From time to time, you may overhear some tech geeks speaking some strange language. These odd words that they speak are actually abbreviations, or acronyms, for larger ideas or phrases.
Here is a short list of some common acronyms, so you can now understand what your local geek is talking about.
| ADF | Automatic Document Feeder |
| ADSL | Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line |
| AGP | Accelerated Graphics Port |
| AIFF | Audio Interchange File Format |
| AIX | Advanced Interactive Executive |
| ANSI | American National Standards Institute |
| API | Application Program Interface |
| ASCII | American Standard Code for Information Interchange |
| ASP | Active Server Page or Application Service Provider |
| ATA | Advanced Technology Attachment |
| ATM | Asynchronous Transfer Mode |
| BASIC | Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code |
| Bcc | Blind Carbon Copy |
| BIOS | Basic Input/Output System |
| Blob | Binary Large Object |
| BMP | Bitmap |
| CAD | Computer-Aided Design |
| Cc | Carbon Copy |
| CCD | Charged Coupled Device |
| CD | Compact Disc |
| CD-R | Compact Disc Recordable |
| CD-ROM | Compact Disc Read-Only Memory |
| CD-RW | Compact Disc Re-Writable |
| CDMA | Code Division Multiple Access |
| CGI | Common Gateway Interface |
| CISC | Complex Instruction Set Computing |
| CMOS | Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor |
| CMYK | Cyan Magenta Yellow Black |
| CPA | Cost Per Action |
| CPC | Cost Per Click |
| CPL | Cost Per Lead |
| CPM | Cost Per 1,000 Impressions |
| CPS | Classroom Performance System |
| CPU | Central Processing Unit |
| CRM | Customer Relationship Management |
| CRT | Cathode Ray Tube |
| CSS | Cascading Style Sheet |
| CTP | Composite Theoretical Performance |
| CTR | Click-Through Rate |
| DBMS | Database Management System |
| DDR | Double Data Rate |
| DDR2 | Double Data Rate 2 |
| DHCP | Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol |
| DIMM | Dual In-Line Memory Module |
| DLL | Dynamic Link Library |
| DMA | Direct Memory Access |
| DNS | Domain Name System |
| DOS | Disk Operating System |
| DPI | Dots Per Inch |
| DRAM | Dynamic Random Access Memory |
| DRM | Digital Rights Management |
| DSL | Digital Subscriber Line |
| DSLAM | Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer |
| DTD | Document Type Definition |
| DV | Digital Video |
| DVD | Digital Versatile Disc |
| DVD+R | Digital Versatile Disc Recordable |
| DVD+RW | Digital Versatile Disk Rewritable |
| DVD-R | Digital Versatile Disc Recordable |
| DVD-RAM | Digital Versatile Disc Random Access Memory |
| DVD-RW | Digital Versatile Disk Rewritable |
| DVI | Digital Video Interface |
| DVR | Digital Video Recorder |
| EDI | Electronic Data Interchange |
| EPS | Encapsulated PostScript |
| EUP | Enterprise Unified Process |
| FAQ | Frequently Asked Questions |
| FIFO | First In, First Out |
| FiOS | Fiber Optic Service |
| FPU | Floating Point Unit |
| FSB | Frontside Bus |
| FTP | File Transfer Protocol |
| GIF | Graphics Interchange Format |
| GIGO | Garbage In, Garbage Out |
| GIS | Geographic Information Systems |
| GPS | Global Positioning System |
| GPU | Graphics Processing Unit |
| GUI | Graphical User Interface |
| HDMI | High-Definition Multimedia Interface |
| HDTV | High Definition Televsion |
| HDV | High-Definition Video |
| HFS | Hierarchical File System |
| HSF | Heat Sink and Fan |
| HTML | Hyper-Text Markup Language |
| HTTP | HyperText Transfer Protocol |
| I/O | Input/Output |
| ICANN | Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers |
| ICF | Internet Connection Firewall |
| ICMP | Internet Control Message Protocol |
| ICS | Internet Connection Sharing |
| IDE | Integrated Device Electronics or Integrated Development Environment |
| IEEE | Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers |
| IGP | Integrated Graphics Processor |
| IM | Instant Message |
| IMAP | Internet Message Access Protocol |
| InterNIC | Internet Network Information Center |
| IP | Internet Protocol |
| IPX | Internetwork Packet Exchange |
| IRC | Internet Relay Chat |
| IRQ | Interrupt Request |
| ISA | Industry Standard Architecture |
| ISDN | Integrated Services Digital Network |
| ISO | International Organization for Standardization |
| ISP | Internet Service Provider |
| IT | Information Technology |
| IVR | Interactive Voice Response |
| JPEG | Joint Photographic Experts Group |
| JRE | Java Runtime Environment |
| JSP | Java Server Page |
| Kbps | Kilobits Per Second |
| KVM | Switch Keyboard, Video, and Mouse Switch |
| LAN | Local Area Network |
| LCD | Liquid Crystal Display |
| LDAP | Lightweight Directory Access Protocol |
| LIFO | Last In, First Out |
| LPI | Lines Per Inch |
| LUN | Logical Unit Number |
| MAC | Address Media Access Control Address |
| MANET | Mobile Ad Hoc Network |
| Mbps | Megabits Per Second |
| MCA | Micro Channel Architecture |
| MIDI | Musical Instrument Digital Interface |
| MIPS | Million Instructions Per Second |
| MP3 | MPEG-1 Audio Layer-3 |
| MPEG | Moving Picture Experts Group |
| MTU | Maximum Transmission Unit |
| NAT | Network Address Translation |
| NetBIOS | Network Basic Input/Output System |
| NIC | Network Interface Card |
| NNTP | Network News Transfer Protocol |
| NOC | Network Operations Center |
| NTFS | New Technology File System |
| OASIS | Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards |
| OCR | Optical Character Recognition |
| ODBC | Open Database Connectivity |
| OEM | Original Equipment Manufacturer |
| OLAP | Online Analytical Processing |
| OLE | Object Linking and Embedding |
| OOP | Object-Oriented Programming |
| OSPF | Open Shortest Path First |
| P2P | Peer To Peer |
| PC | Personal Computer |
| PCB | Printed Circuit Board |
| PCI | Peripheral Component Interconnect |
| PCI-X | Peripheral Component Interconnect Extended |
| PCMCIA | Personal Computer Memory Card International Association |
| PDA | Personal Digital Assistant |
| Portable Document Format | |
| PHP | Hypertext Preprocessor |
| PIM | Personal Information Manager |
| PMU | Power Management Unit |
| PNG | Portable Network Graphic |
| POP3 | Post Office Protocol |
| PPC | Pay Per Click |
| PPGA | Plastic Pin Grid Array |
| PPI | Pixels Per Inch |
| PPL | Pay Per Lead |
| PPP | Point to Point Protocol |
| PPTP | Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol |
| PRAM | Parameter Random Access Memory |
| RAID | Redundant Array of Independent Disks |
| RAM | Random Access Memory |
| RDF | Resource Description Framework |
| RDRAM | Rambus Dynamic Random Access Memory |
| RGB | Red Green Blue |
| RISC | Reduced Instruction Set Computing |
| ROM | Read-Only Memory |
| RPC | Remote Procedure Call |
| RPM | Revenue Per 1,000 Impressions |
| RSS | RDF Site Summary |
| RTE | Runtime Environment |
| RTF | Rich Text Fomat |
| RUP | Rational Unified Process |
| SATA | Serial Advanced Technology Attachment |
| SCSI | Small Computer System Interface |
| SD | Secure Digital |
| SDRAM | Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory |
| SDSL | Symmetric Digital Subscriber Line |
| SEO | Search Engine Optimization |
| SIMM | Single In-Line Memory Module |
| SLI | Scalable Link Interface |
| SMART | Self-Monitoring Analysis And Reporting Technology |
| SMB | Server Message Block |
| SMS | Short Message Service |
| SMTP | Simple Mail Transfer Protocol |
| SNMP | Simple Network Management Protocol |
| SO-DIMM | Small Outline Dual In-Line Memory Module |
| SOA | Service Oriented Architecture |
| SOAP | Simple Object Access Protocol |
| SQL | Structured Query Language |
| SRAM | Static Random Access Memory |
| sRGB | Standard Red Green Blue |
| SSH | Secure Shell |
| SSID | Service Set Identifier |
| SSL | Secure Sockets Layer |
| TCP/IP | Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol |
| TFT | Thin-Film Transistor |
| TIFF | Tagged Image File Format |
| TTL | Time To Live |
| TWAIN | Toolkit Without An Informative Name |
| UDDI | Universal Description Discovery and Integration |
| UDP | User Datagram Protocol |
| UML | Unified Modeling Language |
| UNC | Universal Naming Convention |
| UPnP | Universal Plug and Play |
| UPS | Uninterruptible Power Supply |
| URI | Uniform Resource Identifier |
| URL | Uniform Resource Locator |
| USB | Universal Serial Bus |
| VCI | Virtual Channel Identifier |
| VFAT | Virtual File Allocation Table |
| VGA | Video Graphics Array |
| VLB | VESA Local Bus |
| VoIP | Voice Over Internet Protocol |
| VPI | Virtual Path Identifier |
| VPN | Virtual Private Network |
| VRAM | Video Random Access Memory |
| VRML | Virtual Reality Modeling Language |
| WAIS | Wide Area Information Server |
| WAN | Wide Area Network |
| WEP | Wired Equivalent Privacy |
| Wi-Fi | Wireless Fidelity |
| WPA | Wi-Fi Protected Access |
| WWW | World Wide Web |
| XHTML | Extensible Hypertext Markup Language |
| XML | Extensible Markup Language |
| XSLT | Extensible Style Sheet Language Transformation |
| Y2K | Year 2000 |
| ZIF | Zero Insertion Force |