Glossary
W
26 terms.
- Wait-To-Restore (WTR)
A timer that delays moving traffic back to a repaired working path. It prevents repeated switching when a defect comes and goes.
Like I'm five Waiting a few minutes after a road is fixed before sending everybody back, in case it breaks again.
- Watcher
An entity that receives presence information about a presentity, for example to decide how to contact them.
Like I'm five Someone who looks at your status to see if and how they can reach you.
- Wavelength division multiplexing
A way of carrying several optical channels on one fiber by giving each its own wavelength of light. Each channel can then be managed separately.
Like I'm five Sending many messages down one cable, each in its own color of light.
- Wavelength Switched Optical Network
An optical network in which traffic is carried on individual wavelengths of light that are switched through the network. Not every signal is compatible with every network element.
Like I'm five A network that sends information as different colors of light, switched from one path to another.
- Weak key
A cipher key with a property that makes encryption with it less secure than with a normal key. Implementations should check for such keys and reject them.
Like I'm five A bad secret key that makes the lock easy to open, so you should not use it.
- Web Linking
The practice of using HTTP headers or HTML attributes to express relationships between web resources, standardized by RFC 5988.
Like I'm five Connecting web pages together by saying what kind of relationship they have.
- Web origin
The protection domain a user agent assigns to a URI. For most URIs it is the triple of scheme, host and port; otherwise it is a globally unique identifier.
Like I'm five The name of the room a website lives in, made from its link type, name and door number.
- WebDAV
Web Distributed Authoring and Versioning, a set of HTTP extensions (RFC 4918) for creating, changing and managing resources and their properties on a server.
Like I'm five A way to use a web server like a shared folder you can edit.
Used in RFC 3648 RFC 4316 RFC 4709 RFC 4791 RFC 5323 RFC 5689 RFC 5995 RFC 6352 RFC 8144
- WebFinger
A protocol that uses an HTTPS request to a well-known path to discover information about a person or other entity identified by a URI. The answer is a JSON Resource Descriptor.
Like I'm five A lookup that answers 'where can I find out more about this name?' with a list of links.
- WebRTC
Web Real-Time Communication, a set of specifications that lets web browsers exchange audio, video and arbitrary data directly in real time.
Like I'm five A way for web pages to let people talk and share video with each other live.
- WebSocket
A protocol (RFC 6455) that gives a client and server a two-way message channel over a single TCP connection, started with an HTTP handshake.
Like I'm five A phone line that stays open so both sides can talk any time.
Used in RFC 6202 RFC 6455 RFC 7118 RFC 7355 RFC 7395 RFC 7692 RFC 7936 RFC 7977 RFC 8124 RFC 8307 RFC 8323 RFC 8441 RFC 8825 RFC 8826 RFC 8827 RFC 8831 RFC 8832 RFC 8857 RFC 8887 RFC 9220 RFC 9931
- Weighted fair queueing (WFQ)
A queue-scheduling method that shares a link among several queues in proportion to assigned weights. RFC 2549 jokes that it MAY be implemented using scales.
Like I'm five Taking turns, but some kids get a bigger turn than others.
Used in RFC 1046 RFC 1633 RFC 2212 RFC 2549 RFC 2598 RFC 3246 RFC 3289 RFC 3290 RFC 3449 RFC 3670 RFC 4594 RFC 5865 RFC 6817 RFC 7567 RFC 7640 RFC 8033 RFC 8260 RFC 9332 RFC 9956
- Well-known endpoint
A service address in a domain that applications know how to find by name, such as
apex=presence@example.com, allowing clients to contact a service without prior configuration.Like I'm five A door everyone in a building knows about because it has a sign on it.
- Well-known URI
A URI path that begins with
/.well-known/and is reserved in an IANA registry for a particular purpose, so clients can find a given resource on any site without being told where it is. Defined in RFC 8615.Like I'm five A spot on every website's front door where a particular kind of note is always kept.
Used in RFC 4387 RFC 5785 RFC 6415 RFC 6690 RFC 6694 RFC 6764 RFC 6920 RFC 7030 RFC 7033 RFC 7072 RFC 7252 RFC 7320 RFC 7711 RFC 7712 RFC 7808 RFC 8075 RFC 8295 RFC 8307 RFC 8414 RFC 8461 RFC 8555 RFC 8615 RFC 8620 RFC 8801 and 18 more
- White pages
An electronic directory service that holds information about people and organizations, such as names, addresses and phone numbers, so they can be looked up.
Like I'm five An electronic phone book for people and companies.
- White space
Portions of licensed radio spectrum that are not in use at a given place and time and can be used by others without interfering with the licensee.
Like I'm five The empty gaps between radio stations that other gadgets can borrow without bothering anyone.
- WHOIS
An older text-based protocol for looking up registration data. RDAP responses can point to the WHOIS server for an object using the port43 member.
Like I'm five The old-fashioned phone book for internet names.
Used in RFC 812 RFC 2345 RFC 7480 RFC 7481 RFC 7485 RFC 9082 RFC 9083
- Wildcard certificate
A certificate whose name contains the * character. RFC 2818 says * matches any single domain name component or component fragment, so *.a.com matches foo.a.com but not bar.foo.a.com.
Like I'm five A name tag with a blank spot that any one word can fill, but only one word.
Used in RFC 2595 RFC 2818 RFC 5425 RFC 5734 RFC 5922 RFC 6125 RFC 7817 RFC 8336 RFC 8659 RFC 9444 RFC 9525 RFC 9726 RFC 9799 RFC 9887
- Wildcard expansion
The DNS rule that a record owned by a name such as *.example can answer queries for names that do not otherwise exist under example. DNSSEC records the wildcard in the RRSIG Labels field so validators can recognize it.
Like I'm five A card that says "anyone not on the list gets this answer."
Used in RFC 882 RFC 974 RFC 1480 RFC 1703 RFC 2163 RFC 2535 RFC 2812 RFC 3833 RFC 4035 RFC 4592 RFC 5155 RFC 5229 RFC 5617 RFC 7129 RFC 8198 RFC 8552 RFC 9077 RFC 9156 RFC 9824
- Wildmat
A pattern used in NNTP to select newsgroup names, using wildcards such as an asterisk and an exclamation mark to exclude names.
Like I'm five A short pattern that picks out a set of names, like all names ending in tea.
- Wire Image
The unencrypted information visible in a protocol's packet headers on the network path, as opposed to encrypted payload or control information.
Like I'm five The part of a network packet that isn't locked up and can be read by anyone on the network.
- Wireless Termination Point
The WTP is the access point device that talks to wireless terminals over the air. In the CAPWAP framework it is managed by a WLAN controller.
Like I'm five One of the Wi-Fi boxes on the ceiling that your phone connects to.
Used in RFC 4564 RFC 5413 RFC 5414 RFC 5415 RFC 5416 RFC 5833 RFC 7494
- Working Group
A group chartered within the IETF to produce specific documents on a defined topic. Its charter sets its scope and deliverables.
Like I'm five A team with a written job description that works together on one task.
Used in RFC 2028 RFC 2418 RFC 3710 RFC 3774 RFC 3844 RFC 5434 RFC 7418 RFC 9281
- World Wide Name
A worldwide-unique 64-bit identifier for a Fibre Channel node or port, used to look up the current address of a device.
Like I'm five A name that belongs to only one device in the whole world, even when its street address changes.
- WSDL
Web Services Description Language, an XML format for describing the interface and behavior of a web service, allowing automatic code generation.
Like I'm five A recipe that describes what messages a web service accepts and what it returns.
- WWW-Authenticate
An HTTP response header with which a server tells a client which authentication scheme and parameters it wants, usually sent along with a 401 status code.
Like I'm five The server's note saying how to prove yourself.
Used in RFC 2617 RFC 6750 RFC 7235 RFC 7616 RFC 7617 RFC 7804 RFC 8053 RFC 8760 RFC 9470 RFC 9577 RFC 9728