Jargon busting

Spotted a news story on the BBC earlier about gadget jargon confusing people ... So I thought I'd help out with a little bit of decoding.

(people who know me well just groaned and now have their heads in their hands)

First up - Dongle. Is a widget that people hang around their necks and when they want something to work right, they'll plug it in. Really !!! Used to be for things like the AutoCAD drawing package, where they'd keep their £1000+ software under control by using these dongles plugged in the back to say it was a legal copy. Coming in more now with cryptographic protected laptops.

Cookies - otherwise known as Geek Ambrosia. Give a geek or a nerd a techie problem to tackle and as long as the cookie supply holds out, they'll keep going until they finish. (And then they'll play games until the cookies run out). Also helps to feed them Fizzy Caffeine drinks (see Abby in NCIS).

Word of warning : do not intentionally expose a geek or a nerd to coffee. They will attempt to take over the world.

WAP - Without A Purpose. Has other meanings like Without Application Potential or Wireless Application Protocol but the Without A Purpose fits best. It's something for phones that lets you run software on them, usually software that doesn't actually achieve much.

Phone jack - you know those shady guys who walked around, see a mark, open their coats and saw "Say, wanna genuine Rolex ?" The Rolex people have gone over to email peddling, leaving the Shady Coat Guy niche to mobile phone peddlers. So the Phone Jack will be the modern version of the Rolex Jack, except with a heap of mobiles inside instead of watches.
(or it's how you plug your phone into the wall)

Navi Key - Gotta admit, clueless here. Although if they ever come up with a satnav that attaches to a keyring, this is probably what they'll call it ...

Time shifting - This is what happens when you play the online games too much. Night becomes day, day becomes night and before you know it you're a hermit with pallid skin from never seeing the sun.
(or it's recording something that's on at an awkward time so you can watch it when convenient)
(or a means of encoding a message into a signal)

Digital TV - This is a Wiggly Amps thing. The old way of telly was Analogue, where the Wiggly Amps are all slooow, relaxed, move about in curves. Digital Wiggly Amps don't like curves. (Except when they're on hot actresses)

The problem with Analogue is that if there's interference or the signal's weak, the shapes of the curves are harder to figure out. With Digital, you know the curves should be square, which helps in figuring out what the signal should be. So instead of looking fuzzy, those curves are sharp. Unless they're hidden behind thin, gauzy, see through outfits.

Ethernet - If the Internet is International, doesn't this make Ethernet Ethernational ? Yeah ! This is how all the ghosts talk to each other, with the term borrowed by computer people (who are very strange) to give them something catchy to cover the semi-mystical realm of getting computers to communicate. It's a network thing - the Internet is the World outside your door, delivered by all sorts of software and hardware, Ethernet is just the wires level.

But the Ghosts and Mysticism link still works for me, cos networking can be somewhat of a Black Art. I think before I buy my next router, I'll have to investigate some luck rituals. (Or I can just buy Linksys instead of Belkin)

PC Suite - Another modern innovation. Before, we had chairs that extend their fronts up to support your legs. Now it's using the otherwise wasted space underneath the sofa. There's so many wireless bits around nowadays that we'll be able to shove a PC underneath the sofa and hook it up to the telly. Just plug it in at the back and away you go. An especially good PC Suite will have speakers hidden in the cushions and a subwoofer underneath so you really feel those vibrations.

Oh, it'll also have the heat made by the processor ducted upwards so it warms your bum.

Lastly, Desktop - people used to have all their mess on the tables they worked on right ? Modern age has had its thing to say about that ... People (aka Thought Police) say we should tidy our work tables up when we go home, in case someone desksharing needs to use it tomorrow. So all the mess that used to go on our tables to make it look lived in and comfortable has to go somewhere else. Hence the use of the icons on the computer screen to get that lived in messy look back.

(also see note about keeping Geeks & Nerds happy)

That's all the terms in that BBC report dealt with, so it's time for me to head back to looking at PC World's site to see if they have any PC Suites. (While I attempt to get over Cookie Withdrawal)