List of computing and IT abbreviations

There are many abbreviations associated with the computer industry - PC, IT, CPU etc. Add them to this alphabetical listing. \n

A

\n* AA - Anti-Aliasing\n* AABB - Axis Aligned Bounding Box\n* AAC - Advanced Audio Coding (audio compression format defined by the MPEG-2 standard)\n* ACID - Atomiticy Consistency Isolation Durability\n* ACM - Association for Computing Machinery\n* ACPI - Advanced Configuration and Power Interface\n* AES - Advanced Encryption Standard\n* APCI - Application-Layer Protocol Control Information\n* APIC - Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controller\n* ADC - Apple Display Connector (DVI variant)\n* ADO - ActiveX Data Object\n* ADSL - Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line, variant of DSL\n* AGP - Accelerated Graphics Port, sometimes used with a suffix indicating the port's bandwidth, like APG4x\n* AI - Artificial Intelligence\n* AIM - AOL Instant Messenger\n* ALU - Arithmetic/Logic Unit\n* AMD - Advanced Micro Devices\n* AMI - American Megatrends ... (BIOS manufacturer)\n* AMR - Audio Modem Riser\n* ANSI - American National Standards Institute\n* AOL - America Online\n* AOP - Aspect-Oriented Programming\n* API - Application Programming Interface\n* ARP - Address Resolution Protocol\n* ARPA - Advanced Research Projects Agency (see also DARPA)\n* ARPANET - Advanced Research Projects Agency Network\n* ASCII - American Standard Code for Information Interchange\n* ASIC - Application Specific Integrated Circuit\n* ASP - Application Service Provider\n* ASP (MS ASP) - Active Server Pages\n* ATA - Advanced Technology Attachment\n* ATAPI - Advanced Technology Attachment Packet Interface\n* AT&T - American Telephone & Telegraph\n* AVI - Audio Video Interleaved\n* AWT - Abstract Windowing Toolkit

B

\n* BASIC - Beginner's All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code (acronym was added later)\n* BBS - Bulletin Board System\n* BCD - Binary Coded Decimal\n* BER - Bit Error Rate\n* BIND - Berkeley Internet Name Daemon\n* BIOS - Basic Input Output System\n* BJT - Bipolar Junction Transistor\n* BOOTP - Bootstrap Protocol\n* BSA - Business Software Alliance\n* BSD - Berkeley Software Distribution (Unix variant)\n* BSOD - Blue Screen of Death (MS Windows specific)\n* BSS - Block Started by Symbol

C

\n* CAD - Computer Aided Design\n* CAM - Computer Aided Manufacturing\n* CASE - Computer-Aided Software Engineering\n* CD-R - CD-Recordable\n* CD-ROM - CD Read-Only Memory\n* CD-RW - CD-Rewritable\n* CF - Compact Flash\n* CFG - Context-free grammar\n* CFG - Control Flow Graph\n* CG - Computer Graphics?\n* CGA - Color Graphics Array\n* CGI - Common Gateway Interface\n* CISC - Complex Instruction Set Computer\n* CLI - Command Line Interface\n* CLR - Common Language Runtime\n* CM - Configuration Management\n* CMOS - Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor\n* CMS - Content Management System\n* CNC - Computer Numerical Control\n* COBOL - Common Business-Oriented Language\n* COM - Component Object Model\n* CORBA - Common Object Request Broker Architecture\n* CPAN - Comprehensive Perl Area Network\n* CPU - Central Processing Unit\n* CRC - Cyclic Redundancy Check\n* CRM - Customer Relationship Management\n* CRT - Cathode Ray Tube\n* CS - Computer Science\n* CSE - Computer Science Engineering\n* CSS - Cascading Style Sheets\n* CSS - Content Scrambling System\n* CT - Computerized Tomography\n* CTSS - Compatible Time-Sharing System\n* CVS - Concurrent Versioning System

D

\n* DARPA - Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency\n* DAO - Data Access Objects\n* DAP - Directory Access Protocol\n* DAT - Digital Audio Tape\n* DB - Database\n* DBA - Database Administrator\n* DBMS - Database Management System\n* DCOM - Distributed Component Object Model\n* DD - Double Density\n* DDE - Dynamic Data Exchange\n* DDR - Double Data Rate\n* DEC - Digital Equipment Corporation\n* DES - Data Encryption Standard\n* DHCP - Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol\n* DHTML - Dynamic HTML\n* DIMM - Dual Inline Memory Module\n* DIVX - Digital Video Express\n* DLL - Dynamic Load Library\n* DLP - Digital Light Processing\n* DMA - Direct Memory Access\n* DMCA - Digital Millenium Copyright Act\n* DN - Distinguished Name\n* DND - Drag and Drop\n* DNS - Domain Name Server\n* DOM - Document Object Model\n* DOS - Disk Operating System\n* DPI - Dots Per Inch\n* DRAM - Dynamic Random Access Memory\n* DRM - Digital Rights Management\n* DTP - Desktop Publishing\n* DVD - Digital Video Disc

E

\n* EBCDIC - Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code\n* ECC - Elliptic Curve Cryptography\n* ECMA - European Computer Manufacturers Association\n* EEPROM - Electronically Eraseable Programmable Read-Only Memory\n* EFF - Electronic Frontier Foundation\n* EGA - Enhanced Graphics Array\n* EIDE - Enhanced IDE\n* EISA - Extended Industry Standard Architecture\n* ELF - Extremely Low Frequency\n* ELM\n* EOF - End of File\n* EOL - End of Life\n* EOL - End of Line\n* EPROM - Eraseable Programmable Read-Only Memory\n* ERP - Enterprise Resource Planning

F

\n* FAP - FORTRAN Assembly Program\n* FAT - File Allocation Table\n* FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions\n* FDD - Floppy Disk Drive\n* FET - Field Effects Transistor\n* FIFO - First In First Out\n* FLAC - Free Lossless Audio Codec\n* FLOPS - Floating-Point Operations Per Second\n* FPGA - Field Programmable Gate Array\n* FPU - Floating Point Unit\n* FS - File System\n* FSB - Front Side Bus\n* FSF - Free Software Foundation\n* FTP - File Transfer Protocol\n* FUD - Fear Uncertainty Doubt

G

\n* GB - Gigabyte\n* GCC - GNU C Compiler\n* GDB - GNU Debugger\n* GFDL - GNU Free Documentation License\n* GIF - Graphics Interchange Format\n* GIGO - Garbage In Garbage Out\n* GIMP - GNU Image Manipulation Program\n* GIMPS - Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search\n* GNOME - GNU Object Model Environment\n* GNU - GNU's Not Unix\n* GPG - GNU Privacy Guard\n* GPL - GNU Public License\n* GRUB - Grand Unified Boot-Loader\n* GTK - GIMP Toolkit\n* GUI - Graphical User Interface

H

\n* HAL - Hardware Abstraction Layer\n* HCI - Human Computer Interaction\n* HD - High Density\n* HDD - Hard Disk Drive\n* HF - High Frequency\n* HIG - Human Interface Guidelines\n* HIRD - Hurd of Interfaces Representing Depth\n* HP - Hewlett-Packard\n* HPFS - High Performance File System\n* HT - Hyper Threading\n* HTML - Hypertext Markup Language\n* HTTP - Hypertext Transport Protocol\n* HTTPd - Hypertext Transport Protocol Daemon\n* HURD - Hird of Unix-Replacing Daemons\n* Hz - Hertz

I

\n* IBM - International Business Machines\n* IC - Integrated Circuit\n* ICMP - Internet Control Message Protocol\n* IDL - Interface Definition Language\n* IEEE - Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers\n* IETF - Internet Engineering Task Force\n* IGMP - Internet Group Management Protocol\n* IIOP - Internet Inter-Orb Protocol\n* IM - Instant Messaging\n* IMAP - Internet Message Access Protocol\n* IP - Internet Protocol\n* IRC - Internet Relay Chat\n* IrDA - Infrared Data Association\n* IRQ - Interrupt Request\n* IS - Information Systems\n* ISA - Industry Standard Architechture\n* ISO - International Organization for Standardization\n* ISP - Internet Service Provider\n* ISPF - Interactive System Productivity Facility\n* IT - Information Technology

J

\n* JAXP - Java API for XML Processing\n* JCL - Job Control Language\n* JDK - Jva Developer's Kit\n* JDS - Java Desktop System\n* JFC - Java Foundation Classes\n* JNI - Java Native Interface\n* JPEG - Joint Photographic Experts Group\n* JFET - Junction Field Effect Transistor\n* JFS - Journaling Filesystem\n* JIT - Just-In-Time\n* JRE - Java Runtime Environment\n* JS - JavaScript\n* JSP - Jackson Structured Programming\n* JSP - Java Server Page\n* JVM - Java Virtual Machine

K

\n* KB - Kilobyte\n* KDE - K Desktop Environment\n* kHz - KiloHertz\n* KISS - Keep It Simple, Stupid

L

\n* LAN - Local Area Network\n* LCD - Liquid Crystal Display\n* LDAP - Lightweight Directory Access Protocol\n* LED - Light Emitting Diode\n* LF - Low Frequency\n* LFS - Linux From Scratch\n* LIFO - Last In First Out\n* LILO - Linux Loader\n* LGPL - [GNU] Lesser General Public License\n* LOC - Lines of Code\n* LSB - Least Significant Bit\n* LSB - Linux Standard Base\n* LUG - Linux User's Group\n* LZW - Lempel-Ziv-Welch

M

\n* MAC (address) - Media Access Control\n* MAN - Metropolitan Area Network\n* MB - Megabyte\n* MCSE - Microsoft Certified System Engineer\n* MAC - Media Access Control\n* ME - [Windows] Millenium Edition\n* MFC - Microsoft Foundation Classes\n* MHz - Megahertz\n* MIPS - Million Instructions Per Second\n* MIPS - Microprocessor without Interlocked Pipeline Stages\n* MIT - Massachusetts Institute of Technology\n* MIME - Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions\n* MMU - Memory Management Unit\n* MMX - Multi-Media Extensions\n* MOSFET - Metal-oxide semiconductor FET\n* MPAA - Motion Picture Association of America\n* MPEG - Motion Pictures (Coding) Experts Group\n* MPL - Mozilla Public License\n* MS - Microsoft\n* MSB - Most Significant Bit\n* MS-DOS - Microsoft DOS\n* MSDN - Microsoft Developer's Network\n* MUD - Multi-user dungeon\n* MVS - Multiple Virtual Storage

N

\n* NAT - Network Address Translation\n* NCSA - National Center for Supercomputing Applications\n* NDS - Novell Directory Services\n* NFS - Network Filesystem\n* NIST - National Institute of Standards and Technology\n* NP - Non-Polynomial\n* NPL - Netscape Public License\n* NPU - Numeric Processing Unit?\n* NMI - Non-Maskable Interrupt\n* NNTP - Network News Transfer Protocol\n* NT - New Technology\n* NTFS - NT Filesystem

O

\n* OLE - Object Linking and Embedding\n* OLED - Organic Light Emitting Diode\n* OMG - Object Management Group\n* OO - Object Oriented\n* OO - Open Office\n* OOo - openoffice.org\n* OOP - Object Oriented Programming\n* ORB - Object Request Broker\n* OS - Operating System\n* OSI - Open Source Initiative\n* OSI - Open Systems Interconnect\n* OSS - Open Source Software\n* OSDN - Open Source Developer's Network

P

\n* PAN - Personal Area Network\n* PARC - Palo Alto Research Center (Xerox PARC)\n* P-ATA - Parallel ATA\n* PCB - Printed Circuit Board\n* PC - personal computer\n* PCI - Peripheral Component Interconnect\n* PCMCIA - Personal Computer Memory Card International Association\n* PCM - Pulse Coded Modulation\n* PDA - Personal digital assistant\n* PDF - Portable Document Format\n* PDP - Programmed Data Processor\n* PERL - Practical Extraction and Reporting Language\n* PGA - Programmable Gate Arrays\n* PGP - Pretty Good Privacy\n* PINE - PINE Is Not Elm\n* PIO - Programmed Input/Output\n* PL/I - Programming Language One \n* PL/M - Programming Language Microcomputer \n* PNG - Portable Network Graphics\n* POP - Point of Presence\n* POP3 - Post Office Protocol v3\n* POSIX - Portable Operating System Interface\n* PPC - PowerPC\n* PPI - Pixels Per Inch\n* PPP - Point to Point Protocol\n* PPPoE - PPP over Ethernet\n* PS - PostScript\n* PS/2 - Personal System/2\n* PVR - Personal Video Recorder\n* PXE - Pre Execution Environment\n* PXI

Q

\n* QoS - Quality of Service\n* Qt - Quasar Toolkit

R

\n* RAD - Rapid Applliction Development\n* RAID - Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks\n* RAM - Random \'Access Memory\n* RARP - Reverse Address Resolution Protocol\n* RC - Release Candidate\n* RCS - Revision Control System\n* RDBMS - Relational Database Management System\n* RDF - Resource Description Framework\n* RF - Radio Frequency\n* RFC - Request For Comments\n* RFI - Radio Frequency Interference\n* RFID - Radio Frequency Identification\n* RGB - Red, Green, Blue\n* RH - RedHat (Linux)\n* RHEL - RedHat Enterprise Linux\n* RIAA - Recording Industry Association of America\n* RIFF - Resource Interchange File Format\n* RIP - Routing Information Protocol - raster image processor\n* RISC - Reduced Instruction Set Computer\n* RLE - Run-Length Encoding\n* RMI - Remote Method Invocation\n* ROM - Read Only Memory\n* RPM - RedHat Package Manager\n* RSA - Rivest Shamir Adelman\n* RSS - RDF Site Summary\n* RSS - Really Simple Syndication\n* RSS - Rich Site Summary\n* RTOS - Real Time Operating S'ystem

S

\n* SAN - Storage Area Network\n* SATA - Serial ATA\n* SAX - Simple API for XML\n* SCP - Secure Copy\n* SCSI - Small Computer System Interface\n* SDK - Software Developer's Kit\n* SDRAM - Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory\n* SEAL - Semantics-directed Environment Adaptation Language\n* SEI - Software Engineering Institute\n* SGI - Silicon Graphics, Incorporated\n* SGML - Standard Generalized Markup Language\n* SHA - Secure Hash Algorithm\n* SIMD - Single Instruction, Multiple Data\n* SIMM - Single Inline Memory Module\n* SMB - Server Message Block\n* SMC - SMC Networks (company)\n* S/MIME - Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions\n* SMP - Symmetric Multi-Processing\n* SMS - Short Message Service\n* SMT - Simultaneous Multithreading\n* SMTP - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol\n* SNMP - Simple Network Management Protocol\n* SOAP - Simple Object Access Protocol\n* SP - Service Pack\n* SPARC - Scalable Processor Architecture\n* SQL - Structured Query Language\n* SRAM - Static Random Access Memory\n* SSH - Secure Shell\n* SSI - Server Side Include\n* SSL - Secure Socket Layer\n* SUS - Single UNIX Specification\n* SVG - Scalable Vector Graphics\n* SVGA - Super Video Graphics Array\n* SWT - Stardard Widget Toolkit

T

\n* TB - Terabyte\n* Tcl - Tool Command Language\n* TCP - Transmission Control Protocol\n* TCP/IP - Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol\n* TFT - Thin Film Transistor\n* TI - Texas Instruments\n* TIFF - Tagged Image File Format\n* Tk - \n* TLA - Three-Letter Acronym (actually an initialism, not an acronym)\n* TLD - Top-Level Domain\n* TSO - Time Sharing Option\n* TSP - Traveling Salesman Problem\n* TTL - Transistor-Transistor Logic\n* TTL - Time To Live

U

\n* UDDI - Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration\n* UDMA - Ultra DMA\n* UDP - User Datagram Protocol\n* UHF - Ultra High Frequency\n* UML - Unified Markup Language\n* UPS - Uninterruptible Power Supply\n* URI - Uniform Resource Identifier\n* URL - Uniform Resource Locator\n* URN - Uniform Resource Name\n* USB - Universal Serial Bus\n* UUCP - Unix to Unix Copy Protocol

V

\n* VAX - Virtual Address eXtension\n* VRML - Virtual Reality Markup Language\n* VB - Visual Basic\n* VBA - Visual Basic for Applications\n* VBS - Visual Basic Script\n* VESA - Video Electronics Standards Association\n* VGA - Video Graphics Array\n* VHF - Very High Frequency\n* VLB - Vesa Local Bus\n* VLF - Very Low Frequency\n* VLSI - Very-Large-Scale Integration\n* VM - Virtual Machine\n* VTAM - Virtual Telecommunications Access Method

W

\n* WAIS - Wide Area Information Servers\n* WAN - Wide Area Network\n* WAP - Wireless Access Point\n* WAP - Wireless Application Protocol\n* WAV - WAVEform audio format\n* WEP - Wired Equivalent Privacy\n* WOL - Wake on LAN\n* WMA - Windows Media Audio\n* WPA - Wi-Fi Protected Access\n* WSDL - Web Services Description Language\n* WWW - World Wide Web\n* WYSIWYG - What You See Is What You Get

X

\n* XAML - eXtensible Application Markup Language\n* XFS\n* XHTML - eXtensible Hypertext Markup Language\n* XML - eXtensible Markup Language\n* XMMS - X Multimedia System\n* XP - Cross Platform (not Windows XP)\n* XPCOM - Cross Platform Component Object Model\n* XPI - Cross Platform Installer\n* XPIDL - Cross Platform IDL\n* XSL-T - eXtensible Stylesheet Language Transformations\n* XUL - XML-based User-interface Language

Y

\n* YACC - Yet Another Compiler Compiler\n* YAML - YAML Ain't Markup Language\n* YAST - Yet Another Setup Tool

Z

\n* ZIF - Zero Insertion Force\n* ZOPE - Z Object Publishing Environment Back to Acronym

External links

• Virtual Entity of Relevant Acronyms\n\n