Below we have a listing of terms and definitions used throughout our web site. If you see a word that you think should be in our glossary please be sure to let us know. BinHex Demoware Freeware MacBinary Shareware UUencoding BinHex The internet is a network that was originally designed for sending text messages between computers. Text messages need only 7-bits of data, so many internet gateways are 7-bits wide by default. Most non-text files that we use are 8-bits wide. If 8-bit wide files are sent through the internet, they can lose 1/8th of their content and be rendered unusable. It's a bit like sending a big truck through a small tunnel. There are ways to perform a 'binary' transfer via the internet which forces the file to be sent through an 8-bit wide gateway (a bigger tunnel), but the most common way to get around this "bit-width" problem is to encode the 8-bit wide file into a 7-bit wide format (actually a text format). This process will actually make the file bigger in file-length. ENCODING IS NOT COMPRESSION! For Mac users, BinHex is the standard 7-bit encoded format because it preserves that Mac resource fork, as well as the data fork. BinHex files usually have a '.hqx' suffix. Demoware Demoware products are full featured versions of products that may be used for a limited time after which they expire. Users must register the product to intstall a non-expiring version. Freeware Freeware products are products that may be used at no charge. We encourage users to distribute our freeware products with friends and associates. Please only distribute freeware product installers, not the individual components themselves. MacBinary Unlike files on other computer platforms which are data only, Macintosh files have a 'Resource fork' and a 'data fork'. If you take a Mac file and put it on a non-Mac such as a PC or a UNIX machine, the resource fork will be stripped off. In some situations, this is ok, but many Mac files will be rendered unusable if they lose their resource fork. To prevent this from happening, users can 'MacBinary encode' their files before posting to a non-Mac. MacBinary encoding takes the resource and data forks of a Mac file and attaches them together into a single data file. MacBinary encoded files often have '.bin' at the end of the file name. While binary files are smaller then text-encoded files and therefore download faster, they are more likely to be damaged during the file-transfer process if not downloaded correctly (using an 8-bit, binary transfer mode). If you are not sure how to perform a transfer in binary mode, or you don't think your application will do the transfer in binary mode automatically, then you should download a text enocded version of the file you are looking for. Shareware Shareware products are products that may be used for a limited time (15-day trial period) after which users must register the product or remove it from their computer. Some shareware products such as StuffIt Lite have more features that are enabled when they are registered. UUencoding UUencoding like BinHex encoding is a 7-bit encoding method, but UUencoding only encodes the data fork of a Mac file. (For some files such as applications, this means stripping off critical information!) UUencoding is common for files that are non-Macintosh or not platform-specific such as GIFs. UUencoded files usually have a '.uu' or '.uue' suffix.
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