A way to request information from someone.

Think of it like a common language between two websites/systems that need to exchange information. One service makes a request and the other understands and gives it back. This request can be anything from “give me the latest marvel movies” (which the IMDB API could give you), or process this credit card (which can be done with a payment APIs like Stripe).

A real life example of an API is when you use Lyft for a ride, it uses Stripe’s API to process your credit card. Lyft didn’t actually build their own payments, which is a smart thing to do. 

This is one of the most commonly used tech words, surprisingly used a lot by people who have no idea what it means. Also, usually to make them sound like they are more technical than they are. 

And yes, it’s an acronym which stands for Application Programming Interface. 

All websites and apps you interact with have an architecture, which is how everything is  connected together within the app. Think of it like a blueprint.

What kind of architecture you may ask? Well there are a lot of things to figure out like designing the databases and how will the app handle traffic.

In larger companies, there are positions specifically for people who design the architecture and they are called … technical architects. No points for guessing that :)

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When you enter a username/password so a website knows it’s you. 

Most websites and apps will need you to create a username and password to access and use it. 

You’ve also probably noticed websites allowing you to log in through your Facebook or Google account. That’s another way to let you in and confirm your identity.

The part of a  site that’s not visible to you, but makes things run smoothly behind the scenes.

Without the backend the site won't do anything. It will just be a pretty page.

So, for example, Google.com without a backend would look exactly the same, but no search results will be returned when you typed something.

Think of the backend like the kitchen in a restaurant. You can take a look at the menu, and enjoy the ambiance all day long, but without the kitchen, you won’t be able to get any food.

A piece of software which can be used to access any webpage. Chrome, Firefox and Internet Explorer are examples.

So using a browser,you can browse the whole giant internet..Like you browse a shop or a library… except here – there’s already helpful addresses and directions to get you exactly where you need to go.

We are not talking about insects, but something probably equally annoying.

A bug is something that is not working as expected. You know, like say you want to click on a website which is supposed to take you to the About page but instead takes you to some other page _ That’s a bug.

Even the most perfect website has bugs in it, nothing is 100% bug free. That’s because humans aren’t perfect, and they write the code. Essentially, to err is human, to bug is computer.

Related term: To debug or debugging is the process of understanding what’s causing the bug and fixing it.

Temporary storage.  
For example, say you go to a Wikipedia page multiple times a day. Every time you type Wikipedia, what happens is your browser requests the Wikipedia server for information. Now look, it's highly unlikely that the Wikipedia page is going to change. So what happens instead is that your browser may store the information in a cache and so the next time you type that page, the browser will just show you the page from what’s stored, a.ka. the cache!

This  results in faster experience for you and is also more efficient all around.

A number that websites use to track you when you visit. Like an SSN, it’s unique to you.

When you visit a website, the website will automatically create a cookie, so the next time you visit,that website it knows you are returning.  

For example, when you go to Facebook, it keeps you logged in, because it knows it’s you through your cookie. This is an example when cookies are used for good things to make our lives easy.

The more annoying usage of cookies is when you visit a website and then you keep seeing ads everywhere for it especially on Google or Facebook. This happens because it lets advertisers access your information to send you MORE ads for similar content since they know you are interested. Yeah.. you just need to blame the cookie.

Essentially cookies are useful, but can also be a pain. Which differs from actual cookies – there can’t be a bad side to a chocolate chip cookie ;)

Where your data gets stored when you interact with websites.

What data are we talking about?

So let’s take Instagram. When you create an account, your details get stored in a database. Similarly, when you post pictures of your latest vacation, all the pictures get stored in a database too. And when you like and comment on pics, that stuff gets stored in a database.

Essentially, any kind of information you enter into a site or your interactions with it, goes into a database.

When some design/feature/code has been suspended. Usually happens because there is a better replacement in an upcoming version.

Sometimes things that are deprecated may be removed entirely as well.

If something is deprecated, use the newer version or another tool.

Something that explains how something works. Usually used to reference how code or API or even an application works. Think of it like an FAQ.

Usually when people type code, they add documentation within it so other people working on it can understand what it’s about. Or if you build a product, you can have a documentation section like this. If you are working with an API, you definitely need documentation.

People who are starting to learn how to code sometimes ask a lot of questions because they aren’t in the habit of reading the documentation.

The first part of the url.
In our case, the domain is “howtospeak.tech”. Within a domain, there are usually multiple pages.

Think of it like an apartment building. Say there are 100 units in a skyscraper at 400 Geary St.

400 Geary St. is the domain, and if you put in the complete address of the unit with the postal code, that’s the url.

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How long something will take to build. You are probably thinking why did we add such an obvious one. Because engineers usually don’t estimate in time.

They estimate in..drumroll...  “points”.

So an estimate may come back as 3 or 5. 1 usually means something really quick and if something is a 8 it’s going to take a while.

The pretty part of the web that you see and interact with (while the backend makes it all work from behind the scenes).

An analogy here is a restaurant menu: You can read the menu all day long but without a server and the kitchen, you can’t really order anything. The restaurant menu is the front end, nice to look, at, but very limited in function.

Let’s talk about the most common usage of this which is web hosting. It’s when you buy server space to actually make something exist on the internet. Every website you type is hosted on a server.

Think of it like renting physical space where your website data can be stored or managed.  Just like paying rent for an apartment.
Say you want to start a blog, you buy a domain, design the blog, and  write some articles. Then you have to pay for hosting.

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To simply rewrite code. Engineers refactor if: a) They come up with a better way to  write the same code b) Their code may not scale as the company grows c) The company decides to use a new language (which is pretty common).

Software on a machine, which, when pinged, gives you the information you requested.

So, for example when you type Google.com on your browser, a Google server returns the Google website. And if you don’t get the website, that means the server is down. “Server is down” just means the server is not working as intended.

It’s a heavy word. But, did you know if you wanted to build the simplest server, it can be done in a few lines of code in a few minutes (depending on your typing speed).

Btw, if you are in a company and the company’s server is down, panic often ensues.

Whatever languages or tools are used to build an application. So, for example, someone can tell you the stack they use for their app is React, Node, Mysql. Breaking that down means they used React to build their frontend, Node for their backend and Mysql for their database. So you see it essentially describes what languages or frameworks to build an app.

If you are a marketer and someone asks you what stack you work with, you can describe the tools you work with frequently, say Google Analytics, Mailchimp, Optimizely. There, you just described your marketing stack!

So websites can either be  static or dynamic. One way to identify static sites is they don’t have any interactive elements.. Think of things like creating a profile or adding a post on  Facebook, all these make a website dynamic.

Static websites only have a frontend (no back end), while dynamic websites have both a front end and a back end.
This is an example of a static website.

Pretty much all of the websites we interact with on a daily basis are dynamic.

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Super simple but what you type in the browser to reach a website.
For example, this page’s url is: “https://speaktech.webflow.io/terms#url”.
Think of it as the complete address to any webpage on the internet.

The acronym here stands  for Uniform Resource Locator. No wonder it has an acronym!