Plain-language definitions for technical terms

A system to manage all company interactions with current and potential customers, from first contact to after-sales support.

The system a cashier uses to complete a sale: scan a barcode, calculate the total, print a receipt, and accept payment.

A formal contract between a service provider and the customer that defines the guaranteed performance level (e.g., 99.9% uptime) and compensation if violated.

Two key metrics for disaster recovery: RPO = how much data you can afford to lose, RTO = how long recovery takes.

A network of globally distributed servers that delivers your site files from the location closest to each visitor.

A design pattern where the app works fully without internet, then syncs data automatically when connectivity returns.

An AI model trained on massive amounts of text, capable of generating human-like responses and natural conversation.

A technique that augments LLM answers with up-to-date information retrieved from a knowledge base before responding.

A branch of AI where systems learn from data instead of explicit programming, and improve with experience.

A branch of computer science that aims to build systems capable of performing tasks that normally require human intelligence.

A digitally signed token format used to authenticate users in web and mobile apps without storing sessions on the server.

An open standard that lets a third-party app access a user resources on another service (like Google or Facebook) without knowing the password.

A security model that grants permissions to users based on their role in the organization (admin, accountant, sales rep) rather than individually.

A system that lets a user sign in once and access multiple connected applications without re-entering credentials.

Optimizing content to be the source of answers in AI assistants (ChatGPT, Gemini) and voice search results (Google Assistant, Siri).

Optimizing content to be picked up and cited by generative AI search engines (Perplexity, Google SGE, Bing Copilot).