List of computing and IT abbreviations: Meaning (information,
definition, explanation)
There are many abbreviations associated with the computer industry - PC, IT, CPU etc. Add
them to this alphabetical listing.
Table of contents
1 A-C 2 D-F 3 G-I 4 J-M 5 N-R 6 S-V 7 W-Z 8 External links
A-C

AA - anti-aliasing <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Anti-aliasing.html>

AABB - Axis aligned bounding box

AAC - Advanced Audio Coding
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Advanced-Audio-Coding.html> (audio
compression format defined by the MPEG-2
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/MPEG-2.html> standard)

ACID - Atomiticy Consistency Isolation Durability

ACM -

ACPI <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/ACPI.html> - Advanced Configuration and
Power Interface

APCI - Application-Layer Protocol Control Information

APIC <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/IO-APIC.html> - Advanced Programmable
Interrupt Controller

ADC - Apple Display Connector (DVI
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Digital-visual-interface.html> variant)

ADO - ActiveX Data Object

ADSL - Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line, variant of DSL

AGP - Accelerated Graphics Port
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Accelerated-Graphics-Port.html>, sometimes
used with a suffix indicating the port's bandwidth, like APG4x

AI - artificial intelligence
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Artificial-intelligence.html>

AIM - AOL Instant Messenger

AMD - Advanced Micro Devices <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/AMD.html>

AMI - American Megatrends ... (BIOS manufacturer)

AMR - Audio Modem Riser

ANSI - American National Standards Institute

AOL - America Online

API - Application Programming Interface
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Application-Programming-Interface.html>

ASCII <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/ASCII.html> - American Standard Code
for Information Interchange

ASIC -

ASP - Application Service Provider

ASP (MS ASP)

AVI <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/AVI.html> - Audio Video Interleaved

BASIC - Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code, acronym was added later,
originally it was simply Basic

BBS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/BBS.html> - Bulletin Board System

BIND - Berkeley Internet Name Daemon

BIOS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/BIOS.html> - Basic Input Output System

BJT - Bipolar Junction Transistor

BSA <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/BSA.html> - Business Software Alliance

BSD <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Berkeley-Software-Distribution.html> Berkeley Software Distribution (Unix variant)

BSOD - Blue Screen of Death (MS Windows specific)

CAD <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/CAD.html> - Computer Aided Design

CAM -

CASE -

CD-R <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/CD-R.html> - CD-Recordable

CD-RW - CD-Rewritable

CF - Compact Flash

CFG - Context-free grammar - control flow graph

CG - Computer Graphics?

CGA - Color Graphics Array

CGI - Common Gateway Interface

CLI - Command Line Interface

CM - Configuration Management

CNC -

COM - Component Object Model

CPAN <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/CPAN.html> - Comprehensive Perl Area
Network

CPU <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Central-processing-unit.html> - Central
Processing Unit

CRC - Cyclic Redundancy Check

CRM -

CRT - Cathode Ray Tube

CS - Computer Science

CSE - Computer Science Engineering

CSS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Cascading-Style-Sheets.html> - Cascading
Style Sheets

CSS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Content-scrambling-system.html> - Content
Scrambling System

CT - Computerized Tomography

CVS - Concurrent Versioning System
D-F

DAO - Data Access Objects

DB - database

DBA - database administrator

DBMS - Database Management System

DDE -

DEC - Digital Equipment Company

DES -

DHTML - Dynamic HTML

DIMM - Dual Inline Memory Module

DLL - Dynamic Load Library

DMA - Direct Memory Addressing

DN - Distinguished Name

DND - drag and drop

DNS - Domain Name Server

DOM - Document Object Model

DOS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/DOS.html> - Disk Operating System

DRAM -

ECC - Elliptic Curve Cryptography

EEPROM -

EGA -

EISA -

ELF - Extremely Low Frequency

ELM -

EOF - End of File

EOL - End of Life

EPROM -

ERP - Enterprise Resource Planning

FAT - File Allocation Table

FAQ <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/FAQ.html> - Frequently Asked Questions

FET - Field Effects Transistor

FIFO - First In First Out

FPGA - Field Programmable Gate Array

FS - file system

FTP - File Transfer Protocol

GB - Gigabyte

GCC -

GDB <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/GNU-Debugger.html> - GNU debugger

GIF - Graphics Interchange Format

GIGO <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/GIGO.html> - Garbage In Garbage Out

GIMP - GNU Image Manipulation Program

GNOME - GNU Object Model Environment

GNU <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/GNU.html> - GNU's Not Unix

GPG - GNU Privacy Guard

GPL - GNU Public License

GRUB - GRand Unified Boot-loader

GUI - Graphical User Interface

HAL - Hardware Abstraction Layer

HCI - Human Computer Interaction
G-I

HDD - Hard Disk Drive

HF - High Frequency

HPFS -

HTML <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/HTML.html> - Hypertext Markup
Language

HTTP <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/HTTP.html> - Hypertext Transport
Protocol

HURD -

Hz - Hertz

IBM - International Business Machines

IC - Integrated Circuit

ICMP -

IDL - Interface Definition Layer

IEEE -

IETF -

IM - Instant Messaging

IMAP -

IP <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Internet-Protocol.html> - Internet Protocol

IRC - Internet Relay Chat

IrDA -

IRQ - Interrupt Request

IS - Information Systems

ISA - Industry Standard Architechture

ISO - International Organization for Standardization

ISP - Internet Service Provider

IT <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/IT.html> - Information Technology
J-M

JDK - Java Developer's Kit

JPEG - Joint Photographic Experts Group

JFET -

JFS - Journaling filesystem

JS - Javascript

JSP - Java Server Page

KB - Kilobyte

KDE - K Desktop Environment

kHz - Kilohertz

KISS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/KISS-Principle.html> - Keep it simple,
stupid

LAN - Local Area Network

LDAP - Lightweight Directory Access Protocol

LED - Light Emitting Diode

LF - Low Frequency

LIFO - Last In First Out

LILO -

LGPL -

LOC - Lines of Code

LUG - Linux User's Group

LZW

MAN <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Metropolitan-area-network.html> Metropolitan Area Network

MB - Megabyte

MCSE - Microsoft Certified System Engineer

MHz - Megahertz

MMU <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/MMU.html> - Memory Management Unit

MOSFET - Metal-oxide semiconductor FET

MPEG <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/MPEG.html> - Motion Pictures (Coding)
Experts Group

MPL - Mozilla Public License

MS - Microsoft

MS-DOS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/MS-DOS.html> - Microsoft DOS

MSDN - Microsoft Developer's Network

MUD - Multi-user dungeon
N-R

NCSA -

NDS - Novell Directory Services

NFS - Network filesystem

NIST -

NP - Non-polynomial

NPL - Netscape Public License

NPU - Numeric processing unit?

NMI - Non-Maskable Interrupt

NNTP - Network News Transfer Protocol

NT -

NTFS - NT file system

OLED - Organic Light Emitting Diode

OO - Object Oriented

OO - Open Office

OOo - openoffice.org

OOP - Object Oriented Programming

OS - Operating System

OSI - Open Source Initiative

OSI - Open Systems Interconnect

OSS - Open Source Software

OSDN - Open Source Developer's Network

PAN - Personal Area Network

PCB - Printed Circuit Board

PC <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Personal-computer.html> - personal computer

PCI -

PCMCIA <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/PCMCIA.html> - Personal Computer
Memory Card International Association

PCM - Pulse Coded Modulation

PDA - Personal digital assistant
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Personal-Digital-Assistant.html>

PERL - Practical Extraction and Reporting Language

PGA - Programmable Gate Arrays

PGP - Pretty Good Privacy

PINE - PINE Is Not Elm

PL -

PNG - Portable Network Graphics

POP <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/POP.html> - Point of Presence

POP3 <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/POP3.html> - Post Office Protocol v3

PPP -

PPPOE -

PS2 -

PVR - Personal Video Recorder

PXE - Pre Excecution Environment

PXI -

QoS - Quality of Service?

RAID - Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks

RAM - Random Access Memory

RC - Release Candidate

RDBMS - Relational Database Management System

RDF - Resource Description Framework

RF - Radio Frequency

RFI - Radio Frequency Interference

RFID - Radio Frequency Identification

RGB - Red, Green, Blue

RIP - Routing Information Protocol
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Routing-Information-Protocol.html> - raster
image processor <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Raster-image-processor.html>

RLE - run-length encoding

ROM - Read Only Memory

RSA - Rivest Shamir Adelman

RSS -
S-V

SCP - Secure Copy

SAN - Storage Area Network

SDK - Software Developer's Kit

SEAL - Semantics-directed Environment Adaptation Language

SEI - Software Engineering Institute

SIMM - Single Inline Memory Module

SMC -

SMP - Symmetric Multi-Processing

SMTP - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol

SP - Service Pack

SQL - Structured Query Language

SSH - Secure Shell

SSI - Server Side Include

SSL - Secure Socket Layer

SVG - Scalable Vector Graphics

SVGA -

TB - Terabyte

TCL -

TCP - Transmission Control Protocol

TCP/IP - Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol

TLA <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/TLA.html> - three letter acronym (actually
an initialism, not an acronym <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Acronym.html>)

TLD - top-level domain

TSP - Traveling Salesman Problem

TTL - transistor to transistor logic

TTL - time to live

UDMA -

UDP -

UHF - Ultra High Frequency

UML - Unified Markup Language

UPS - Uninterruptible Power Supply

URI - Uniform Resource Identifier?

URL - Uniform Resource Locator?

USB - Universal Serial Bus

VRML - Virtual Reality Markup Language

VB - Visual Basic

VBA - Visual Basic for Applications

VBS - Visual Basic Script

VESA -

VGA - Variable Graphics Array

VHF - Very High Frequency

VLB - Vesa Local Bus

VLF - Very Low Frequency
W-Z

WAIS <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/WAIS.html> - Wide Area Information
Servers

WAN - Wide Area Network

WAP - wireless application protocol

WEP - Wired equivalent protocol?

WOL <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Wol.html> - Wake on LAN

WMA -

WPA (wireless protocol)

WWW - World Wide Web
<http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/World-Wide-Web.html>

XFS -

XHTML <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/XHTML.html> - eXtensible Hypertext
Markup Language

XML -

XP - Cross Platform (not Windows XP)

XPCOM - Cross Platform Component Object Model

XPI - Cross Platform Installer

XPIDL - Cross Platform IDL

XUL -

YACC -

YAML -

YAST -

ZIF - Zero Insertion Force
Back to Acronym <http://explanation-guide.info/meaning/Acronym.html>
External links:
Virtual Entity of Relevant Acronyms <http://www.delorie.com/gnu/docs/vera/vera_toc.html>
(http://www.delorie.com/gnu/docs/vera/vera_toc.html)