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Glossary
227
S
select — To highlight or otherwise specify text, data, or graphics with the
intent to perform some operation on it.
serial — Processes that occur one at a time. In communications, it means
the transmission of one bit at a time sequentially over a single
channel. On your computer, the serial port provides a serial interface
between the computer and an appropriate device. Compare parallel.
shortcut — See keyboard shortcut.
Sleep — A feature of some Windows
®
operating systems that allows you
to turn off the computer without exiting your open applications and
to continue from where you left off when you turn the computer on
again.
software — See program. Compare hardware.
Suspend — A feature of some Windows
®
operating systems that allows
you to turn off the computer without exiting your open applications
and to continue from where you left off when you turn the computer
on again.
system disk — A diskette that contains the operating system files needed
to start the computer. Any diskette can be formatted as a system
disk. A system disk is also called a “bootable disk” or a “startup
disk.” Compare non-system disk.
system prompt — The symbol (in the MS-DOS
®
operating system,
generally a drive letter followed by a “greater than” sign) indicating
where users are to enter commands.
T
TFT display — See active-matrix display.
U
universal serial bus (USB) — USB is a serial bus that supports a data
transfer rate of up to 480 Mbps (480 million bits per second). USB
can connect up to 127 peripheral devices through a single all-
purpose USB port. USB allows hot swapping of peripherals. See
also bus, hot swapping, serial.
upload — To send a file to another computer through a modem or
network. See also download.
USB — See universal serial bus (USB).
utility — A computer program designed to perform a narrowly focused
operation or solve a specific problem. Utilities are often related to
computer system management.