Pelican Digital

Art paper: Paper that is evenly coated with a fine clay compound that creates a hard smooth (matt or gloss) surface on one or both sides.
Back to back: Print applied to both sides of a sheet of paper.
Backing up: Printing the second side of a printed sheet.
Bandwidth: The maximum amount of data that can be transferred over a connection at any one time.
Bleed: The allowance on a printed piece (usually either a graphic or colour area) beyond the trimmed and finished size, to ensure a clean cut off (usually 3mm)
Broadband: Refers to high-band-width internet connections, such as ADSL
CMYK: Cyan, magenta, yellow and black. The four (subtractive) process colours that are used in four-colour printed reproduction.
Collate: To gather sheets, signatures or page sections of a publication together, ensuring they are complete and in their correct order.
Dedicated server: A server which is used solely for use by one organisation. The server is leased and stored in the data center of the host company.
Desktop publishing: Desktop publishing (DTP) software was originally developed to allow computer users to create professional-looking newsletters, magazines and brochures, complete with pictures, diagrams and colour. Now that word-processing software can do most of these things, DTP software has become more of a tool for professional designers, though small companies often use DTP for producing newsletters and reports.
Document management systems: The control of electronic documents, such as images, spreadsheets and word-processed files. A document management system is created by combining several types of software to control document identification, storage, retrieval, tracking, version control, workflow management and presentation. Good systems can create, use and control documents across different computers, software packages and company divisions.
DPI: Dots Per Inch. Number of dots a printer or device (like a monitor) can display per linear inch. For example, most laser printers have a resolution of 300 dpi, most monitors 72 dpi, most PostScript image setters 1200 to 2450 dpi. Photo quality inkjet printers now range from 1200 to 2400 dpi.
File server: Also known as a server, this is a dedicated machine that runs the network operating system that services all the other computers in a network (the 'clients'). All the working files of a company are stored centrally on this server.
FTP (file transfer protocol): A method of transferring files from one computer to another. It is the standard way of uploading web pages to a server.
ISDN (integrated services digital network): A fast phone line that significantly increases the rate at which you can transmit and receive information (either 64 or 128kbps), for example when connect to the Internet. If you have large files of data to transmit (such as video or high resolution photography) or you want to video and data conference regularly, you may want an ISDN line. Broadband connections are even faster than ISDN, and are beginning to supersede it).
JPEG: A standardized format used by many digital cameras for storing images. This format is also commonly used for images on the web and images attached to e-mail messages. JPEG, which stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group, the group that established this file standard, is one of the most widely used formats today. JPEG is a standardized image compression mechanism designed for compressing full-colour or gray scale images of natural, real-world scenes. JPEG uses lossy compression, which can damage image quality
Kilobyte: An amount of computer memory, disk space, or document size consisting of approximately one thousand bytes. Actual value is 1,024 bytes.
Megabyte: An amount of computer memory consisting of about one million bytes. The actual value is 1,048,576 bytes.
Megapixel: A unit equal to one million pixels. The higher the resolution, the more pixels in an image and therefore the greater the image quality. An image file that is 1 megapixel (MP) can make a photo realistic print of 5 x 7 inches; a 2 MP file can make an 8 x 10-inch print; a 3 MP file can make an 11 x 14-inch print.
Pixel: (PICture ELement) The smallest element of a digitized image. One small dot of light among the many dots that make up an image on a computer screen.
PPI: Pixels Per Inch. The number of pixels per linear inch is used to describe image resolution. A higher ppi means more image detail and correlates to higher image quality. Monitors display images at 72 ppi, inkjet printers require at least 150 ppi to produce photo realistic prints.
RAM (Random Access Memory): The main memory of a computer. Upgrading the available RAM will often dramatically improve a PC's performance. 128 MB of RAM is often standard for new PCs, although double this figure is much better. RAM is now very cheap.
Resolution: The number of pixels in an image. A higher number correlates to a higher quality image.
ROM (Read Only Memory): Where PCs store important information that they need to run the operating system and other software. Unlike RAM, ROM is permanent and its contents cannot be changed, replaced or deleted.

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