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Ad Clicks		Number of times users click on an ad banner.
Ad Click Rate		Sometimes referred to as "click-through," this is the percentage of ad views that resulted in an ad click.
Ad Views (Impressions)		Number of times an ad banner is downloaded and presumably seen by visitors. If the same ad appears on multiple pages simultaneously, this statistic may understate the number of ad impressions, due to browser caching. Corresponds to net impressions in traditional media. There is currently no way of knowing if an ad was actually loaded. Most servers record an ad as served even if it was not.
Backbone		A high-speed line or series of connections that forms a large pathway within a network. The term is relative to the size of network it is serving. A backbonein a small network would probably be much smaller than many non-backbone lines in a large network.
Bandwidth		How much information (text, images, video, sound) can be sent through aconnection. Usually measured in bits-per-second. A full page of text is about 16,000 bits. A fast modem can move approximately 15,000 bitsin one second. Full-motion full-screen videorequires about 10,000,000 bits-per- second, depending on compression. (See also: 56K, bit, modem, T-1)
Banner		An ad on a Web page that is usually "hot-linked" to the advertiser's site.
Browser Caching		To speed surfing, browsers store recently used pages on a user's disk. If a site is revisited, browsers display pages from the disk instead of requesting them from the server. As a result, servers under-count the number of times a page is viewed.
CGI		Common Gateway Interface. An interface-creation scripting program that allows Web pages to made on the fly based on information from buttons, checkboxes, text input, etc.
CPM		CPM is the cost per thousand for a particular site. A Web site that charges $15,000 per banner and guarantees 600,000 impressions has a CPM of $25 ($15,000 divided by 600).
Cyberspace		Coined by author William Gibson in his 1984 novel "Neuromancer," cyberspace is now used to describe all of the information available through computer networks.
Domain Name		The unique name of an Internet site; for example www.cyberatlas.com. There are six top-level domains widely used in the US: .com (commercial) .edu (educational),.net (network operations), .gov (US government), .mil (US military) and .org (organization). Other, two letter domains represent countries; thus; .uk for the United Kingdom and so on.
Gross Exposures		Each time a Web server sends a file to a browser, it is recorded in the server log file as a "hit." Hits are generated for every element of a requested page (including graphics, text and interactive items). If a page containing two graphics is viewed by a user, three hits will be recorded - one for the page itself and one for each graphic. Webmasters use hits to measure their server's work load. Because page designs vary greatly, hits are a poor guide for traffic measurement.
Hit		Each time a Web server sends a file to a browser, it is recorded in the server log file as a "hit". Hits are generated for every element of a requested page (including graphics, text and interactive items). If a page containing two graphics is viewed by a user, three hits will be recorded - one for the page itself and one for each graphic. Webmasters use hits to measure their server's work load. Because page designs vary greatly, hits are a poor guide for traffic measurement.
Host		An Internet host used to be a single machine connected to the Internet (which meant it had a unique IP address). As a host it made available to other machines on the network certain services. However virtual hosting has now meant that one physical host can now be actually many virtual hosts.
HTML		HyperText Markup Language is a coding language used to make hypertext documents for use on the Web. HTML resembles old-fashioned typesetting code, where a block of text is surrounded by codes that indicate how it should appear. HTML allows text to be "linked" to another file on the Internet.
Hypertext		Any text that that can be chosen by a reader and which causes another document to be retrieved and displayed.
Internet		A collection of approximately 60,000 independent, inter-connected networks that use the TCP/IP protocols and that evolved from ARPANet of the late '60s and early '70s.
IP address		Internet Protocal address. Every system connected to the Internet has a unique IP address, which consists of a number in the format A.B.C.D where each of the four sections is a decimal number from 0 to 255. Most people use Domain Names instead and the resolution between Domain Names and IP addresses is handled by the network and the Domain Name Servers. With virtual hosting, a single machine can act like multiple machines (with multiple domain names and IP addresses).
IRC		Internet Relay Chat is a worldwide network of people talking to each other in real time.
ISDN		Integrated Services Digital Network is a digital network that moves up to 128,000 bits-per-second over a regular phone line at nearly the same cost as a normal phone call.
Link		An electronic connection between two Web sites (also called "hot link").
Listserv		The most widespread of maillists. Listervs started on BITNET and are now common on the Internet.
Newsgroup		A discussion group on Usenet devoted to talking about a specific topic. Currently, there are over 15,000 newsgroups.
Page		All Web sites are a collection of electronic "pages." Each Web page is a document formatted in HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) that contains text, images or media objects such as RealAudio player files, QuickTime videos or Java applets. The "home page" is typically a visitor's first point of entry and features a site index. Pages can be static or dynamically generated. All frames and frame parent documents are counted as pages.
Page Views		Number of times a userrequestsa pagethat may contain a particular ad. Indicative of the number of times an ad was potentially seen, or "gross impressions." Page views may overstate ad impressions if users choose to turn off graphics (often done to speed browsing).
RealAudio		A commercial software program that plays audio on demand, without waiting for long file transfers. For instance, you can listen to National Public Radios entire broadcast of All Things Considered and the Morning Edition on the Internet.
Server		A machine that makes services available on a network to client programs. A file server makes files available. A WAIS server makes full-text information available through the WAIS protocol (although WAIS uses the term source interchangeably with server).
Sticky		"Sticky" sites are those where the visitors stay for an extended period of time. For instance, a banking site that offers a financial calculator is stickier than on that doesn't because visitors do not have to leave to find a resource they need.
T-1		A high-speed (1.54 megabits/second) network connection.
T-3		An even higher speed (45 megabits/second) Internet connection.
TCP		Transmission Control Protocol works with IP to ensure that packets travel safely on the Internet.
Unique Users		The number of different individuals who visit a site within a specific time period. To identify unique users, Web sites rely on some form of user registration or identification system.
UNIX		A computer operating system (the basic software running on a computer, underneath things like data bases and word processors). UNIX is designed to be used by many people at once ("multi-user") and has TCP/IP built-in. Unix is the most prevalent operating system for Internet servers.
Valid Hits		A further refinement of hits, valid hits are hits that deliver all information to a user. Excludes hits such as redirects, error messages and computer-generated hits.
Visits		A sequence of requests made by one user at one site. If a visitor does not request any new information for a period of time, known as the "time-out" period, then the next request by the visitor is considered a new visit. To enable comparisons among sites, I/PRO uses a 30-minute time-out.