Glossary

ANSI: American National Standards Institute.
ASCII: American Standard Code for Information Interchange, a standard originally defined by ANSI which assigns the binary values used by computers to letters, numbers and symbols recognizable by humans. ASCII is described in many places on the web, such as ComputerHope.com.
aspect ratio: Typically refers to the ratio of width to height of a picture or digital image. When resizing a digital image, it usually best to maintain the same aspect ratio to avoid a stretched appearance.
autorun: The operating system facility and associated files that automatically open an application or document when a CD is inserted in a CD-ROM drive.
CD (compact disc) or CD-ROM (compact disc, read-only memory): In general computer parlance, CD refers to a compact disk, a 4.75" diameter optical disc digital storage medium.
CD (citation detail): In TMG, CD often refers to the citation detail, citation-specific information such as page numbers, dates of correspondence, etc.
coaster: A coaster is a cd that cannot be read. When a CD can't be read, it is better at preventing wet cups and glasses from staining the furniture than it is at storing data!
cascading stylesheet (CSS): A cascading stylesheet defines styles that control the format of HTML elements. An in-depth discussion of styles and stylesheets is beyond the scope of the document. Some Second Site-specific topics are discussed on the Stylesheets page. There are many reference guides for CSS on the web, including one at w3schools that you may find useful. The official standards are published and maintained by the World Wide Web Consortium. See the CSS2 specification for more information.
conditional variable reference: A conditional variable reference is a variable reference enclosed in "<" and ">", such as "<[PO]>". If the variable is empty, i.e., has no value or is excluded, the variable and the associated preposition and/or suffix are omitted from the sentence.
custom index: A list of links to people in your database who meet criteria you specify.
custom sentence: A custom sentence is a sentence that has been keyed into the sentence field for a specific name or event. See default sentence.
default preposition: A conditional variable reference may include a preposition (also known as a prefix) that prints before the value of the variable but only if the variable is not empty. Some variables, such as the date and place variables, have a default preposition that is displayed when the conditional variable reference does not include a user-supplied preposition.
default sentence: The default sentence for a name or event is the sentence defined for the tag type. So, the default sentence for a particular Marriage event is the sentence defined for the Marriage tag. See custom sentence.
deprecated: A deprecated feature is one that is being phased out. In these Help pages, deprecated usually refers to HTML elements and parameters that have been superceded by CSS parameters.
double-excluded: Double-excluded data is stored in fields that begin with the double-exclusion marker "--". Doubly-excluded data can not be included in Second Site output. Contrast with single-excluded.
flag filter: Second Site will exclude people from the web site if they do not pass a filter that is based on the values of a TMG Flag field. See Filters. Flag filters can also be used with custom indexes.
HRef: HyperText Reference, which specifies the location of a web resource and is used as the destination of a hypertext link. Often called a "web address" or "URL". See the W3C's Links page.
HTML: HyperText Markup Language, the language used to create most web pages. The HTML standard is administered by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
image code: In Second Site, an image code is the filename portion of an image file, i.e., the image code does not include the filetype. Second Site populates various pull-down menus with a pre-defined set of image codes that represent image files that are defined in one or more Themes. Users can add to the set of available image codes by adding graphic files to the Input (-i) Folder. The filetype is omitted because Themes may provide image files in different formats, so Theme1 may use "background.jpg" but Theme2 may use "background.gif". The user chooses the image code "background", and Second Site searches for background.gif, background.jpg, and background.png, in that order, and uses the first file it finds.
input folder: Second Site creates the Input (-i) folder automatically when you make a new SDF file. Second Site appends "-i" to the SDF file name and uses that as the Input folder name. Graphic files you supply, and any other files that should be copied to the Output (-o) folder should be placed in the Input (-i) folder.
IPTC: The IPTC is a consortium of the world's major news agencies. The IPTC's primary focus is on developing and publishing Industry Standards for the interchange of news data. See the Exhibits page for information about how Second Site uses IPTC-format meta data stored in image files.
ISP: Internet Service Provider, a company that provides access to the Internet. Some companies specialize in dial-up service where you use a modem and a telephone line to connect to a modem bank provided by the ISP. Many cable TV providers are also ISPs.
lifespan: In these help pages, a lifespan refers to the combination of the birth date and the death date. Second Site has a few formatting options for lifespans that are explained in the Dates section.
linked image icon: Second Site displays an icon in place of an image exhibit when the user chooses "Link" for one of the external image exhibit properties. The default icon is a camera . Clicking on the icon opens a page that displays the linked image exhibit.
linked text icon: Second Site displays an icon in place of a text exhibit when the user chooses "Link" for one of the external text exhibit properties. The default icon is an image of a document . Clicking on the icon opens a page that displays the linked text exhibit.
open source: Open source refers to a practice where goods, products or other resources are shared. The term was first applied to software source code, but has been extended to other items such as digital graphics and digital photographs. See the WikiPedia definition for more information.
non-person: Many TMG users add people to their dataset that do not represent real people. A "non-person" is used to record events involving another entity such as a ship, a census, a battle, etc. Tags attached to the non-person link actual people to whatever the non-person represents. Many people use census people as part of Diana Begeman's method of using non-people to record census data. Second Site supports index people, non-people whose events are used to create a custom index, and timeline people, non-people whose events are used as entries in a timeline chart.
Output folder: Second Site creates the Output folder automatically when you make a new SDF file. Second Site appends "-o" to the SDF file name and uses that as the Output folder name. Second Site writes all the generated pages to the Output folder.
PARX: The PARX variable is a Second Site variable; it is not a TMG variable. PARX is similar to PAR, but PARX does not include the leading comma and space as part of the value of the variable.
Person Page Entry: For each person in the database that is included in the site, Second Site produces a person page entry on a person page. Second Site builds as many person pages as necessary. The person page entry includes information from the name and event tags associated with that person as well as other information about the person such as parent and child relationships. The exact format of the person page entry is determined by the selected Format. When Second Site is building a particular person page entry, the person whose information is being processed is called the subject.
place levels: Place data in TMG is divided into levels, City, County, State, etc. Another name for a place level is a place subfield. Levels can be assigned labels that agree with the corresponding political jurisdictions, and so they vary from place to place and from project to project. For that reason, Second Site refers to place levels using the generic names L1 to L10.
preposition: A conditional variable reference may include a preposition (also known as a prefix) that is included in the sentence before the value of the variable but only if the variable is not empty. In the following conditional variable reference, the preposition is "and ":

<and [PO]>

See default preposition.
script: A file used by Second Site that contains VBScript statements.
single-excluded: Single-excluded data is stored in fields that begin with the single-exclusion marker "-". Singly-excluded data can be included or excluded in Second Site based on the setting of the Show Excluded Data checkbox. Contrast with double-excluded.
Split CD: In TMG, a Citation Detail (CD) field that is divided into segments using the "||" characters is often called a "split CD." The segments can be included in the citation using the [CDn] notation, where N is replaced by the segment number, e.g., [CD1], [CD2].
string: In computer parlance, a sequence of characters.
variable, variable name, or variable reference: A variable name is a symbol that is used to refer to data whose value may change. A variable reference is a variable name enclosed in brackets, e.g., [P]. Variable references are replaced by the value of the variable when Second Site formats a sentence.
When TMG users refer to variables, they are typically referring to variable references. See conditional variable reference.
XML: eXtensible Markup Language, a simple, flexible text format used to interchange data between computer applications. The XML standard is administered by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
XSLT: eXtensible Stylesheet Language Transformations, a language used to transform XML documents into other documents. In Second Site, XSLT is used to transform XML documents into HTML tags. The XSLT standard is administered by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).