National Teaching and Learning Change ProgrammeInformation and Communication Technology:
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• alpha test
  Alpha testing is the issue of the software to a restricted number of testers within the developer
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• alphanumeric data
  A general term used for textual data which may include letters, digits and, sometimes, punctuation.
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• alt key
  One of a number of special keys which, when pressed, changes the effect of other keys on the keyboard. What these keys do will depend on the software, rather than the hardware, being used.
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• alt tag
  An HTML tag which displays a piece of text describing a displayed image, used mostly for reasons of accessibility, since the tag can be voiced by screen readers.
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• alt tag
  An HTML tag which displays a piece of text describing a displayed image, used mostly for reasons of accessibility, since the tag can be voiced by screen readers.
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• alt text
  Text displayed by an alt tag.
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• American National Standards Institute (ANSI)
  This is a character set, the set of symbols that may be represented by a computer. These symbols are called characters and can be letters, digits, spaces, punctuation marks, and include non-printing, control characters. The ANSI character set also provides various lines and shapes as additional characters. These simplify the production of screen displays involving lines and shapes.
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• analog/analogue
  An electronic signal which varies continuously from one level to another, and so has potentially many values - unlike a digital signal, which only has two values, usually represented as one and zero. For use with computers, analogue signals (such as the output of a microphone) are converted into digital form so they can be processed by the computer.
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• anchor
  In HTML, anchors can be inserted at different places in a web page, so they become a target for a link. This enables the user to be directed to any part of a web page, not just the beginning.
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• AND
  A logical operation, typically used within a program to say that a statement will only be executed if both conditions are true.
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• AND gate
  The output of an AND gate is TRUE if all inputs are TRUE, otherwise the output is FALSE.
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• animated gif
  An animation created by combining a number of gif images into one file, which when run, gives the appearance of movement.
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• animation
  The creation of apparent movement through the presentation of a sequence of slightly different still pictures (as in cartoons).
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• anti-aliasing
  A method of smoothing pixels to create more even, less jagged edges.
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• anti-virus software
  Software which detects and removes viruses from a computer.
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• Apple
  A computer company best known for making Macs and iPods.
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• applet
  A small program written in Java and included in an HTML page. It is independent of the operating system on which it runs. Examples are displaying animations, creating chat rooms, time and date functions, etc.
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• application
  This is a software program which enables the user to perform specific tasks, such as word processing, accounting, etc.
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• application program interface (API)
  This is the way a supplier of a software application enables a user to integrate this application with the user
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• applications programmer
  A person who writes software applications.