This is a glossary of acronyms used with Microsoft technologies. An acronym is an abbreviated term formed from the first letter (or first few letters) of several words. Many acronyms are used in Microsoft technologies, and new ones appear constantly. Often someone unfamiliar with the acronym does not even know what technology area it refers to. Many are used in all information technology.
A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z
AA Acronym for Anti-Aliasing AAD
Acronym for Azure Active Directory. Active Directory Domain Services in the Windows Azure cloud. Windows Azure is the Microsoft cloud computing platform, and one of the services available is Active Directory.
AAD RM
Acronym for Windows Azure Active Directory Rights Management. See Azure Rights Management.
AADJ
Acronym for Azure Active Directory Join.
AAM
Acronym for Alternate Access Mappings. Directs users to the correct URLs during their interaction with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server. See Plan alternate access mappings (Office SharePoint Server).
AC
Acronym for Attribute Certificate. A digital X.509 document containing attributes associated with a user. Also the acronym for Authorization Certificate, where the associated attributes in the digital document are used mainly for authorization.
ACE
Acronym for Access Control Entry. Individual entries in a security descriptor (called an access control list or ACL). Specifies permissions granted or denied to trustees for the resource to which the ACE applies.
ACL
Acronym for Access Control List. A collection of Access Control Entries (ACE's) that specify the security applied to a resource.
ACS
Acronym for:
AD
Acronym for Active Directory. See Active Directory.
AD CS
Acronym for Active Directory Certificate Services. See Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS) Overview.
AD DS
Acronym for Active Directory Domain Services. Microsoft's directory service product. See Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) Overview.
AD FS
Acronym for Active Directory Federation Services. See Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) Overview.
AD LDS
Acronym for Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services. This used to be called Active Directory Application Mode, or ADAM. A database for directory-enabled applications that do not need AD DS. See Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services Overview.
AD RMS
Acronym for Active Directory Rights Management Services. See Active Directory Rights Management Services Overview.
ADAC
Acronym for Active Directory Administrative Center. See Active Directory Administrative Center: Getting Started.
ADAL
Acronym for Windows Azure Active Directory Authentication Library. See Azure AD Authentication Library for .NET.
ADAM
Acronym for Active Directory Application Mode, now renamed Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services (AD LDS).
ADMT
Acronym for Active Directory Migration Tool. Toolset to facilitate migration and restructuring tasks in an Active Directory Domain Services infrastructure. See ADMT Guide: Migrating and Restructuring Active Directory Domains.
ADO
Acronym for ActiveX Data Objects. ADSI can act as an OLE-DB provider that allows database queries of Active Directory using ADO. Active Directory searches using ADO are only allowed in the LDAP namespace. ADO can also be used to access Microsoft Access databases, SQL Server databases, and even text files.
ADSI
Acronym for Active Directory Service Interface. A library of routines that provide an interface to various directory namespaces, such as Active Directory, the Windows NT SAM account database, Novell bindery, Novell NDS, and Internet Information Server (IIS).
ADUC
Acronym for Active Directory Users and Computers, the MMC snap-in used to manage objects in Active Directory. Besides users and computers, you can also use this tool to manage contacts, groups, containers, and Organizational Units.
ADWS
Acronym for Active Directory Web Services. A Windows service that provides a Web interface to Active Directory domains, Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services instances, and Active Directory Database Mounting Tool instances on a Windows Server 2008 R2 (or above) server. See What's New in AD DS: Active Directory Web Services.
AES
Acronym for Advanced Encryption Standard. A specification for the encryption of electronic data used by Kerberos. Supercedes the Data Encryption Standard (DES).
AGPM
Acronym for Microsoft Advanced Group Policy Management. Tool to manage Group Policy Objects (GPO). Part of the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP) for Software Assurance. See Overview Series: Advanced Group Policy Management.
AIA
Acronym for Authority Information Access. Points to the public key for the certificate authority (CA) in AD CS. See AD CS: Authority information access locations should be included in the extensions of issued certificates.
AIK
Acronym for Windows Automated Installation Kit. See Windows Automated Installation Kit (Windows AIK).
AJAX
Acronym for Asynchronous JavaScript And XML. See Ajax (programming).
ALM
Acronym for Application Lifecycle Management. See Microsoft Application Lifecycle Management.
ANR
Acronym for Ambiguous Name Resolution, an efficient search algorithm in Active Directory that allows you to specify complex LDAP syntax filters involving multiple naming-related attributes in a single clause. The attributes must be ANR enabled in the directory schema. See Active Directory: Ambiguous Name Resolution.
ANSI
Acronym for American National Standards Institute. A private non-profit organization that oversees development of voluntary consensus standards in the United States. See American National Standards Institute.
API
Acronym for Application Programming Interface. See Application programming interface.
App-V
Acronym for Microsoft Application Virtualization. See Microsoft App-V.
ARM
Acronym for Acorn RISC Machine or Advanced RISC Machine. A family of processors based on RISC architecture originally developed by Acorn Computers (now ARM Holdings). The RISC based design requires fewer transistors resulting in lower costs, reduced power consumption, and less heat. This makes ARM processors ideal for small battery powered devices. See ARM architecture.
ASCII
Acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange. A character encoding scheme. See ASCII.
ASP
Acronym for Active Server Pages. Server-side script engine for dynamically generated web pages. Superseded by ASP.NET
ASP.NET
Acronym for Active Server Pages .NET. Framework based on the Common Language Runtime (CLR) to build dynamic web applications and services using any supported .NET language. Successor to ASP. See ASP.NET.
ATA
Acronym for Advanced Technology Attachment. Host adapter that allows a computer to communicate with a peripheral bus. See Parallel ATA.
AWE
Acronym for Address Windowing Extensions. A Windows api that allows a 32-bit software application to access more physical memory than it has virtual address space. See Address Windowing Extensions.
AWS
Acronym for Amazon Web Services. See Amazon Web Services.
BAM
Acronym for Business Activity Monitoring. Software to monitor business activities. See Business activity monitoring.
Base64
Binary to text encoding scheme, according to a MIME specification. Encodes any binary string (a byte sequence of 8-bit padded ASCII characters) using a 64 character alphabet of printable characters. Used by the ldifde command line utility.
BCHR
Acronym for Buffer Cache Hit Ratio. Percentage of pages found in the buffer pool without incurring a read from disk or a database query. Ratio of the number of logical reads to the number of physical reads.
BCS
Acronym for Business Connectivity Services. A SharePoint feature. Formerly called Business Data Catalog. See Microsoft Business Connectivity Services (BCS) in SharePoint 2010.
BDC
Acronym for Backup Domain Controller. In NT domains there was one primary domain controller and zero or more backup domain controllers. The concepts no longer apply in Active Directory, which uses a multi-master database system where all domain controllers are are essentially equal.
BI
Acronym for Business Intelligence. See Business intelligence.
BIDS
Acronym for Business Intelligence Development Studio. See Business Intelligence Development Studio.
BIOS
Acronym for Basic Input/Output System. Computer firmware interface. See BIOS.
BITS
Acronym for Background Intelligent Transfer Service. See Background Intelligent File Transfer Service (BITS) Overview.
BKF
Acronym for Backup File. Proprietary files created by the Windows NT Backup Utility (NTBackup) in Windows NT and above. The files have the .bkf extension. See NTBackup.
BLOB
Acronym for Binary Large Object. A collection of binary data stored as a single entity in a database. See Binary large object.
BMC
Acronym for Baseboard Management Controller. See Baseboard management controller.
BMR
Acronym for Bare Metal Recovery. Or Bare Metal Restore. See Bare-metal restore.
BRE
Acronym for Business Rule Engine, a BizTalk feature. See Business Rule Engine. Also the acronym for Business Rules Engine, a .NET compliant class library. See Business Rules Engine.
BSOD
Acronym for Blue Screen Of Death. The blue error screen displayed by some operating systems after encountering a critical system error. Usually, the system must be shut down.
BTS
Acronym for Azure BizTalk Services, a cloud-based integration service. See BizTalk Services.
BYOD
Acronym for Bring Your Own Device. See Bring your own device.
CA
Acronym for Certificate Authority, or sometimes Certification Authority. An entity that issues digital certificates. See Certificate authority.
CAD
Acronym for Computer-Aided Design. See Computer-aided design.
CAL
Acronym for Client Access License. See Client access license.
CAML
Acronym for Collaborative Application Markup Language. An XML based markup language used in SharePoint. See Introduction to Collaborative Application Markup Language (CAML).
CAPI
Acronym for the Microsoft CryptoAPI or Cryptographic Application Progamming Interface. Also known as MS-CAPI. An API in Windows operating systems for applications using cryptography.
CAS
Acronym for Client Access Server. An Exchange Server role that provides authentication, proxy, and limited redirection services. See Client Access server.
CBA
Acronym for Claims Based Access. Also Claims Based Authentication.
CDMA
Acronym for Code Division Multiple Access. A channel access method used in radio communications, particularly in mobile phone standards. See Code division multiple access.
CDP
Acronym for CRL Distribution Point. Location where the Certificate Revocation List (CRL) is maintained, allowing clients to determine if a certificate has been revoked.
CIL
Acronym for Common Intermediate Language. Lowest level human readable programming language, defined by the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI). Used by the .NET Framework and produced by .NET compilers. Independent of CPU or higher level languages. Intermediate between assembly language and modern programming languages. Formerly called Microsoft Intermediate Language, or MSIL. See Common Intermediate Language.
CIM
Acronym for Common Information Model. The repository in the WMI schema that stores class definitions that model WMI managed resources. See Common Information Model.
CLI
Acronym for Common Language Infrastructure. An open specification developed by Microsoft that describes executable code and the runtime environment. Allows multiple high level languages on different computer platforms without rewritting code for different architectures. The .NET Framework is an implementation of CLI. See Common Language Infrastructure.
CLR
Acronym for Common Language Runtime. A run-time environment provided by the .NET Framework which runs code and provides services that make the development process easier. See Common Language Runtime (CLR).
CMDB
Acronym for Configuration Management DataBase. See Configuration management database.
CN
Acronym for Common Name in Active Directory. Also the moniker for objects with a common name in their distinguished names, for example "cn=Jim Smith,ou=West,dc=mydomain,dc=com".
CNA
Acronym for Converged Network Adapter, or converged network interface controller (C-NIC). Computer input/output device that combines a host bus adapter (HBA) with a network interface controller (NIC).
CNG
Acronym for Cryptography Next Generation. Cryptographic development platform introduced in Windows Server 2008 that implements the United States government's Suite B cryptographic algorithms. See Cryptography Next Generation.
COM
Acronym for Component Object Model. Standard for software components that enables interprocess communication and dynamic object creation in programming languages.
CP
Acronym for Claims Provider. See Claims Providers.
CPU
Acronym for Central Processing Unit. See Central processing unit.
CRL
Acronym for Certificate Revocation List. A list of certificates in a Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) that have been revoked and should no longer be trusted. See Revocation list.
CRM
Acronym for Customer Relationship Management. See Customer relationship management.
CRUD
Acronym for Create, Read, Update, and Delete. See Create, read, update and delete.
CSE
Acronym for Client Side Extensions. A dynamic-link library (DLL) that implements a group policy on the client computer. See Client-side Processing of Group Policy.
CSOM
Acronym for Client Side Object Model. Provides client applications access to a subset of the SharePoint Foundation server object model. See Using the Client Object Model.
CSP
Acronym for Cloud Service Provider. See Cloud computing. Also the acronym for Cryptographic Service Provider, a software library that implements the Microsoft CryptoAPI (CAPI). See Cryptographic Service Providers. Also the acronym for Configuration Service Provider.
CSR
Acronym for Certificate Signing Request. In public key infrastructure (PKI) systems, a message sent from an applicant to a certificate authority (CA) in order to apply for a digital identity certificate. See Certificate signing request.
CSS
Acronym for Cascading Style Sheets. A style sheet language to format a document written in markup language. See Cascading Style Sheets.
CSV
Acronym for Comma-Separated Values. A plaintext file of records with fields separated by commas, or some other character. See Comma-separated values.
CTE
Acronym for Common Table Expression. In SQL Server Transact-SQL, a temporary named result set defined within the execution scope of a single SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, or CREATE VIEW statement. A CTE is similar to a derived table in that it is not stored as an object and lasts only for the duration of the query. See Using Common Table Expressions.
CTP
Acronym for Community Technology Preview (or Customer Technology Preview). Often called the beta release in the software release life cycle. See Beta.
CU
Acronym for Cumulative Update.
CYOD
Acronym for Choose Your Own Device.
DAC
Acronym for Dynamic Access Control. Provides data governance across file servers to control who can access information and to audit who has accessed information. See Dynamic Access Control: Scenario Overview.
DACL
Acronym for Discretionary Access Control List. See DACLs and ACEs.
DAG
Acronym for Database Availability Group. A high availablity feature of Exchange server. See Database availability groups.
DaRT
Acronym for Microsoft Diagnostics and Recovery Toolset. Toolset to troubleshoot and repair Windows desktops. See Diagnostics and Recovery Toolset.
DAX
Acronym for Data Analysis Expressions. The native formula and query language for Microsoft PowerPivot and SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) Tabular models. See Data analysis expressions.
DBCC
Acronym for DataBase Console Commands. A series of Transact-SQL commands to check the physical and logical consistency of a Microsoft SQL Server database. See DBCC (Transact-SQL). Also acronym for DataBase Consistency Check, an SQL Server command line utility.
DBCS
Acronym for Double Byte Character Set. A character encoding in which all characters are encoded in two bytes. See DBCS.
DBE
Acronym for the SQL Server DataBase Engine. See Microsoft SQL Server and SQL Server Database Engine.
DBMS
Acronym for DataBase Management System. See Database.
DC
Acronym for Domain Controller in Active Directory networks. Also the moniker for Domain Component, as used in distinguished names (for example "dc=mydomain,dc=com").
DCaaS
Acronym for Data Center as a Service. Also the acronym for Data Consistency as a Service. See DCaaS: Data Consistency as a Service for Managing Data Uncertainty on the Clouds.
DCB
Acronym for Data Center Bridging. Enhancements to Ethernet Local Area Networks (LAN's) for use in data centers. See Data Center Bridging (DCB) Overview.
DCOM
Acronym for Distributed Component Object Model. Microsoft technology for communication among software components distributed across networked computers. Extends COM. See Distributed Component Object Model.
DCTCP
Acronym for Data Center Transmission Control Protocol. See Data Center Transmission Control Protocol (DCTCP).
DDL
Acronym for Data Definition Language. Also Data Description Language. Syntax for defining data structures, especially database schemas. See Data definition language.
DDNS
Acronym for Dynamic Domain Name System, or Dynamic DNS. See Dynamic DNS.
DEP
Acronym for Data Execution Prevention. A security feature of an operating system to prevent errors and malware exploits. See Data Execution Prevention.
DER
Acronym for Distinguished Encoding Rules . See DER encoding.
DES
Acronym for Data Encryption Standard. A specification for the encryption of electronic data used by Kerberos. Superceded by the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). See Data Encryption Standard.
DFL
Acronym for Domain Functional Level. Specifies the versions of Windows Server supported as domain controllers in the domain, and the features of Active directory that are available.
DFS
Acronym for Distributed File System. Client and server services that allow servers to organize distributed file shares into a distributed file system. See Distributed File System (Microsoft).
DFSR
Acronym for Distributed File System Replication. See Distributed File System Replication.
DHCP
Acronym for Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol. Service that provides centralized control of Internet Protocol (IP) addresses. DHCP servers assign dynamic IP addresses and TCP/IP settings to other computers. See DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) Basics.
DIT
Acronym for Directory Information Tree. The Active Directory database file on a Domain Controller is referred to as the DIT. The file name is ntds.dit
DIY
Acronym for Do It Yourself.
DLL
Acronym for Dynamic Link Library. See Dynamic-link library.
DLP
Acronym for Data Loss Prevention. See Data loss prevention.
DMA
Acronym for Direct Memory Access. Allows computer hardware subsystems to access system memory independently of the central processing unit (CPU). See Direct memory access.
DML
Acronym for Data Manipulation Language. Syntax used for selecting, inserting, deleting and updating data in a database. See Data manipulation language.
DMV
Acronym for Dynamic Management Views, a feature of SQL Server. See Use Dynamic Management Views (DMVs) to Monitor Analysis Services.
DMZ
Acronym for DeMilitarized Zone. A perimeter network or subnetwork exposed to an untrusted network, such as the Internet, requiring special protection. See DMZ (computing).
DNF
Acronym for Do Not Forward.
DNS
Acronym for Domain Name System. The service that resolves computer names into IP addresses. See Domain Name System.
DOS
Acronym for Disk Operating System. Several Microsoft operating systems before Windows 95. See DOS.
DPM
Acronym for Data Protection Manager. See Data Protection Manager.
DQS
Acronym for Data Quality Services. See Introduction to Data Quality Services.
DRaaS
Acronym for Disaster Recovery as a Service. See Microsoft Case Studies.
DSC
Acronym for Desired State Configuration. See Get Started with Windows PowerShell Desired State Configuration.
DSRM
Acronym for Directory Services Restore Mode. Used on Domain Controllers to take the instance of Active Directory on that computer offline, possibly for maintenance or troubleshooting. Requires a DSRM password.
DTC
Acronym for Distributed Transaction Coordinator. See DTC.
EAC
Acronym for Exchange Administration Center. See Exchange Admin Center in Exchange 2013.
EAI
Acronym for Enterprise Application Integration. Framework of technologies and services that form a middleware to enable integration of systems and applications across the enterprise. See Enterprise application integration.
EAS
Acronym for Exchange ActiveSync. A client protocol that lets you synchronize a mobile device with an Exchange mailbox. See Exchange ActiveSync.
EB
Acronym for ExaBytes, or 1.1529 x 10^18 bytes (1024 PB). See Exabyte.
ECC
Acronym for Elliptic Curve Cryptography. Public key cryptography based on the algebraic structure of elliptic curves over finite fields. Required by the United States government's Suite B effort. See Elliptic curve cryptography.
ECMA
Formerly the acronym for the European Computer Manufacturers Association, an international, private, non-profit standards organization. ECMAScript is a scripting language standardized by Ecma International, used for client-side scripting on the web using JavaScript, JScript, or ActionScript.
ECP
Acronym for Exchange Control Panel. See Understand and Use the Exchange Control Panel.
ECS
Acronym for Encryption Control System.
EDI
Acronym for Electronic Data Interchange. A document standard for eCommerce and transmitting documents. See Electronic data interchange.
EEPROM
Acronym for Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory.
EFS
Acronym for Encrypted File System, or Encrypting File System. See The Encrypting File System.
EHA
Acronym for Exchange Hosted Archive. See Exchange Hosted Archive (EHA) Quick Start Guide.
EKU
Acronym for Enhanced Key Usage. Also the acronym for Extended Key Usage. An extension that is a collection of object identifiers (OIDs) that indicate the applications that use the key. See Extended Key Usage.
EMC
Acronym for Exchange Management Console. An MMC to manage the configuration of Exchange. See Exchange Management Console.
EMET
Acronym for Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit. See The Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit.
EMM
Acronym for Enterprise Mobility Management. Technology to manage mobile devices in an organization. See Enterprise mobility management.
EPROM
Acronym for Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory.
ERP
Acronym for Enterprise Resource Planning. Business Management Software. See Enterprise resource planning.
ESB
Acronym for Enterprise Service Bus. Software architecture that implements the interaction and communication between applications in a service-oriented architecture (SOA).
ESE
Acronym for Extensible Storage Engine. The Jet-based ISAM data storage technology used in Active Directory and Exchange. Also called Jet Blue. Allows data storage and retrieval using indexed and sequential access. See Extensible Storage Engine.
ESP
Acronym for Enterprise Search Platform. See Fast Search & Transfer.
ESRI
Acronym for Environmental Systems Research Institute. International supplier of Geographic Information System (GIS) software, web GIS, and geodatabase management applications. See Esri.
ETL
Acronym for Extract, Transform, Load. A process in database usage to extract data from an external source, transform it to meet operational needs, then load it into a data store. See Extract, transform, load.
ETW
Acronym for Event Tracing for Windows. See Event Tracing for Windows (ETW) Simplified.
EWS
Acronym for Exchange Web Services. See Exchange Web Services (EWS).
EXO
Acronym for Exchange Online. See Exchange Online.
FAS
Acronym for Filtered Attribute Set, the subset of Active Directory attributes that are not replicated to Read-Only Domain Controllers (RODC's). See RODC Filtered Attribute Set, Credential Caching, and the Authentication Process with an RODC.
FAST
Search Server for SharePoint. See Fast Search & Transfer.
FAT
Acronym for File Allocation Table. A legacy computer file system, largely used in small capacity USB storage devices and memory cards, supported by all the operating systems. See File Allocation Table.
FBL
Acronym for Farm Behavior Level.
FC
Acronym for Fibre Channel, a high-speed technology to connect data storage devices to the network. See Fibre Channel.
FCoE
Acronym for Fibre Channel over Ethernet. See Fibre Channel over Ethernet.
FCS
Acronym for Forefront Client Security. See Microsoft Forefront Client Security.
FEP
Acronym for Forefront Endpoint Protection. See Forefront Endpoint Protection Client.
FFL
Acronym for Forest Functional Level. Specifies the versions of Windows Server supported as domain controllers in the forest, and the features of Active Directory that are available.
FGPP
Acronym for Fine-Grained Password Policy. An Active Directory feature to specify multiple password policies. Allows application of different password restrictions and account lockout policies to different sets of users within a single domain. See AD DS: Fine-Grained Password Policies.
FIM
Acronym for Forefront Identity Manager. See Forefront Identity Manager.
FIMCM
Acronym for Forefront Identity Manager Certificate Management. See FIM CM Architecture.
FIPS
Acronym for Federal Information Processing Standards. Standards developed by the United States federal government for computer systems used by non-military government agencies and contractors. Many are modified versions of technical community standards, such as ANSI, ISO, or IEEE.
FOPE
Acronym for Forefront Online Protection for Exchange. See Forefront Online Protection for Exchange (FOPE) transition center.
FPE
Acronym for Forefront Protection for Exchange, a discontinued product.
FPSMC
Acronym for Forefront Protection Server Management Console. See Forefront Protection Server Management Console.
FPSP
Acronym for Forefront Protection for SharePoint. See Microsoft Forefront Protection 2010 for SharePoint.
FQDN
Acronym for Fully Qualified Domain Name. See Fully qualified domain name.
FSA
Acronym for FAST Search Authorization. A security module for FAST Search Server for SharePoint systems. See FAST Search Authorization (FSA) overview.
FRS
Acronym for File Replication Service. Service for distributing shared files and Group Policy Objects (GPO's). See File Replication Service.
FSE
Acronym for Forefront Security for Exchange. See Microsoft Forefront Security for Exchange Server.
FSMO
Acronym for Flexible Single Master Operator. These are roles that are assigned only to designated domain controllers, either one in each domain, or one in the forest. The five FSMO roles are:
FTP
Acronym for File Transfer Protocol, a standard protocol for transfering files from one network to another (such as the Internet). See File Transfer Protocol.
GA
Acronym for General Availability. Software available for purchase by the public. After the Release To Manufacturing (RTM) stage.
GAC
Acronym for Global Assembly Cache. See Global Assembly Cache.
GAL
Acronym for Global Address List. See Global Address List.
GALSync
Acronym for Global Address List Synchronization. See Global Address List Synchronization (GalSync) Resources.
GB
Acronym for GigaBytes, or 1,073,741,824 bytes (1,024 MB). See Gigabyte.
GC
Acronym for Global Catalog. A read-only catalog of all objects in a forest, which contains a subset of the attributes. The subset of attributes is called the partial attribute set (PAS). A domain controller can be designated a GC.
GP
Acronym for Group Policy. See Step-by-Step Guide to Understanding the Group Policy Feature Set.
GPMC
Acronym for Group Policy Management Console, the MMC used to manage group policy objects.
GPO
Acronym for Group Policy Object. See Group Policy Objects.
GPP
Acronym for Group Policy Preferences. See Group Policy Preferences Getting Started Guide.
GSM
Acronym for Global System for Mobile Communications. A standard to describe protocols for second generation digital cellular networks used by mobile phones.
GUI
Acronym for Graphical User Interface. See Graphical user interface.
GUID
Acronym for Globally Unique IDentifier. A 128-bit value that should uniquely identify an object. The value is usually displayed as 32 hexadecimal digits. Every object in Active Directory has an objectGUID attribute, which is the GUID of the object. See Globally unique identifier.
HA
Acronym for High Availability. See High-availability cluster.
HAB
Acronym for Hierarchical Address Book. A feature in Microsoft Exchange 2013 and Outlook. See Hierarchical Address Books.
HAL
Acronym for Hardware Abstraction Layer. See Windows NT Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL).
HBA
Acronym for Host Bus Adapter. Connects a host computer system to other network or storage devices. See Host adapter.
HDD
Acronym for Hard Disk Drive. See Hard disk drive.
HNSC
Acronym for Host Named Site Collection. See Host Named Site Collections (HNSC) for SharePoint 2010 Architects.
HPC
Acronym for High Performance Computing. See Windows HPC Resource Kit for IT Professionals.
HPFS
Acronym for High Performance File System. File system for the OS/2 operating system, jointly developed by Microsoft and IBM. Improvement over the FAT file system, superseded by NTFS. See High Performance File System.
HSM
Acronym for Hardware Security Module. A physical device that safeguards and manages digital keys. See Hardware Security Module.
HTML
Acronym for HyperText Markup Language. Language for creating web pages. See HTML.
HTTP
Acronym for HyperText Transfer Protocol. An application protocol for information systems and data communication on the World Wide Web. See Hypertext Transfer Protocol.
HTTPS
Acronym for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure. The result of layering HTTP on top of SSL/TLS to add security capabilities. See HTTP Secure.
IaaS
Acronym for Infrastructure as a Service. See Infrastructure as a service (IaaS).
IADs
Interfaces supported by ADSI. Exposes methods and properties of namespace objects. See IADs interface.
IAM
Acronym for Identity and Access Management. See Identity and Access Management.
IANA
Acronym for Internet Assigned Numbers Authority. A department of ICANN, a nonprofit private American corporation, that oversees global IP address allocation. Also root zone management in the Domain Name System (DNS) and other Internet Protocol related symbols and numbers.
IAS
Acronym for Internet Authentication Server. Provides centralized authentication services in Windows Server operating systems. Replaced by Network Policy Server (NPS) in Windows Server 2008.
ICA
Acronym for Independent Computing Architecture. See Independent Computing Architecture.
ICANN
Acronym for Internet Corporation for Assigned Numbers and Names. A nonprofit private organization in the United States that oversees Internet related tasks. Operates the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).
ICMP
Acronym for Internet Control Message Protocol. See Internet Control Message Protocol.
IdAM
IDE
Acronym for Integrated Drive Electronics. See IDE and ATA-1. Also Integrated Development Environment. See Integrated development environment.
IDMU
Acronym for IDentity Management for UNIX. See Installing Identity Management for UNIX.
IE
Acronym for Internet Explorer. Microsoft's web browser product. See Internet Explorer.
IEEE
Acronym for Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. A professional association dedicated to advancing technological innovation and excellence that publishes numerous industry standards.
IETF
Acronym for the Internet Engineering Task Force. Develops and promotes Internet standards. See Internet Engineering Task Force.
IFM
Acronym for Install From Media, a feature for installing software or enabling features from media. See Installing AD DS from Media.
IIFP
Acronym for Identity Integration Feature Pack. See Identity Integration Feature Pack SP2 GalSync with Exchange 2007.
IIS
Acronym for Internet Information Services. Also sometimes referred to as Internet Information Server. See Internet Information Services (IIS).
ILM
Acronym for Identity Lifecycle Manager. See Identity Lifecycle Manager 2007 (ILM 2007) Technical Library.
IO
Acronym for Input / Output. Communication between a computer and other systems.
IOPS
Acronym for Input/Output Operations Per Second. A performance measurement for devices like disk drives.
IoT
Acronym for Internet of Things. The network of physical objects (things) embedded with software, sensors, and connectivity to enable the objects to exchange data with (and be remotely controlled by) the manufacturer, other objects, or the operator. See Internet of Things.
IP
Acronym for Internet Protocol. Networking model and communication protocols for the Internet. See Internet Protocol.
IPaaS
Acronym for Integration Platform as a Service. See Cloud-based integration.
IPAM
Acronym for IP Address Management. See IP Address Management (IPAM) Overview.
IPD
Acronym for Infrastructure Planning and Design guide. Documents providing guidance on design of infrastructure for Microsoft products.
IPMI
Acronym for Intelligent Platform Management Interface. See Intelligent Platform Management Interface.
IPSec
Acronym for Internet Protocol Security. A protocol suite for securing Internet Protocol (IP) communications. See IPsec.
IPv4
Acronym for Internet Protocol version 4. The fourth version of the Internet Protocol. The successor protocol is IPv6.
IPv6
Acronym for Internet Protocol version 6. The latest version of the Internet Protocol. The successor to IPv4.
IRM
Acronym for Information Rights Management. See Information rights management.
IRP
Acronym for I/O Request Packet. Structures used by Windows Driver Model (WDM) and Windows NT device drivers to communicate with each other and the operating system. See IRP.
ISA
Acronym for Internet Security and Acceleration Server. See About Internet Security and Acceleration Server.
ISAM
Acronym for Indexed Sequential Access Method. A method of indexing data for fast retrieval. The Extensible Storage Engine (ESE) used in Active Directory is an implementation of ISAM. See ISAM.
ISAPI
Acronym for Internet Server Application Programming Interface. See Internet Server Application Programming Interface.
iSCSI
Acronym for Internet Small Computer System Interface. SCSI over IP networks.
ISE
Acronym for Integrated Scripting Environment. A graphical host application for Windows PowerShell.
ISO
Acronym for the International Organization for Standardization. See International Organization for Standardization. Also used as acronym for a disc image based on the ISO 9660 standard.
ISTG
Acronym for InterSite Topology Generator. Automatically creates connection objects in Active Directory between domain controllers to enable replication. See The Role of the Inter-Site Topology Generator in Active Directory Replication.
IT
Acronym for Information Technology. See Information Technology.
ITU
Acronym for International Telecommunications Union. A specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for information and communication technology issues.
ITU-T
Acronym for International Telecommunications Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector. One of the three sectors or divisions of ITU. Coordinates standards for telecommunications.
IW
Acronym for Information Worker. Also Knowledge Worker. See Knowledge worker.
JBOD
Acronym for Just a Bunch of Disks. An array of drives, each of which can be independently accessed directly. See JBOD.
JSOM
Acronym for JavaScript Object Model. See JavaScript Object Model.
JSON
Acronym for JavaScript Object Notation. A standard format that uses text files to transmit data objects of key:value pairs. An alternative to XML. See JSON.
JVM
Acronym for Java Virtual Machine. A virtual machine that can execute Java bytecode. See Java virtual machine.
JWT
Acronym for JSON Web Token. See JSON Web Token (JWT).
KB
Acronym for Knowledge Base, as in a Microsoft knowledge base article. Also the acronym for KiloBytes, or 1024 bytes. See Kilobyte.
KCC
Acronym for Knowledge Consistency Checker. A process in Active Directory that automatically generates and maintains connection objects that describe which naming contexts should be replicated between which domain controllers and when. See KCC Replication Path Computation.
KCD
Acronym for Kerberos Constrained Delegation.
KDC
Acronym for Key Distribution Center. See Key distribution center.
KMS
Acronym for Key Management Service. A Windows service that allows organizations to manage the activation of Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office. Eliminates the need for individual computers to connect to Microsoft for product activation. See Getting Started with KMS (Key Management Service).
KSP
Acronym for Key Storage Provider. See CNG Key Storage Providers.
LAN
Acronym for Local Area Network. See Local area network.
LANMAN
Acronym for LAN Manager. A discontinued Network Operating System (NOS) based on the OS/2 operating system. See LAN Manager.
LCID
Acronym for LoCale Identifier. A 32-bit number where the lower 10 bits are a language code and the upper bits are a culture code. See Locale IDs Assigned by Microsoft.
LDAP
Acronym for Lightweight Directory Access Protocol. A language based on the X.500 directory standard that allows clients and servers to communicate. The LDAP provider allows access to the hierarchical structure of Active Directory, or any LDAP compliant database. The LDAP syntax is a filter syntax used to query LDAP compliant databases. See Lightweight Directory Access Protocol.
LDAPS
Acronym for LDAP over SSL. See LDAP over SSL (LDAPS) Certificate.
LDIF
Acronym for LDAP Data Interchange Format. A standard plain text data interchange format. Represents directory content as records for update requests. Used by the ldifde command line utility. See LDAP Data Interchange Format.
LDP
A graphical user interface (GUI) based LDAP client utility used to search, browse, and update LDAP compliant directories, such as Active Directory. See Ldp.
LOB
Acronym for Line Of Business. One or more related products that service a business function.
LPIM
Acronym for Locked Pages In Memory. See Support for Locked Pages on SQL Server Standard Edition (64-bit) systems.
LSA
Acronym for Local Security Authority. Windows NT security subsystem. See LSA Authentication.
LSASS
Acronym for Local Security Authority Subsystem Service. Process that enforces security policy on Microsoft Windows operating systems. See Local Security Authority Subsystem Service.
LUN
Acronym for Logical Unit Number. See Logical unit number.
LVR
Acronym for Linked Value Replication. In Active Directory, linked multi-valued attributes only replicate the updated values, rather than all values in the attribute. Requires Windows Server 2003 Interim mode or Windows Server 2003 Forest Functional Level or higher. When a non-linked multi-valued attribute is updated, the entire attribute must be replicated.
MAC
Acronym for Media Access Control address (MAC address). A unique identifier assigned to a network interfaces for communications on a network segment.
MAK
Acronym for Multiple Activation Key. Starting with Windows Vista, Microsoft replaced VLKs with Multiple Activation Keys (MAK) or with Key Management Server (KMS) keys. See MAK & KMS.
MAM
Acronym for Mobile Application Management. Software and services for controlling access to internally developed and commercially available mobile applications. See Mobile application management.
MAP
Acronym for Microsoft Assessment and Planning. See Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) Toolkit for Windows 8, Windows 7, and Internet Explorer.
MAPI
Acronym for Messaging Application Programming Interface. See Messaging Application Programming Interface.
MAPP
Acronym for Microsoft Active Protections Program. A program run by the Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC) to provide early access to security vulnerability information in advance of monthly updates. See Becoming a Member of MAPP.
MB
Acronym for MegaBytes, or 1,048,576 bytes (1,024 kilobytes). See Megabyte.
MBAM
Acronym for Microsoft Bitlocker Administration and Monitoring. See Microsoft BitLocker Administration and Monitoring.
MCC
Acronym for Microsoft Community Contributor. A Microsoft award to "recognize notable contributions to Microsoft online community forums such as TechNet, MSDN, O365 and Microsoft Community." See Differences Between the MVP and MCC Awards.
MCP
Acronym for Microsoft Certified Professional. See Microsoft Certified Professional.
MCSA
Acronym for Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate, a Microsoft certification. See Microsoft Certified Professional.
MCSE
Acronym for Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert, a Microsoft certification. See Microsoft Certified Professional.
MD4
Acronym for Message Digest version 4. A 128-bit cryptographic hash function. See MD4.
MDC
Acronym for Master Data Services. A feature of SQL Server. See Master Data Services.
MDM
Acronym for Mobile Device Management. A product for the administration of mobile devices, such as smartphones, tablets, and laptops. See Mobile device management.
MDOP
Acronym for Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack. See Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack.
MDT
Acronym for Microsoft Deployment Toolkit. Formerly Microsoft Desktop Deployment. Software that permits network deployment of Windows and Office. See Microsoft Deployment Toolkit.
MDX
Acronym for Multidimensional Expressions, a query language for OLAP databases. See MultiDimensional eXpressions.
Med-V
Acronym for Microsoft Enterprise Desktop Virtualization. See Microsoft Enterprise Desktop Virtualization.
MFA
Acronym for Multi-Factor Authentication. Authentication that requires more than one verification method. Adds a second layer of security to logons. The verification methods can include: a password, biometrics, challenge response question, trusted device characteristics. A related concept is Two-Factor Authentication, or 2FA.
MIIS
Acronym for Microsoft Identity Integration Server. See Microsoft Identity Integration Server.
MIME
Acronym for Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions. An Internet standard for email content. See MIME.
MMC
Acronym for Microsoft Management Console. An extensible service for management applications. Provides a user interface allowing addition of snap-ins to manage services in a GUI console.
MOSS
Acronym for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server. See SharePoint 2007 products and technologies.
MPA
Acronym for Multi Page Allocator. See What causes Multi-Page allocations?
MPIO
Acronym for Multipath I/O. Multipathing solutions use redundant physical path components — adapters, cables, and switches — to create logical paths between the server and the storage device. See Multipath I/O.
MRS
Acronym for Mailbox Replication Service. Service on client access servers responsible for moving mailboxes, importing and exporting .pst files, and restoring disabled and soft-deleted mailboxes.
MSA
Acronym for Managed Service Account. See Introducing Managed Service Accounts.
MSCEP
Acronym for Microsoft Simple Certificate Enrollment Protocol. Implementation of SCEP available in Windows Server.
MSDN
Acronym for Microsoft Developer Network. See Microsoft Developer Network.
MSDTC
Acronym for MicroSoft Distributed Transaction Coordinator. A transaction manager in Microsoft SQL Server that allows client applications to include different sources of data in one transaction. See MS DTC Service.
MSE
Acronym for Microsoft Security Essentials. Free virus protection for Windows Vista and Windows 7. Replaced by Windows Defender in Windows 8.
MSIL
Acronym for Microsoft Intermediate Language (or simply IL). Lowest level human readable programming language, defined by the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI). Used by the .NET Framework and produced by .NET compilers. Independent of CPU or higher level languages. Intermediate between assembly language and modern programming languages. Now called Common Intermeditate Language, or CIL. See CIL.
MSMQ
Acronym for MicroSoft Message Queuing. See Message Queuing (MSMQ).
MSRC
Acronym for Microsoft Security Response Center. See Microsoft Security Response Center. Microsoft security experts that identifies and responds to security incidents and vulnerabilities in Microsoft software. See Microsoft Security Response Center.
MTA
Acronym for Microsoft Technology Associate, a Microsoft certification. Also acronym for Message Transfer Agent, used for Microsoft Exchange communications. See Microsoft Certified Professional.
MUI
Acronym for Multilingual User Interface. See Windows MUI Knowledge Center.
MVC
Acronym for Model View Controller, three elements of ASP.NET MVC, a framework for building scalable, standards-based web applications. Architecture for implementing user interfaces. See Model–view–controller.
MVP
Acronym for Most Valuable Professional. A Microsoft award program to recognize "exceptional, independent community leaders who share their passion, technical expertise, and real-world knowledge of Microsoft products with others". See Most Valuable Professional.
MVVM
Acronym for Model View ViewModel. See Model View ViewModel.
NAS
Acronym for Network Attached Storage. File-level computer data storage connected to a network. Provides data access to a group of clients. See Network-attached storage.
NAT
Acronym for Network Address Translation. Method to modify Internet Protocol (IP) datagram packet headers to remap one IP address space to another. See Network address translation.
NAV
Acronym for Microsoft Dynamics, formerly Navison. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software. See Microsoft Dynamics.
NBT
Acronym for NetBIOS over TCP/IP, sometimes also called NetBT. A networking protocol that allows legacy applications that rely on the NetBIOS API to work in TCP/IP networks. See NetBIOS over TCP/IP.
NC
Acronym for Naming Context. A partition (namespace) in Active Directory. Examples include the Schema container, Configuration container, the Domain Naming context for each domain, and any application partitions. See Naming Contexts and Directory Partitions.
NCQ
Acronym for Native Command Queuing. Technology built into SATA hard drives. See Native Command Queuing.
NDES
Acronym for Network Device Enrollment Service. A role service in Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS). See Network Device Enrollment Service (NDES) in Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS).
NDS
Acronym for Netware Directory Services. Also Novell Directory Services. An X.500 compatible directory service product by Novell. Now called Novell eDirectory. See NetWare.
.NET
The .NET Framework is a programming model designed to replace the Win32 and COM APIs. The major components are the Common Language Runtime (CLR) and the .NET Framework class libraries.
NetBIOS
Acronym for Network Basic Input/Output System. Service allowing applications on separate computers to communicate over a network. Uses NetBIOS over TCP/IP (NBT) protocol. The NetBIOS name of a computer is generally the first 15 characters of the host name, followed by the "$" character. NetBIOS name to IP address resolution is provided by the WINS service on a WINS server.
NetBT
Acronym for NetBIOS over TCP/IP, also called NBT. A networking protocol that allows legacy applications that rely on the NetBIOS API to work in TCP/IP networks. See NetBIOS over TCP/IP.
NFC
Acronym for Near Field Communication. A set of standards for smartphones and similar devices to establish radio communication with each other by touching them or bringing them into proximity. See Near field communication.
NFS
Acronym for Network File System. A distributed file system protocol. See Network File System.
NGC
Acronym for Next Generation Credentials. A service running on Windows 10. Provides process isolation for cryptographic keys used to authenticate users. See Hands-on Part 2 - Windows 10 Technical Preview.
NIC
Acronym for Network Interface Controller or Network Interface Card. Also called a network adapter or LAN adapter. Hardware that connects a computer to a computer network. See Network interface controller.
NIS
Acronym for Network Information Service. A client-server directory service protocol for distributed system configuration data, such as user and host names, between computers on a network. Replaced in many situations by Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) or Domain Name System (DNS). See Network Information Service.
NIST
Acronym for National Institute of Standards and Technology. Formerly the National Bureau of Standards (NBS). Measurement standards laboratory that promotes innovation and industrial competitiveness in the United States by advancing measurement science, standards, and technology. See National Institute of Standards and Technology.
NLB
Acronym for Network Load Balancing. A clustering technology. See Network Load Balancing Technical Overview.
NOS
Acronym for Network Operating System. An operating system installed on a server that allows clients to communicate and share resources on the server. See Network operating system.
NPAR
Acronym for nPartitioning. See NPAR.
NPS
Acronym for Network Policy Server. Microsoft's implementation of Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service (RADIUS). Originally the Internet Authentication Server (IAS) role service (before Windows Server 2008). See Network Policy Server.
NSPI
Acronym for Name Service Provider Interface. A service on Global Catalog (GC) servers used for Microsoft Outlook Address Book lookups.
NT
Acronym for Windows NT, a family of Microsoft operating systems. NT originally was the acronym for New Technology. See Windows NT.
NTFRS
Acronym for NT File Replication Service. Service for distributing shared files and Group Policy Objects (GPO's). See File Replication Service.
NTFS
Acronym for New Technology File System. Microsoft proprietary file system that supersedes the FAT and HPFS file systems. The default file system on Windows operating systems since Windows NT. See NTFS.
NTLDR
Acronym for NT Loader. The boot loader for all versions of Window NT operating systems up to Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. See NTLDR.
NTLM
Acronym for NT LAN Manager. Microsoft protocols for authentication with backward compatibility with LANMAN. See NT LAN Manager.
NTP
Acronym for Network Time Protocol. Protocol for time synchronization between computer systems. See Network Time Protocol.
NUMA
Acronym for Non-Uniform Memory Access. A computer memory design used in multiprocessing. See Non-uniform memory access.
OA
Acronym for Outlook Anywhere. See Outlook Anywhere.
OAB
Acronym for Offline Address Book. See Offline Address Books.
OAuth
Acronym for Open standard for Authorization. A service that provides a method for clients to access server resources on behalf of a resource owner. See OAuth.
OCR
Acronym for Optical Character Recognition. See Optical character recognition.
OCS
Acronym for Office Communications Server. Server software for enterprise instant messaging, VoIP, and conferencing. Now called Microsoft Lync Server. See Microsoft Lync Server.
OCSP
Acronym for Online Certificate Status Protocol. Internet protocol for obtaining revocation status of X.509 digital certificates. See Online Certificate Status Protocol.
OCX
Acronym for OLE Control EXtension. OLE custom controls are usually shipped as a dynamic link library (DLL) with .ocx extension. See Object Linking and Embedding.
OData
Acronym for Open Data Protocol. A data access protocol. See Open Data Protocol.
ODBC
Acronym for Open DataBase Connectivity. Standard programming API for accessing database management systems (DBMS). See Open Database Connectivity.
OID
Acronym for Object IDentifier. For example, each attribute in the Active Directory schema has a unique X.500 OID (the value of the attributeID attribute of the attribute). All OID values created by Microsoft begin with 1.2.840.113556. OID values are also used to identify attribute syntaxes and filter matching rules. See Object identifier.
OLAP
Acronym for Online Analytical Processing. See Online analytical processing.
OLE
Acronym for Object Linking and Embedding. A Microsoft technology that allows embedding and linking to documents and other objects. See Object Linking and Embedding.
OLE DB
Acronym for Object Linking and Embedding DataBase. Microsoft API to access data using Component Object Model (COM). See OLE DB.
OLTP
Acronym for On line Transaction Processing. Information systems that facilitate and manage transaction-oriented applications. See Online transaction processing.
OOBE
Acronym for Out Of Box Experience. See Out-of-box experience.
OOM
Acronym for Out Of Memory. State of a computer operation where the program or operating system runs out of memory. See Out of memory.
OOP
Acronym for Object Oriented Programming. See Object-oriented programming.
OpenID
Acronym for Open standard for IDentification. Allows users to be authenticated by co-operating sites (relying parties) using a third party service. See OpenID.
OpenSSL
Acronym for Open Secure Sockets Layer. Open source implementation of SSL and TLS protocols. See OpenSSL.
OPK
Acronym for OEM Preinstallation Kit. See The Difference Between Windows Automated Installation Kit (AIK) and OEM Preinstallation Kit (OPK).
OS
Acronym for Operating System. See Operating system.
OSD
Acronym for On-Screen Display. See On-screen display.
OU
Acronym for Organizational Unit. Also the naming attribute for organizational unit objects in Active Directory, and the moniker used in their distinguished names (for example "ou=West,dc=mydomain,dc=com").
OWA
Acronym for Outlook Web App. Allows access to Exchange mailbox from a web browser. In Exchange 2003 this was called Outlook Web Access. See Understanding Outlook Web App.
OWIN
Acronym for Open Web Interface for .NET. A standard interface between .NET web servers and web applications. See OWIN.
PaaS
Acronym for Platform as a Service. See Platform as a service.
PAC
Acronym for Privilege Attribute Certificate. A Kerberos Certificate that contains all security group memberships of the security principal that is requesting access to a resource. See Privilege Attribute Certificate Configuration.
PAE
Acronym for Physical Address Extension. A feature of 32-bit processors that allows them to access a physical address space larger than 4 gigabytes. See Physical Address Extension.
PAS
Acronym for Partial Attribute Set. The subset of attributes of the objects replicated to the Global Catalog. See Active Directory: Attributes in the Partial Attribute Set.
PATA
Acronym for Parallel Advanced Technology Attachment, or Parallel ATA. See Parallel ATA.
PB
Acronym for PetaBytes, or 1.1259 x 10^15 bytes (1,024 TB). See Petabyte.
PC
Acronym for Personal Computer. A general purpose computer operated by an end-user with no intervening computer operator (as opposed to batch processing or time-sharing computers). See Personal computer.
PCI
Acronym for Peripheral Component Interconnect, a local computer bus for attaching devices. See Conventional PCI.
PCL
Acronym for Printer Command Language. See Printer Command Language.
PCNS
Acronym for Password Change Notification Service. Enables synchronization of passwords between Active Directory and other identity systems. See Password Change Notification Service.
PDC
Acronym for Primary Domain Controller. In NT domains there was one primary domain controller and zero or more backup domain controllers. The concepts no longer apply in Active Directory, which uses a multi-master database system where all domain controllers are essentially equal.
PDF
Acronym for Portable Document Format. See About Adobe PDF.
PDT
Acronym for PowerShell Deployment Toolkit. A set of PowerShell scripts for automatic deployment of System Center 2012 SP1/R2, including all SQL requirements and post-setup integration. See PowerShell Deployment Toolkit.
PDW
Acronym for Parallel Data Warehousing. See Microsoft SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse (PDW) Explained.
PFE
Acronym for Premier Field Engineer, or Premier Field Engineering. See Premier Field Engineering (PFE).
PHP
A server-side scripting language designed for web development, called HyperText PreProcessor. Originally an acronym for Personal Home Page. See PHP.
PID
Acronym for Packet IDentifier. Also Product ID or Process ID.
PIN
Acronym for Personal Identification Number. A secret numeric password used to authenticate a user to a system. See Personal identification number.
PKCS
Acronym for Public Key Cryptography Standards. See PKCS.
PKI
Acronym for Public Key Infrastructure. Hardware, software, people, policies, and procedures to create, manage, distribute, use, store, and revoke digital certificates. See Public key infrastructure.
PLE
Acronym for Page Life Expectancy. The number of seconds a memory page will remain in the SQL Server buffer pool without references. See SQL Server Page Life Expectancy.
PnP
Acronym for Plug and Play. See Legacy Plug and Play.
PMI
Acronym for Privilege Management Infrastructure. Manages user authorization based on X.509 attribute certificates (ACs). See Privilege Management Infrastructure.
POP
Acronym for Post Office Protocol. An email protocol. See Post Office Protocol.
PPP
Acronym for point-to-Point Protocol. A data link protocol to establish a direct connection between tow nodes in a network. See Point-to-Point Protocol.
PPT
Acronym for PowerPoinT. Also the file format used by PowerPoint.
PRT
Acronym for Primary Refresh Token.
PSCX
Acronym for PowerShell Community Extensions. Cmdlets, filters, providers, functions, and scripts contributed by the community. See PowerShell Community Extensions.
PSO
Acronym for Password Setting Object. Objects in the System container of Active Directory that implement Fine-Grained Password Policies. See AD DS Fine-Grained Password and Account Lockout Policy Step-by-Step Guide.
PtH
Acronym for Pass the Hash. A credential replay hacking technique. See Pass the hash.
QoS
Acronym for Quality of Service. See Quality of service.
QR Code
Acronym for Quick Response Code. A two-dimensional matrix barcode. See QR code.
RA
Acronym for Registration Authority. Verifies user requests for digital certificates and instructs the certificate authority (CA) to issue them. See Public key infrastructure.
RADIUS
Acronym for Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service. Networking protocol for centralized authentication, authorization, and accounting. See RADIUS.
RADT
Acronym for Risk Assessment and Diagnostic Tool.
RAID
Acronym for Redundant Array of Independent Disks (originally Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks), a storage technology using multiple disk drives. See RAID.
RAM
Acronym for Random-Access Memory. Computer memory that can be read from or written to in an arbitrary sequence. See Random-access memory.
RAS
Acronym for Remote Access Service. Services to connect clients to a host, also called a remote access server. See Remote Access Service.
RBAC
Acronym for Role Based Access Control. See Role-based access control.
RBS
Acronym for Remote BLOB Storage. Optional component of SQL Server that allows storage of binary large objects in commodity storage solutions instead of directly on the main database server. See Remote BLOB Store.
RC
Acronym for Release Candidate. A beta version of software that is ready to be released as the final product (if there are no unexpected problems). The next stage would be Release to Manufacturing (RTM). See Software release life cycle.
RD
Acronym for Remote Desktop. See Remote Desktop Services Overview. Also the rd command line utility to remove a directory (short for remove directory).
RDMA
Acronym for Remote Direct Memory Access. Direct memory access from the memory of one computer into that of another without involving the operating system. See Remote direct memory access.
RDN
Acronym for Relative Distinguished Name. The name of an object in Active Directory relative to it's location in the hierarchical structure of Active Directory. The Relative Distinguished Name will be the lowest level component of the Distinguished Name (DN). The RDN must be unique in the parent container or Organizational Unit (OU), while the Distinguished Name will be unique in the forest.
RDP
Acronym for Remote Desktop Protocol. See Remote Desktop Protocol.
RDS
Acronym for Remote Desktop Services. See Remote Desktop Services.
RDSH
Acronym for Remote Desktop Session Host. See Remote Desktop Session Host (RD Session Host).
REST
Acronym for Representational State Transfer. See Representational state transfer.
RFC
Acronym for Requests for Comments. Publication of Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the Internet Society. Memorandum describing methods, behaviors, research, or innovations applicable to the working of the Internet and Internet connected systems. See Request for Comments.
RFID
Acronym for Radio-Frequency IDentification. Wireless radio-frequency transfer of data to automatically identify tags attached to objects. See Radio-frequency identification.
RID
Acronym for Relative IDentifier. All security principals (users, computers, and groups) in Active Directory have a Security ID (SID). SID values include several components, including the RID. The SID without the RID is the same for all objects in a domain. The RID value uniquely identifies the object in the domain.
RISC
Acronym for Reduced Instruction Set Computing. A cpu design based on the concept that a simplified instruction set can result in high performance and faster execution. See Reduced instruction set computing.
RMS
Acronym for Rights Management Services. See Active Directory Rights Management Services.
RODC
Acronym for Read-Only Domain Controller. A domain controller that cannot be used to update objects in Active Directory. See AD DS: Read-Only Domain Controllers.
ROM
Acronym for Read Only Memory.
RP
Acronym for Relying Party. See Relying Party.
RPC
Acronym for Remote Procedure Call. See Remote procedure call.
RRAS
Acronym for Routing and Remote Access Service. See Routing and Remote Access Service.
RSAT
Acronym for Remote Server Administration Tools. See Remote Server Administration Tools (RSAT) for Windows Client and Windows Server (dsforum2wiki).
RSO
Acronym for ReplicateSingleObject. A Read-Only Domain Controller (RODC) can request replication of a specific object with functionality known as a Replicate-Single-Object operation. See replicateSingleObject.
RSoP
Acronym for Resultant Set of Policy. See Resultant Set of Policy (RSoP).
RSS
Acronym for Rich Site Summary, or often Really Simple Syndication. Standard web feed formats to publish frequently updated information. See RSS.
RT
Acronym for RunTime, as in Windows RT or WinRT. An edition of Windows only available pre-installed on PCs or tablets powered by ARM processors. Designed for improved battery life on thin, lightweight devices running cloud-enabled, touch-enabled, web-connected applications. Previously called Windows on ARM (WOA). See Windows 8 and 8.1 Preview, Editions (SKUs) and features.
RTM
Acronym for Release To Manufacturing. Software ready to be delivered. RTM is followed by General Availability (GA). See Software release life cycle.
RUS
Acronym for Recipient Update Service. Used by Exchange to generate and update default and customized address lists, and to process changes made to recipient policies. See Recipient Update Service.
RWDC
Acronym for Read-Write Domain Controller. A writeable domain controller, meaning it can be used to update objects in Active Directory. All domain controllers are writeable, unless they are a Read-Only Domain Controller (RODC).
SaaS
Acronym for Software as a Service. See Software as a service.
SACL
Acronym for System Access Control List. See Access Control Lists.
SAM
Acronym for Security Account Manager, the Windows NT account database format. A Windows NT SAM account database exposes a flat namespace. See Security Accounts Manager.
SAML
Acronym for Security Assertion Markup Language. An XML based standard for exchanging authentication and authorization data between an identity provider and a service or application. See Security Assertion Markup Language.
SAN
Acronym for Storage Area Network. Remotely attached computer storage. See Storage area network. Also the acronym for Subject Alternative Name, or subjectAltName. An extension of X.509 that allows more than one value to be associated with a security certificate. Names can include email addresses, IP addresses, URIs, DNS names, directory names (DNs), or OIDs. See SubjectAltName.
SAS
Acronym for Serial Attached SCSI. A point-to-point serial protocol to move data to and from computer storage devices. See Serial attached SCSI.
Also, an acronym for Shared Access Signature. A URI that grants restricted access rights to containers, blobs, queues, and tables. See Delegating Access with a Shared Access Signature.
SASL
Acronym for Simple Authentication and Security Layer. A framework for authentication and data security on the Internet. See Simple Authentication and Security Layer.
SATA
Acronym for Serial Advanced Technology Attachment, or Serial ATA. A computer bus interface to connect host bus adapters to mass storage devices. See Serial ATA.
SBS
Acronym for Small Business Server. An easy-to-use server solution designed and priced for small businesses. Now called Windows Server Essentials. See Windows Server Essentials (Small Business Server).
SBSL
Acronym for Slow Boot, Slow Logon. See Troubleshooting Slow Operating System Boot Times and Slow User Logons (sbsl).
SC
Acronym for System Center.
SCAC
Acronym for Standard Carrier Alpha Code. A code to uniquely identify transportation companies. See Standard Carrier Alpha Code.
SCCM
Acronym for System Center Configuration Manager. See System Center Configuration Manager.
SCDPM
Acronym for System Center Data Protection Manager. See Data Protection Manager.
SCEP
Acronym for Simple Certificate Enrollment Protocol. Defines the communication between network devices and a Registration Authority (RA) for certificate enrollment. See http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-nourse-scep-18.
Acronym for Simple Cloud Identity Management. See Simple Cloud Identity Management (SCIM).
SCM
Acronym for Security Compliance Manager. Also Source Code Management.
SCOM
Acronym for System Center Operations Manager. See System Center Operations Manager.
SCOR
Acronym for System Center Orchestrator. See Getting Started with System Center 2012 - Orchestrator.
SCP
Acronym for Service Connection Point object. An object that represents one or more instances of a service and is used to connect to the service. These are objects in Active Directory usually published under the computer object where the corresponding service is installed. Used to maintain information about the service. See Publishing with Service Connection Points.
SCSI
Acronym for Small Computer System Interface. Standards for transferring data between computers. See SCSI.
SCSM
Acronym for System Center Service Manager. See System Center Service Manager.
SCVMM
Acronym for System Center Virtual Machine Manager. See System Center Virtual Machine Manager.
SDDL
Acronym for Security Descriptor Definition Language. Defines the string format for security descriptors. See Security Descriptor Definition Language.
SDK
Acronym for Software Development Kit. See Software development kit.
SDS
Acronym for System.DirectoryServices namespace. The primary namespace used for code that targets Active Directory in the .NET Framework. See System.DirectoryServices Namespace.
SEO
Acronym for Search Engine Optimization. See Search engine optimization.
SFTP
Acronym for Secure File Transfer Program. A command line utility to transfer files using SSH File Transfer Protocol. See Secure file transfer program. Also SSH File Transfer Protocol. A network protocol, designed by IETF, for file access, transfer, and management over a reliable data stream. See SSH File Transfer Protocol.
SID
Acronym for Security IDentifier. All objects in Active Directory that are security principals (users, computers, groups) have the objectSID attribute, which is a SID. The SID uniquely identifies the object for security permissions. The SID value includes several components, including a RID (Relative ID). The SID without the RID is the same for all objects in the domain. Each object in an Active Directory domain has its own unique RID value.
SKU
Acronym for Stock-Keeping Unit. Unique identifier for each distinct product and service. See Stock keeping unit.
SMB
Acronym for Server Message Block. An application-layer network protocol for providing shared access to files, printers, serial ports, other nodes on a network. Used in Microsoft Windows Networks before Active Directory. See Server Message Block. Also acronym for Small and Medium sized Businesses. See Small and medium enterprises.
SME
Acronym for Subject Matter Expert. See Subject-matter expert.
SMO
Acronym for Social Media Optimization. See Social media optimization.
SMS
Acronym for Short Message Service. A text messaging service. See Short Message Service.
SMTP
Acronym for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol. Internet standard for electronic mail over IP networks. See Simple Mail Transfer Protocol.
SNTP
Acronym for Simple Network Time Protocol. A less complex implementation of NTP. See SNTP.
SOA
Acronym for Service Oriented Architecture. Software architecture where discrete pieces of software provide application functionality as services to other applications. See Service-oriented architecture. Also acronym for Start Of Authority. Records created by Read-Only Domain Controllers for read-only DNS zones.
SOAP
Acronym for Simple Object Access Protocol. XML messaging framework. See Understanding SOAP.
SoFS
Acronym for Scale-out File Services. Scalable, grid-based NAS implementation developed by IBM. See SoFS.
SP
Acronym for Service Pack. See Service pack.
SPA
Acronym for Single Page Allocator. See What causes Multi-Page allocations?
SPF
Acronym for Service Provider Foundation. Provided with System Center 2012 - Orchestrator. Exposes an extensible OData web service that interacts with Virtual Machine Manager (VMM). See Service Provider Foundation.
SPN
Acronym for Service Principal Name. The name by which a client uniquely identifies an instance of a service. Each instance of a service must have its own SPN, but a given service instance can have multiple SPNs. See Service Principal Names.
SPO
Acronym for SharePoint Online. See SharePoint Online.
SQL
Acronym for Structured Query Language. See SQL.
SQLIO
Acronym for SQL Server Input Output. A tool developed by Microsoft to to determine the I/O capacity of a given configuration of SQL Server. See SQLIO.
SR-IOV
Acronym for Single Root I/O Virtualization. An extension to the PCI Express (PCIe) specification, that allows a device to separate access to resouces among PCIe hardware functions. See Overview of Single Root I/O Virtualization (SR-IOV).
SSAS
Acronym for SQL Server Analysis Services. See Microsoft Analysis Services.
SSD
Acronym for Solid State Drive. See Solid-state drive.
SSDT
Acronym for SQL Server Data Tools. See SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT).
SSH
Acronym for Secure SHell. A cryptographic protocol for shell based sessions on remote machines. See Secure Shell.
SSIS
Acronym for SQL Server Integration Services. See SQL Server Integration Services.
SSL
Acronym for Secure Sockets Layer. Cryptographic protocols to provide secure communications over the Internet. See Transport Layer Security.
SSMS
Acronym for SQL Server Management Studio. See Use SQL Server Management Studio.
SSO
Acronym for Single Sign On. A Property of access control of multiple related but independent software systems that allows users to logon once and gain access to all systems without being prompted to logon again. See Single sign-on.
SSP
Acronym for Shared Service Provider.
SSPI
Acronym for Security Support Provider Interface. An API for integrated security services authentication, message integrity, message privacy, and security quality of service. See The Security Support Provider Interface.
SSPR
Acronym for Self Service Password Reset. Process that allows users to reset their own password, usually by answering a series of questions or responding to an email. See Self-service password reset.
SSRS
Acronym for SQL Server Reporting Services. See SQL Server Reporting Services.
TAM
Acronym for Technical Account Manager.
TB
Acronym for TeraBytes, or 1.0995 x 10^12 bytes (1,024 GB). See Terabyte.
TCO
Acronym for Total Cost of Ownership. A financial estimate of direct and indirect costs of a product or system. See Total cost of ownership.
TCP
Acronym for Transmission Control Protocol. Networking model and communication protocols for the Internet. See Transmission Control Protocol.
TCP/IP
Acronym for Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol. Networking model and communication protocols for the Internet. See How TCP/IP Works.
TCQ
Acronym for Tagged Command Queuing. Technology built into ATA and SCSI hard drives. See Tagged Command Queuing.
TFS
Acronym for Team Foundation Server. See Team Foundation Server.
TFVC
Acronym for Team Foundation Version Control. See Use Team Foundation Version Control.
TGS
Acronym for Ticket Granting Service. See Kerberos (protocol).
TGT
Acronym for Ticket Granting Ticket. Encrypted file granting access for a user to data protected by a Key Distribution Center (KDC). Contains session key, expiration date, and user IP Address. See Ticket Granting Ticket.
TLG
Acronym for Test Lab Guide. See Test Lab Guides.
TLS
Acronym for Transport Layer Security. Cryptographic protocols to provide secure communications over the Internet. See Transport Layer Security.
TOU
Acronym for Terms Of Use. Terms a customer agrees to before they can use a service or product. See Terms of service.
TMG
Acronym for Threat Management Gateway, a discontinued product. See Microsoft Forefront Threat Management Gateway.
TNWiki
Acronym for TechNet Wiki. A library of information about Microsoft technologies inspired by Wikipedia, written by the community for the community. See Wiki: About TechNet Wiki.
TPM
Acronym for Trusted Platform Module. An international standard for a secure cryptoprocessor. See Trusted Platform Module.
TS
Acronym for Terminal Services. Known as Remote Desktop Services after Windows Server 2008. See Remote Desktop Services.
T-SQL
Acronym for Transact-SQL. Query language for SQL Server. See Transact-SQL.
TTL
Acronym for Time To Live. The length of time during which a setting remains valid or before a timeout expires. See Time to live.
UAC
Acronym for User Account Control. A Windows feature introduced in Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 that alerts the user about any actions on the client requiring administrator privileges. If the current user's account has administrative privileges on the local computer, they can consent to the action. Otherwise, someone must enter administrator credentials before the action can proceed. See What is User Account Control?
UAG
Acronym for Unified Access Gateway. See Forefront Unified Access Gateway (UAG).
UDF
Acronym for User Defined Function. See User-defined function.
UDP
Acronym for User Datagram Protocol, a TCP/IP standard. See User Datagram Protocol.
UEFI
Acronym for Unified Extensible Firmware Interface. Specification that defines software interface between an operating system and firmware. Replaces Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) firmware interface. See Unified Extensible Firmware Interface.
UE-V
Acronym for Microsoft User Experience Virtualization. See High-Level Architecture for UE-V 1.0.
UI
Acronym for User Interface. See User interface.
UML
Acronym for Unified Modeling Language or Universal Markup Language. See UML.
UNC
Acronym for Universal Naming Convention or Uniform Naming Convention. Syntax to describe the location of a network resource, such as a file or printer. Also called the network path. The UNC syntax for Windows is in the form file:///ShareName/ResourceName. See Path (computing).
UPA
Acronym for User Profile Application. Also User Profile Service Application. A feature of SharePoint Server that stores information about users in a central location. See Overview of the User Profile service application in SharePoint Server 2013 and Create, edit, or delete User Profile service applications in SharePoint Server 2013.
UPN
Acronym for User Principal Name, or the userPrincipalName attribute in Active Directory.
URI
Acronym for Uniform Resource Identifier. A string of characters to identify a web resource. See Uniform resource identifier.
URL
Acronym for Uniform Resource Locator. A web address. A Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) that identifies a web resource and specifies the means to act upon it. See Uniform resource locator.
URN
Acronym for Uniform Resource Name. A Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) that identifies a resource by name in a namespace. See Uniform resource name.
USB
Acronym for Universal Serial Bus. See USB.
USMT
Acronym for User State Migration Tool. See User State Migration Tool.
USN
Acronym for Update Sequence Number. See update sequence number (USN).
UTC
Coordinated Universal Time. The acronym is a compromise between the English "Coordinated Universal Time" (or Universal Time Coordinated) and the French "Temps Universel Coordonné" (or Universel Temps Coordonné). Formerly known as Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). The time standard by which clocks and time are regulated throughout the world. See Coordinated Universal Time.
UTDV
Acronym for Up-To-Datedness Vector. See Tracking Updates.
UUID
Acronym for Universally Unique IDentifier. A standard for identification in software to enable distributed systems to uniquely identify objects without central coordination. In Microsoft Windows platforms these are knows as GUIDs. See Universally unique identifier.
VAN
Acronym for Value Added Network. See Value-added network.
VAS
Acronym for Virtual Address Space. Virtual addresses that an operating system makes available to a process. See Virtual address space.
VB
Acronym for Visual Basic. See Visual Basic.
VB.NET
Acronym for Visual Basic .NET. A Microsoft high level programming language implemented on the .NET Framework. Successor to the original Visual Basic language. See Visual Basic .NET.
VBA
Acronym for Visual Basic for Applications. See Visual Basic for Applications.
VBScript
Visual Basic Script Edition, a subset of the classic Visual Basic language. Programs written in VBScript are saved in files with the .vbs extension. VBScript programs can be run with either of two host programs, cscript.exe or wscript.exe.
VDI
Acronym for Virtual Desktop Infrastructure. See Desktop virtualization.
VHD
Acronym for Virtual Hard Disk, a file format that represents a virtual hard disk drive. See VHD (file format).
VHDX
Acronym for Hyper-V Virtual Hard Disk. See Hyper-V Virtual Hard Disk Format Overview.
VLAN
Acronym for Virtual Local Area Network. See Virtual LAN.
VLK
Acronym for Volume License Key. Product key used for installing software licensed in bulk. Allows a single product key to be used for multiple installations. See Volume license key.
VLV
Acronym for Virtual List View. Searching capability allowing display of results without returning every entry.
VM
Acronym for Virtual Machine. See Virtual machine.
VMM
Acronym for Virtual Machine Manager. See System Center Virtual Machine Manager.
VMQ
Acronym for Virtual Machine Queue. A hardware virtualization technology. See VMQ.
VPN
Acronym for Virtual Private Network. Bridges a private network across the Internet (or other public network). See Virtual private network.
vRSS
Acronym for Virtual Receive Side Scaling. A feature of Hyper-V on Windows Server 2012 R2. See Virtual Receive Side Scaling (vRSS) In Windows Server 2012 R2 Hyper-V.
VS
Acronym for Visual Studio. See Microsoft Visual Studio.
VSO
Acronym for Visual Studio Online.
VSS
Acronym for Visual SourceSafe. A source code control software application for small software development projects. See Microsoft Visual SourceSafe. Also acronym for Volume Shadow Copy Service. A set of COM interfaces that implements a framework to allow volume backups to be performed while applications on a system continue to write to the volumes. See Volume Shadow Copy Service.
W3C
Acronym for World Wide Web Consortium. The international standards organization for the World Wide Web (WWW or W3). See World Wide Web Consortium.
WAAD
Acronym for Windows Azure Active Directory. Also known as Azure Active Directory (AAD). Active Directory Domain Services in the Windows Azure cloud. Windows Azure is the Microsoft cloud computing platform, and one of the services available is Active Directory.
WABS
Acronym for Windows Azure BizTalk Services. See BizTalk Services.
WADL
Acronym for Web Application Description Language. A machine-readable XML description of HTTP-based web applications (typically REST web services). See Web Application Description Language.
WAIK
Acronym for Windows Automated Installation Kit. Microsoft tools and technologies to help deploy Windows operating systems. See Windows Automated Installation Kit.
WAN
Acronym for Wide Area Network. See Wide area network.
WAP
Acronym for Wireless Application Protocol. Standard for accessing information over mobile wireless networks. See Wireless Application Protocol. Also acronym for Windows Azure Pack (formerly Windows Azure Services for Windows Server). See Windows Azure Pack for Windows Server.
WATM
Acronym for Windows Azure Traffic Manager. Tool that allows control of the distribution of user traffic to specified endpoints. See Traffic Mangager Overview.
WBC
Acronym for Write Back Cache. A high speed disk or memory cache where the cpu first writes data. Then during idle machine cycles the data can be written from the cache into memory or onto disk. See Cache (computing).
WCE
Acronym for Windows CE. See Windows CE.
WCF
Acronym for Windows Communication Foundation. See Windows Communication Foundation.
WDM
Acronym for Windows Driver Model. Formerly known as the Win32 Driver Model. Framework for device drivers.
WEC
Acronym for Windows Embedded Compact. See Windows Embedded Compact.
WF
Acronym for Workflow Foundation. See Windows Workflow Foundation.
WFP
Acronym for Windows Filtering Platform. See Windows Filtering Platform.
WHATWG
Acronym for Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group. See WHATWG.
WHS
Acronym for Windows Home Server. See Windows Home Server.
WIF
Acronym for Windows Identity Foundation. See Windows Identity Foundation.
WinCE
Acronym for Windows CE. An operating system for embedded systems. See Windows CE.
WinPE
Acronym for Windows Preinstallation Environment. Also Windows PE. A lightweight version of Windows used for deployment or troubleshooting. See Windows Preinstallation Environment.
WinRM
Acronym for Windows Remote Management. Microsoft implementation of WS-Management Protocol, a standard Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP)-based, firewall-friendly protocol that allows hardware and operating systems from different vendors to interoperate. See Windows Remote Management.
WinRT
Acronym for Windows RunTime, or Windows RT. An edition of Windows only available pre-installed on PCs or tablets powered by ARM processors. Designed for improved battery life on thin, lightweight devices running cloud-enabled, touch-enabled, web-connected applications. Previously called Windows on ARM (WOA). See Windows 8 and 8.1 Preview, Editions (SKUs) and features.
WINS
Acronym for Windows Internet Naming Service, or alternatively, Windows Internet Name Service. Resolves computer NetBIOS names into IP Addresses. See Windows Internet Name Service.
WMF
Acronym for Windows Management Framework. See Description of WMF 4.0 for Windows 7 SP1, Windows Embedded Standard 7 SP1, and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1. Also acronym for Windows Metafile. See Windows Metafile.
WMI
Acronym for Windows Management Instrumentation. WMI is management technology allowing scripts and programs to monitor and control managed resources throughout the network. Resources include hard drives, file systems, operating system settings, processes, services, shares, registry settings, networking components, event logs, users, and groups. See Windows Management Instrumentation.
WMP
Acronym for Windows Media Player. See Windows Media Player.
WOA
Acronym for Windows On ARM. Windows pre-installed on an ARM processor. Now called Windows RT (WinRT). See Windows RT.
WOW
Acronym for Windows On Windows Systems. An application compatibility layer in 32-bit Windows that provides support for legacy 16-bit (Win16) applications. More recently, WOW64 provides support for running 32-bit applications on 64-bit versions of Windows. See Windows on Windows.
WPAD
Acronym for Web Proxy Autodiscovery Protocol, which allows a web browser to automatically detect proxy settings. See Web Proxy Autodiscovery Protocol.
WPF
Acronym for Windows Presentation Foundation. See Windows Presentation Foundation.
WPT
Acronym for Windows Performance Toolkit. Tools for the analysis of performance problems. See Windows Performance Toolkit Technical Reference.
WQL
Acronym for WMI Query Language, as subset of ANSI Structured Query Language (SQL) used to query WMI namespaces. See WQL.
WS
Acronym for Windows Server. A group of server operating systems from Microsoft. See Windows Server.
WSAD
Acronym for Windows Server Active Directory. On premises Active Directory, as apposed to the cloud based Azure Active Directory (AAD)
WS-Federation
Acronym for Web Services-Federation. An identity federation specification. See Understanding WS-Federation.
WSG
Acronym for Windows Server Gateway. See Windows Server Gateway.
WSH
Acronym for Windows Script Host, an ActiveX scripting host providing an environment for the execution of scripts using one of several scripting engines or languages, such as VBScript.
WSIG
Acronym for Web Services Interoperability Guidance. Guidance for interoperability between web services using .NET Framework and other technologies.
WSS
Acronym for Windows SharePoint Services. See SharePoint.
WSUS
Acronym for Windows Server Update Services. Software to manage the distribution of Microsoft updates and hotfixes to computers in a corporate environment. See Windows Server Update Services.
WUA
Acronym for Windows Update Agent. See Windows Update Agent.
WWF
Acronym for Windows Workflow Foundation. Technology that provides an API, an in-process workflow engine, and a rehostable designer to implement long-running processes as workflows within .NET applications. See Windows Workflow Foundation.
WYSIWYG
It stands for What You See Is What You Get, a category of web page editor that incorporates graphical editing more than through code. See WYSIWYG.
WYSIWYM
It stands for What You See Is What You Mean. Unlike WYSIWYG, this type of editor relies solely on code for editing. See WYSIWYM.
XAML
Acronym for Extensible Application Markup Language. Declarative XML-based language used for initializing structured values and objects. See Extensible Application Markup Language.
XML
Acronym for Extensible Markup Language, for encoding documents in a format that can be read by both humans and machines. See XML.
XNA
Set of tools based on the .NET Framework for video game development and management. See Microsoft XNA.
X.500
Computer networking standards for directory services. Developed by ITU-T (International Telecommunications Union, Telecommunications sector), formerly CCITT (International Telegraph and Telephone Consultative Committee). See X.500.
X.509
An ITU-T cryptography standard for a Public Key Infrastrucure (PKI) and Privilege Management Infrastructure (PMI). Includes standards for public key certificates, certificate revocation lists (CRLs), attribute certificates (CAs), and a certificate path validation algorithm. See X.509.
XSLT
Acronym for Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformations. A language for transforming XML documents into other XML documents or other objects. See XSLT.
YB
Acronym for YottaBytes, or 1.2089 x 10^24 bytes (1024 ZB). See Yottabyte.
ZLE
Acronym for Zero-Latency Enterprise. Any strategy that exploits the immediate exchange of information across technical and organizational boundaries to achieve business benefit. For example, technical boundaries exist between different operating systems, database management systems and programming languages. "Immediate" implies being fast enough to bring all of the business benefits that simultaneous knowledge can potentially achieve. Latency cannot literally be zero in any real system because computers need time to "think."
ZB
Acronym for ZettaBytes, or 1.1806 x 10^21 bytes (1,024 EB). See Zettabyte.