO address, and Interrupt Request Line. COM1 and COM2 are usually
the physical serial ports you can see on the back of your computer
(9-pin and 25-pin DB connectors). COM3 and COM4 are usually virtual
communications ports for internal devices connected via the expansion
slots inside your computer. |
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Compression
Algorithm
|
A
process that reduces the size of a graphics file. Sometimes, the
more you compress, the less detail you have. Examples of compression
algorithms include .LZW and .JPG. |
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CONFIG.SYS
|
A
user-configurable text file, in the MS-DOS Operating System, that
usually contains device drivers and system setup files. During
the bootup process in MS-DOS, CONFIG.SYS is located and the external
device drivers and configuration options in that file are loaded. |
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Conventional
Memory
|
Relating
to the DOS memory map, conventional memory is the memory addresses
between 0 and 640K. MS Dos requires the Operating System, Vector
Table, and all programs to load and run in this small amount of
memory. While trying to maintain backwards compatibility with
the older OS, newer programs and Operating Systems have had to
deal with what is termed the 640K barrier. |
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Cookie
|
A
file written to your hard drive that Web sites use to track visitors.
When you visit a Web site, a file (cookie) may be added to your
hard drive or updated to include information such as the time
and date, which pages you visited, any passwords you might need
for the site, and any other information you might have contributed
at their request. |
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Coprocessor
|
A
separate chip (or nowadays, a portion of the CPU) that performs
a lot of the calculations and number crunching for the microprocessor,
relieving the CPU of some of its work and thus enhancing the overall
speed of the system. |
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Corrupted
Files
|
Any
file that has been damaged or ruined. This can happen for a variety
of reasons; Program glitches, crashes, user error, power failures,
power spikes, memory problems.. There are different precautions
you can take to reduce the chance of corrupted files, but you
will experience them. |
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CPU
|
See
Central Processing Unit. |
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Crop
|
To
delete unwanted portions of an image. |
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Cross-linked
Clusters
|
Files
are stored on your hard disk in chains of clusters linked together.
Which clusters are used and how they are linked is stored in an
index or directory called the File Allocation Table or FAT. If,
through some error, the FAT shows two files using the same cluster,
then they are cross-linked. |
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CRT
|
See
Cathode Ray Tube. |
