Determining who or what can go where, when, and how.

An acronym for atomicity, consistency, isolation, and durability, which are the main requirements for proper transaction processing.

A collection of subroutine calls that allow computer programs to use a software system.

In information processing, the design approach taken in developing a program or system.

The process by which database or file data that is seldom used or is outdated, but is required for historical or audit reasons, is copied to a cheaper form of storage. The storage medium may be online, tape, or optical disc.

Software that allows organizations to record all information about their hardware and software. Most such applications capture cost information, license information, and so on. Such information belongs in the configuration management database. See also CMDB.

A check on the effectiveness of a task or set of tasks, and how the tasks are managed and documented.

A trace of a sequence of events in a clerical or computer system. This audit usually identifies the creation or modification of any element in the system, who did it, and (possibly) why it was done.

The process by which the identity of a person or computer process is verified.

A utility that copies databases, files, or subsets of databases and files to a storage medium. This copy can be used to restore the data in case of serious failure.

Technically, the range of frequencies over which a device can send or receive signals. The term is also used to denote the maximum data transfer rate, measured in bits per second, that a communications channel can handle.

Known more formally as the International Convergence of Capital Measurement and Capital Standards — A Revised Framework. Basel II is an internationally recognized set of rules for evaluating a bank's finances in light of various risks. It's also one of the big compliance regulations making organizations do things that they wouldn't otherwise feel compelled to do. (Basel, by the way, is named after a very lovely city in Switzerland.)

A noninteractive process that runs in a queue, usually when the system load is lowest, generally used for processing batches of information in a serial and usually efficient manner. Early computers were capable of only batch processing.

An effective way of doing something. It can relate to anything from writing program code to IT governance.

Making the necessary connections among software components so that they can interact.

Using a person's unique physical characteristics to prove his identity to a computer — by employing a fingerprint scanner or voice analyzer, for example.

A component or device with an input and an output whose inner workings need not be understood by or accessible to the user.

A computer language based on WSDL (Web Services Description Language, an XML format for describing Web Services) and designed for programming business services. See also XML.

A technology and methodology for controlling the activities — both automated and manual — needed to make a business function.

In computer programming, a program that accepts requests from one software layer or component and translates them into a form that can be understood by another layer or component.

A program that lets you access information on the Internet. Browsers used to run just on personal computers, but now they are on cellphones and personal digital assistants and soon will appear on refrigerators.

A technology that connects multiple components so they can talk to one another. In essence, a bus is a connection capability. A bus can be software (such as an enterprise service bus) or hardware (such as a memory bus). See also ESB.

The codification of rules and practices that constitute a business.

A technique for transforming how business operates into a codified source in code so that it can be translated into software.

Constraints or actions that refer to the actual commercial world but may need to be encapsulated in service management or business applications.

An individual function or activity that is directly useful to the business.

A group of key people from all areas of the business and operations that focuses on best practices. A center of excellence provides a way for groups within the company to collaborate. This group also becomes a force for change, as it can leverage its growing knowledge to help business units benefit from experience.

The management of change in operational processes and applications.

A model of computing in which the various processes are classified as either consumers of services (clients) or providers of services (servers). This classification was once used as the basis for dividing processes among the available processors.

A computing model that makes IT resources such as servers, middleware, and applications available as services to business organizations in a self-service manner.

In general, a repository of service management data.

A process-improvement best practice used to improve processes in a project or overall. The Software Engineering Institute of Carnegie Mellon University developed CMMI along with representatives of industry and government.

An IT framework with a focus on governance and managing technical and business risks.

A piece of computer software that can be used as a building block in larger systems. Components can be parts of business applications that have been made accessible through Web Service–related standards and technologies, such as WSDL, SOAP, and XML. See Web Services.

The complete description of the way in which the constituent elements of a software product or system interrelate, both in functional and physical terms.

The management of configurations, normally involving holding configuration data in a database so that the data can be managed and changed where necessary.

In computer programming, a data structure or object used to manage collections of other objects in an organized way.

Software intended to help you run your sales force and customer support operations.

Software used to identify potential data-quality problems. If a customer is listed multiple times in a customer database due to variations of the spelling of her name, the data-cleansing software makes corrections to help standardize the data.

The part of the computer network devoted to transmissions.

Data access to a variety of data stores, using consistent rules and definitions that enable all the data stores to be treated as a single resource.

A technique or process that helps you understand the content, structure, and relationships of your data. This process also helps you validate your data against technical and business rules.

Characteristics of data such as consistency, accuracy, reliability, completeness, timeliness, reasonableness, and validity. Data-quality software ensures that data elements are represented in a consistent way across different data stores or systems, making the data more trustworthy across the enterprise.

A process by which the format of data is changed so it can be used by different applications.

A large data store containing the organization's historical data, which is used primarily for data analysis and data mining.

A computer system intended to store large amounts of information reliably and in an organized fashion. Most databases provide users convenient access to the data, along with helpful search capabilities.

Spreading the work of an information processing application among several computers.

Making necessary connections among software components when the software system is first put together or built.

: A packaged set of business applications that combines business rules, process, and data management into a single integrated environment to support a business.

A distributed middleware software system that allows computer applications to communicate in a standardized way.

A framework developed at Carnegie Mellon University to provide a best-practices model for improving relationships between customers and suppliers in outsourcing agreements.

Tools for locating and accessing data from a data store (data extraction), changing the structure or format of the data so it can be used by the business application (data transformation), and sending the data to the business application (data load).

A framework that provides a business process model for the telecommunications industry.

The ability of a system to provide uninterrupted service despite the failure of one or more of the system's components.

The combination of disparate things so that they can act as one — as in federated states, data, or identity management — and making sure that all the right rules apply.

A support structure for developing software products.

An open-source copyright license created by Richard Stallman that, in its strictest form, requires programs built on code licensed under GPL to adopt the same license.

An important software design concept, especially in relation to components, referring to the amount of detail or functionality — from fine to coarse — provided in a service component. One software component can do something quite simple, such as calculate a square root; another has a great deal of detail and functionality to represent a complex business rule or workflow. The first component is fine-grained, and the second is coarse-grained. Developers often aggregate fine-grained services into coarse-grained services to create a business service.

A step beyond distributed processing, involving large numbers of networked computers (often geographically dispersed and possibly of different types and capabilities) that are harnessed to solve a common problem.

A set of extensive regulations that health care organizations and providers in the United States must follow. One of the goals of this act is to place controls on the health care system to protect patients' right to privacy regarding information about their health. The policies and regulations place significant demands on technology systems that have anything to do with health care.

A data-encoding scheme invented by Tim Berners-Lee in 1991 and the basic way that information is encoded over the World Wide Web.

The basic way that information is linked and transmitted over the World Wide Web. HTTPS is a version of HTTP with encryption for security.

Keeping track of a single user's (or asset's) identity throughout an engagement with a system or set of systems.

A process using software to link data sources in various departments or regions of the organization with an overall goal of creating more reliable, consistent, and trusted information.

The fundamental systems necessary for the ordinary operation of anything, be it a country or an IT department. The physical infrastructure that people rely on includes roads, electrical wiring, and water systems. In IT, infrastructure includes basic computer hardware, networks, operating systems, and other software that applications run on top of.

Services provided by the infrastructure. In IT, these services include all the software needed to make devices talk to one another, for starters.

A huge computer network linking almost all the computers in the world and enabling them to communicate via standard protocols (TCP/IP) and data formats. See also SMTP, TCP/IP, and XML.

The ability of a product to interface with many other products; usually used in the context of software.

A codified technique for communicating data across a packet-switched network. IP can also mean intellectual property such as patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets. See also TCP/IP.

An organization that has developed more than 17,000 international standards, including standards for IT service management and corporate governance of information technology.

A framework and set of standards for IT governance based on best practices.

A technology that enables Java programs to talk to other software, such as databases and legacy applications.

An indicator used to measure the effectiveness of a process.

An increasingly popular open-source approach to building Web applications. LAMP comprises the Linux operating system; the Apache Web server; a MySQL database; and a scripting language such as PHP, Perl, or Python.

Deferring the necessary connections among applications to when the connection is first needed. Late binding allows more flexibility for changes than early binding does, but it imposes some cost in processing time.

Any application more than a few years old. When applications can't be disposed of and replaced easily, they become legacy applications. The good news is that they're still doing something useful when selected pieces of code can be turned into business services with new standardized interfaces.

An approach to distributed software applications in which components interact by passing data and requests to other components in a standardized way that minimizes dependencies among components. The emphasis is on simplicity and autonomy. Each component offers a small range of simple services to other components.

The general term for computer software that intentionally does ill, such as viruses, Trojans, worms, and spyware.

A way of encoding information that uses plain text containing special tags often delimited by angle brackets (< and >). Specific markup languages are often created, based on XML, to standardize the interchange of information between different computer systems and services. See also XML.

A program (possibly installed on a Web page) that combines content from more than one source, such as Google Maps and a real-estate listing service.

An arrangement in which one system or process is designated as a controller and other participating systems or processes respond to this controller. Should a master fail, the slaves are unable to continue.

The definitions, mappings, and other characteristics used to describe how to find, access, and use the company's data and software components.

A container of consistent definitions of business data and rules for mapping data to their actual physical locations in the system.

Multipurpose software that lives at a layer between the operating system and application in distributed computing environments.

An application that a business cannot afford to be without at any time.

A precursor to the enterprise service bus. See ESB.

An open-source option to SQL.

Pronounced dot-net; the latest Microsoft programming framework, with heavy emphasis on Web Services. See also Web Services.

The connection of computer systems (nodes) by communications channels and appropriate software.

A consortium promoting e-business and Web Services standards.

A movement in the software industry that makes programs available along with the source code used to create them so that others can inspect and modify how programs work.

A networking system in which nodes in a network exchange data directly instead of going through a central server.

A powerful scripting language in widespread use in system administration, Web development, and other activities.

An open-source scripting language (originally designed in Perl) used especially for producing dynamic Web pages.

In computing, a window that contains a means of access, often a menu, to all the applications throughout the whole network that the user is able to run. Often, the window is segmented into smaller windows, or portlets, that provide direct access to applications such as stock-market price feeds or e-mail.

An approach to developing business software that focuses on the various tasks or business processes needed to make the business function — processing an order, for example, or checking product availability — as opposed to more low-level technical tasks such as opening a file.

A set of rules that computers use to establish and maintain communication among themselves.

Making resources available to users and software. A provisioning system makes applications available to users and makes server resources available to applications.

A form of processing in which a computer system accepts and updates data at the same time, feeding back immediate results that influence the data source.

A class of applications that demand timely response to actions that take place out in the world. Typical examples include automated stock trading and RFID. See also RFID.

A single source for all the metadata needed to gain access to a Web service or software component.

A database for software and components, with an emphasis on revision control and configuration management (where they keep the good stuff, in other words).

The time from the moment at which a transaction is submitted by a user or an application to the moment at which the final result of that transaction is made known to the user or application.

A technology that uses small, inexpensive chips attached to products (or even animals) that then transmit a unique identification number over a short distance to a special radio transmitter/receiver.

A way for a program running on one computer to run a subprogram on another computer.

The delivery of computer applications over the Internet.

A standard framework for exchanging authentication and authorization information (that is, credentials) in an XML format called assertions.

The Public Company Accounting Reform and Investor Protection Act of 2002, a U.S. law enhancing standards for all U.S. public companies' boards of directors, resulting in substantial new requirements for corporate IT.

As regards to hardware, the ability to go from small to large amounts of processing power with the same architecture. It also applies to software products such as databases, in which case it refers to the consistency of performance per unit of power as hardware resources increase.

A computer programming language that is interpreted and has access to all or most operating-system facilities. Common examples include Perl, Python, Ruby, and JavaScript. It is often easier to program in a scripting language, but the resulting programs generally run more slowly than those created in compiled languages such as C and C++.

In computer programming, what the data means as opposed to formatting rules (syntax).

A room filled with computer servers, often needed to run large Internet sites.

A purposeful activity carried out for the benefit of a known target. Services are often made up of a group of component services, some of which may also have component services. Services always transform something, and they complete by delivering an output.

A directory of IT services provided across the enterprise, including information such as service description, access rights, and ownership.

A single point of contact for IT users and customers to report any issues they may have with the IT service (or, in some cases, with IT's customer service).

A document that captures the understanding between a service user and a service provider as to quality and timeliness.

Monitoring and optimizing a service to ensure that it meets the critical outcomes that the customer values and the stakeholders want to provide.

A program that runs on a Web server in response to an action taken by the user via a browser.

In IT, an application with a single narrow focus, such as human resources management or inventory control, with no intention or preparation for use by others.

A proposed solution that seems too good to be true and usually is.

A statistical term meaning six standard deviations from the norm and the name of a quality-improvement program that aims at reducing errors to one in a million.

The basic method used to transmit electronic mail (e-mail) over the Internet.

An approach to building applications that implements business processes or services by using a set of loosely coupled black-box components orchestrated to deliver a well-defined level of service.

The most popular computer language for accessing and manipulating databases.

A popular method for making secure connections over the Internet, first introduced by Netscape.

A core set of common, repeatable best practices and protocols that have been agreed on by a business or industry group. Typically, vendors, industry user groups, and end users collaborate to develop standards based on the broad expertise of a large number of stakeholders. Organizations can leverage these standards as a common foundation and innovate on top of them.

A piece of computer code that can easily be used (called) by many other programs, as long as they are on the same computer and (usually) are written in the same programming language.

The complex stack of communications protocols that underlies the Internet. All data is broken into small packets that are sent independently over the network and reassembled at the final destination.

Client hardware in the client/server environment that is dependent on the server for loading applications. Most hardware designed for this purpose is similar to a cut-down PC, with no floppy disk drive or hard drive.

The rate at which transactions are completed in a system.

A newer name for SSL. See also SSL.

A popular quality-improvement program.

A computer action that represents a business event, such as debiting an account. When a transaction starts, it must either complete or not happen at all.

A platform-independent, XML-based services registry sponsored by OASIS. See also OASIS and XML.

Emulation. Virtual memory is the use of a disk to store active areas of memory to make the available memory appear larger. In a virtual environment, one computer runs software that allows it to emulate another machine. This kind of emulation is commonly known as virtualization.

A handy way of referring to the World Wide Web Consortium, an organization that coordinates standards for the World Wide Web.

A software component created with an interface consisting of a WSDL definition, an XML schema definition, and a WS-Policy definition. Collectively, components could be called a service contract — or, alternatively, an API. See also API, WSDL, WS-Policy, and XML.

This is a sequence of steps needed to carry out a business process. Workflow technology automates the passage of information between the steps.

A system built on top of the Internet that displays hyperlinked pages of information that can contain a wide variety of data formats, including multimedia.

An XML-based interface description language that describes the flow of messages exchanged by a Web Service when it participates in choreographed interactions with other services.

An XML format for describing Web services.

The Web Services Policy Framework, which provides a means of expressing the capabilities, requirements, and characteristics of software components in a Web Services system.

A protocol that allows portlets to communicate by using standard Web Services interfaces.

A way of presenting data as plain-text files that has become the lingua franca of SOA. In XML, as in HTML, data is delimited in tags that are enclosed in angle brackets (< and >), although the tags in XML can have many more meanings. See also SOA.

A language for defining and describing the structure of XML documents.

The description of what can be in an XML document.

A computer language, based on XML, that specifies how to change one XML document into another. See also XML.