glossary of terms

Aberdeen -- City of approximately 320,000 on the north-east coast of Scotland, UK where we operate.

Banner ads -- Adverts, usually animated, that appear on web pages and come in various sizes. When clicked these take you to the advertised site.

Branding -- The specific identification of a company by which it becomes known, used, trusted and quoted by the consumer.

Content Managament System -- or 'CMS': A content management system is a program installed on the server which allows someone with little or no web authoring knowledge to update and maintain their website. A CMS usually has two interfaces or login modes: one for the administrator, where they can make necessary updates, and one for the website viewer, where they see the result of those updates.

Corporate Identity -- How a particular business is perceived by its customers and the rest of the marketplace. Its name, logo, typeface, colors, slogan, etc., are all elements that help comprise a company's corporate identity.

Corporate Literature -- A company's advertising material: usually leaflets, pamphlets, booklets, brochures, flyers etc.

Design -- (In this case) Noun: A decorative or artistic work; Verb: to create a design, create or execute in an artistic or highly skilled manner.

Graphic Design -- The branch of visual arts concerned with the aesthetics and production of layout, design and typography to communicate an idea or concept

Web Design -- The production of the look and feel of a site and all its visual elements including page layout, background and spot imagery, color scheme, typography, navigation buttons, etc.

Design for Print -- As Graphic Design, above, but specifically for the print medium.

Domain Name -- The unique name that identifies an internet site: a website's address (e.g. www.pavegraphics.com)

E-Commerce -- Electronic Commerce. Refers to the general exchange of goods and services via the Internet and use of credit and debit card numbers.

Flash -- An authoring software developed by Macromedia used to create graphics-based animation with full-screen navigation interfaces, graphic illustrations, and simple interactivity. Uses vector shapes which helps to keep file sizes to a minimum.

Flyer -- A single-sheet, printed advertisement, usually around A6 size (approx. 10cm x 15cm)

Graphic Design -- See Design, above

Hosting -- The housing of a web site. Your web site must physically reside on a computer (a server) that's connected to the internet, and managed by a hosting company, which ensures it is always available. Hosting companies typically charge a one-time setup fee in addition to the monthly hosting fee. Pave Graphics can host your site at great rates and we charge yearly.

HTML and Javascript -- Languages used for communication between web pages and the web site browsers (e.g. Internet Explorer) that display them.

Identity -- see Corporate Identity, above

Keyphrases -- see 'Keywords' below

Keywords -- Single terms or short phrases that best define the main points of your web page topic. Keywords are used by search engines to match a website topic to a phrase entered in the search bar.

Logo -- A combination of characters and/or graphics creating a single design used to identify a company. Short for 'Logotype'

Meta Tags -- Information placed in the HTML header of a Web page, providing information that is not visible to browsers. The most common meta tags relevant to search engines are keyword and description tags.

Multimedia -- The delivery of information, usually to a personal computer, in a combination of different formats including text, graphics, animation, audio, and video.

Presentation -- (In this case) a series of informational 'slides' to be projected onto a screen during a talk or conference.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) -- The process of crafting a site's content so that the site gets high rankings in the various search engines: Google, Yahoo, Ask etc. (both the site and individual pages), and includes tailoring on-page text (such as headlines and subtitles) as well as choosing the proper keywords for a page's meta tags.

Typography -- The art of arrangement, style, appearance and publishing of type and typefaces.

Vector Graphics -- Generation of images from mathematical and geometric descriptions that determine the position, length, and direction in which lines are drawn.

Web site (Website) -- A collection of "web pages" or files linked together and available on the World Wide Web.

Website Maintenance -- The act of updating the elements (e.g. images and text) of a website.