D

Daemon

A program that runs in the background whenever needed, carrying out tasks for the user. They 'sleep' until something comes along which needs their help; most commonly found on Unix systems.

Also see URL

Datagram

A TCP/IP or IPX message that contains Internet source and destination addresses and data which is used to route the packet through a network. Datagrams are the primary information units used on the Internet.

DBA

(Dynamic Bandwidth Allocation). DBA is a method of reallocating bandwidth (such as a B channel) automatically. DBA allows you to place or receive a voice call while a Multilink PPP call is active.

D Channel

The signalling channel on an ISDN line used to carry messages between an ISDN modem and the public switch. It runs at either 16 or 64 Kbps.

default rule

An XSL convention that describes how all elements not governed by specific construction rules should be formatted.

Also see XSL

DHCP

(Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol). Windows 95, 98 and NT contain software that assigns IP addresses to workstations on a network. These assignments are made by the DHCP server software that runs on Windows NT Server, and Windows 95 and 98 will call the server to obtain the address. Windows 98 will allocate itself an address if no DHCP server can be found.

DELINS (EDI)

DESADV (EDI)

Dialplus

Dial up

'Dialup Access' or a 'Dialup Account' is when a modem is used to gain access to the Internet via a network.

This is commonly used to identify the connection of a computer to another using a simple Modem "Dial Up". This is a very common method of computer to computer access. Although this is now being replaced by ISDN and more recently by ADSL.

DISA

Data Interchange Standards Association. Secretariat of the ASC X12 Committee. Also serves as the secretariat for the Pan American EDIFACT Board.

Distributed Intellligence

A networking scenario by which processing power is distributed among several attached devices working independently while continuing to provide functionality as part of the larger system.

DNS

Computers connected to the Internet whose job it is to keep track of the IP Addresses and Domain Names of other machines. When called upon, they take the ASCII Domain Name and convert it to the relevant numeric IP Address.

document element

The main element of an XML document that contains all of the document's other elements and their content. The document element for an HTML document is ...