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Check out our latest Technical Term definitions. We do our best to translate complex technical jargon into simple words and provide in-depth coverage of a wide range of technical topics to help our readers develop a better understanding of the technical world. You may view the entire index here

MMSMultimedia Messaging Service (MMS) is a primary way to send messages that include multimedia content to and from a mobile phone via a cellular network. Service providers and users may refer to this as a picture message, PXT, or multimedia message. Unlike the typical SMS, MMS allows users to create messages that contain more than 160 characters and deliver various types of media, like videos (up to forty seconds), an image, a slideshow of multiple images, or audio.This service is mainly used on phones with built-in cameras, where users would send and receive photographs from other users. Media companies also use it commercially to provide their content, and businesses are using it to deliver product images, scannable coupons, and additional related information. Useful MMS Articles Failed to Download Attachment from Multimedia Message FIXED Delivery of MMS MessagesMMS messages are sent differently to other users than a typical SMS message. The transmitting device first encodes the multimedia message, similar to delivering a Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension (MIME) message. This message is then forwarded to the provider’s MMS store and forward server or the Multimedia Messaging Service Centre (MMSC).If the recipient device has a different carrier from the sender, the MMSC will relay and forward the message to the MMSC of the receiving device’s carrier via the Internet. Once it’s received by the recipient’s MMSC, it will primarily determine whether the receiver’s phone supports MMS messaging. If it’s MMS-capable, the content is extracted and transmitted to a temporary HTTP front-end storage server.Then, a control message containing the URL of the content is sent to the recipient’s phone to prompt its WAP browser to open and receive the content embedded in the URL. Before the content’s finally delivered, some MMSCs have a conversion service that will attempt to change the multimedia content into a suitable format—this process is called content adaptation.Once the recipient’s handset is not MMS-capable, the message will be delivered to a web-based service, where the user can view the content using a standard mobile internet browser. The URL for the multimedia content is sent to the receiver in a regular SMS. This process is a legacy experience since users can still receive the content.The system for determining whether a mobile phone is MMS-capable isn’t specified by standards. Operators usually refer to a database, where each mobile phone number is marked as a legacy handset. This method is considered unreliable since customers can quickly change their handsets, and these databases are not updated in real time. [...]

SGMLThe Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) is a standard for specifying Generalized Markup Language (GML) for documents. SGML is not a document language but a description of how to specify one—it is a form of metadata. HistorySGML was a product of IBM’s Generalized Markup Language (GML), which Charles Goldfarb, Edward Mosher, and Raymond Lorie created in the 1960s. Goldfarb coined the term “GML” based on the term’s initials and wrote the definitive work on SGML syntax in The SGML Handbook.As a document markup language, SGML was designed to allow the sharing of machine-readable large-project documents in law, government, and various industries. Many of these documents must remain readable for several years. SGML was also used in technical references, industrial publishing, and the military and aerospace industries. Concept of SGML and Its AdvantagesThe concept of SGML relies on the fact that documents have semantic and structural elements that can be described without reference to how those elements should be displayed. The actual display of a document may vary depending on the output medium and style preferences.Below are some known advantages of SGML-based documents:They are more portable since an SGML compiler can define any document by its document type definition (DTD).They can be created based on document structure rather than appearance characteristics, which can change over time.Documents intended for the print medium can easily be re-adapted for other media, such as a computer display.The language that most web browsers use—Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)—is an excellent example of an SGML-based language. In today’s networking environment, many documents are defined with the Extensible Markup Language (XML), a data description language that uses SGML principles. ApplicationsDocument markup languages defined via SGML are called applications by the standard; different pre-XML SGML applications were the proprietary property of organizations that created them and therefore are unavailable on the World Wide Web.Here’s a list of notable pre-XML SGML applications:Text Coding Initiative (TEI) – an academic consortium that maintains, designs, and develops technical standards for digital-format textual representation applications.EDGAR (Electronic Data-Gathering, Analysis, and Retrieval) – a system that does the automated collection, validation, indexing, acceptance, and sending of submissions by companies and other entities legally required to file forms with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).LinuxDoc – used for documentation for Linux packages.DocBook – a markup language initially created as an SGML application designed for authoring technical documentation.SGMLguid – an early SGML document type definition (DTD) created, developed, and utilized at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN).AAP DTD – a document type definition (DTD) for scientific documents developed by the Association of American Publishers. [...]

ZombieA zombie is a computer connected to the Internet that a hacker, computer worm, virus, Trojan horse program, or other similar malware has compromised. It’s mainly used to perform malicious commands under the remote direction of the hacker. Zombie computers often belong and coordinate together with a botnet controlled by a hacker and are used for illegal online activities, such as spreading spam emails and directing distributed denial-of-service attacks (DDoS attacks).Most users are unaware that their machine has become a zombie computer. This concept is inspired by the zombies of Haitian Voodoo folklore, which is perceived as a corpse resurrected by a sorcerer and enslaved to their commands. Applications AdvertisingZombie computers were known to be used in email spam; in 2005, an estimated 50-80% of all spam globally was sent by zombie computers. Hackers benefit from this by making themselves virtually invisible from law enforcement and significantly reducing bandwidth costs since most owners of infected computers still pay for their internet bills.Widespread spam also caused the emergence of Trojan horses since Trojan horses are not self-replicating. They rely on the movement of emails to grow, compared to computer worms, which can spread in various ways. Zombies are also used for other scams, like click fraud displaying pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, phishing, and money mule recruitment. Distributed Denial-of-Service AttacksZombies can be used to do activities like distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, a term that refers to the orchestrated flooding of target sites by large numbers of computers at once. The simultaneous requests made by these computers cause overwhelming traffic on the website’s server, causing it to crash and preventing legitimate users from accessing the site.Another variation of DDoS attacks is distributed degradation-of-service (DoS) attacks. It’s the moderated and periodic flooding of target websites, leading to slow server responses. DoS attacks are made instead of the typical DDoS since the latter can be quickly detected and stopped, while DoS attacks done by pulsing zombie computers have long-term effects that can go unnoticed for long periods.The most famous DDoS and DoS attacks done in the past were against the Blue Frog service in 2006 and the Spam Prevention Early Warning System (SPEWS) service in 2003. In 2000, a hacker by the codename “MafiaBoy” was infamous for conducting DDoS attacks on mainstream sites like Yahoo, Amazon, CNN, eBay, and a few others. SmartphonesIn 2009, similar botnet capabilities also emerged for smartphones. One of the most notable worms was the Sexy Space text message worm, the first botnet-capable worm in the world. It specifically targeted devices with the Symbian OS in Nokia smartphones. Users in the United Arab Emirates were also targeted by the Etisalat by e& Blackberry spyware program. [...]

EISAThe Extended Industry Standard Architecture (EISA) is a bus standard of IBM PC-compatible computers. It was introduced by a consortium of PC clone vendors (known as the Gang of Nine) as an alternate option to IBM’s proprietary Micro Channel Architecture (MCA) of its PS/2 PC series. Compared to the ISA bus, EISA is extended to 32 bits and allows multiple CPUs to share the bus. The bus mastering support is also enhanced to enable access to 4 GB of memory. It can also accept older XT and ISA boards, compared to the MCA.EISA was also more favored by manufacturers due to the proprietary nature of MCA; even IBM made machines that supported it. However, it was unpopular with most desktop PCs because of its cost. But, EISA was particularly successful in the server market since it was great at handling bandwidth-related tasks, like networking and disk access. HistoryThe EISA bus slot is a two-level staggered pin system, with the upper part corresponding to the ISA bus pin layout. Most additional features of the EISA are integrated at the bottom of the slot conductor, using thin traces inserted into the insulating gap of the ISA card edge connector. Also, the lower portion of the bus has five keying notches to prevent ISA cards with long notches from sliding down to the lower part of the slot.Intel introduced its first EISA chipset—with code 82350—in September 1989. The company also launched a lower-cost variant, 82350DT, in 1991.The world’s first EISA computer was the HP Vectra 486, announced in October 1989. Notable EISA computers that were introduced to the market were the SystemPro (1989) and the Compaq Deskpro 486 (1991). The SystemPro was the first PC-style network server built around EISA technology; it had features like multiprocessing, bus-mastering network cards, and hardware RAID. The Gang of NineThe Gang of Nine was the informal name given to the consortium—association of several companies with pooled resources—of personal computer (PC) manufacturing companies that collaboratively created the EISA bus. The known leader of the group was Compaq, an American information technology company.Rival companies recognized Compaq’s leadership, with one company citing that: “when you have ten people sit down before a table to write a letter to the president, someone has to write the letter. Compaq is sitting down at the typewriter.” Its member companies were:Compaq Computer CorporationSeiko Epson CorporationNEC CorporationAST Research, Inc.Hewlett-Packard CompanyTandy CorporationOlivettiZenith Data SystemsWyse Technology [...]

DiscordDiscord is a Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and instant messaging service created by ​​Jason Citron in 2015. The platform enables users to message and call fellow users and share media via Direct Messages or private communities called servers. Most servers can only be accessed through invite links shared by server members.Users can run Discord on various devices, such as Android, iOS, macOS, Windows, Linux, and internet browsers. As of 2022, the platform has over 300 million registered users.Useful Discord ArticlesHow To Get Free Discord NitroHow to Stream Netflix on DiscordHow To Change Discord Background ThemeHow to See Deleted Messages on DiscordHow to Stream Hulu on DiscordFIXED: Discord Stream Has No Sound FeaturesAs an instant messaging social platform, Discord is designed to manage public and private communities online. It gives its users tools for online communication, like video and voice calls, persistent chat rooms, and other gamer-centric services. Later on, Discord made changes to attract typical users using the platform. User ProfilesWhen registering to Discord, users must have their email address and username. To allow multiple users to use the same username, they will be assigned a four-digit Discord tag—prefixed with a hash or pound (#)—added at the end of their username.Users can add their custom profile picture and a description on the bio or about me section on their profile. Discord Nitro members can use anime profiles and upload animated or static custom images as their profile banners.Also, Discord users can link their accounts from other platforms, like Steam, Spotify, Xbox, PlayStation, Reddit, YouTube, Twitch, Twitter, and a few more. These can optionally be displayed on a user’s profile. ServersCommunities on Discord are grouped into a private collection of channels called servers. Each Discord user can create a server for free, create voice and text channels, and manage their visibility and specific categories. Any server has a known capacity of up to 800,000 members, based on when Genshin Impact’s Discord server reached maximum capacity.However, Discord increased the server capacity to over one million members for their 2021 Snowsgiving event.Discord later allowed game publishers, developers, artists, and esports teams to verify their servers. These servers will have a badge similar to the feature on other social media platforms. It helps other users identify them as an official community; verified servers are moderated by their development or publishing team.Members can help their server access perks via the Server Boost feature. It unlocks more emojis, higher-quality voice channels, and other advantages. A server boost costs $4.99/month, while Discord Nitro users have two boosts included in their subscription and a 30% off for further boost purchases. ChannelsDiscord channels can be used for streaming, chats, or file sharing. Their owners can customize access to channels to limit certain users; for instance, channels with Not Safe For Work (NSFW) content require new viewers to verify that they’re over 18 and are willing to see such content.In May 2021, Discord released Stage Channels, which allows live, moderated channels for discussions, audio talks, and other related entertainment. These channels can be set exclusive to specific members through tickets or invite links. Discord also launched the Threads feature in August 2021. These are temporary text channels that are self-deleting or automatically disappear. A year later, the platform released Forums, a channel similar to Threads but for more organized discussions. [...]

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