Jargon Dictionary - Letter A

Access Or making a connection to the Internet. You would normally do this via an ISP (Internet Service Provider), but you may also have access to the Internet through an office network.

Account When you sign up for theopenworld.com you are given a username and a password. This is your account and each time you go online it allows theopenworld to check that you are authorised to access the Internet.

Acrobat Also known as the Acrobat Reader. This program allows you to read documents that are stored in the PDF format (Portable Document Format). There are versions of Acrobat available for PC, Macintosh and Linux computers, which means that documents stored as PDF files can be opened and read by anyone, regardless of what type of computer they use.

ADSL Asynchronous Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) is a technology that provides high-speed Internet access (also known as 'broadband') over an ordinary telephone line. Connection speeds can be up to 20 times faster than ordinary modems and provide a permanent link to the Internet. However you can still make ordinary voice calls over the telephone line while you are connected to the Internet.
See also: Broadband, ISDN

Adware Adware is software often associated with advertisers. It can be used to send information about web pages you view to advertisers, deliver additional pop-ups and can even restrict the sites you view, e.g. competitor services.

Attachments These are files that are sent with an email message. They can be text, graphics, sound, video, spreadsheets, databases, or even an entire application. However, attachments can also come in the form of computer viruses that can damage your computer. Be wary of attachments and don't open any attachment unless you know and trust the person that sent it to you.

Auction You can buy and sell goods online with eBay.co.uk. Goods are usually on offer for a few days, with the highest bidder winning the product when the auction closes.

AVI This stands for Audio-Video Interleave - a file format invented by Microsoft for storing video clips. Video files in this format have .avi as their filename extension, for example, starwars.avi. The software needed to play AVI files is already installed on all PCs running Microsoft Windows.