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Glossary

CG

Center of Gravity

The “balance point” of a part or assembly. Measured from some reference point, usually the origin of the coordinate system used to design the part or assembly.

CLI

command line interface

The application code that provides a way fr the user to control how an application runs. This interface provides for basic commands and optional arguments that define exactly what features of the program will be activated.

cloud

A fancy term for the Internet. Servers available on the Internet network system provide a variety of services: web pages, data storage, applications. I guess “cloud” is easier to type then “Internet”.

command line

A user interface where you type in commands to get the operating system to run some program or command. Available on all systems.

command prompt

When you open a command line window, you are shown a “command prompt” telling you the system is waiting for you to type in some command. There is usually a special character at the start of a line where you will type in something. On Linux and Mac, this character is usually a dollar sign, on Windows it is the right angle bracket. Given When Then A version of Test Driven Development where we define the state of the project (Given) and an action we will take (When) and the result we expect (Then). See given when then

environment variable

Operating systems let users set special variables that can be accessed by software later. These variables can be used to store sensitive data that should not be accidentally be coded into software.

GUI

graphical user interface

The traditional mouse driven point and click interface.

HTML

Hyper Text Markup Language. The language used to create web pages.

IDE

Integrated development Environment

A tool, usually language specific used by developers that packages everything needed to write and maintain program code.

JSON

JavaScript Object Notation - a text-based file format for data interchange.

LaTeX

A popular high-end publishing language used to produce professional publications.

PDF

Portable Document format. A standard document format developed by Adobe.

railroad diagram

A graphical depiction of a grammar rule, commonly used in designing programming languages. SCAD Code file extension for OpenSCAD

SCAD

A file containing code for OpenSCAD to process. These files end with .scad.

Script

A text file containing instructions for the operating system. The scripting language can vary depending on the system: Bash for Linux and Mac, and Batch files for the PC.

semantic versioning

A style if version numbering common in software development. See semantic versioning

Shell

A text only window where you can issue commands to the operating system. See command line

STL

Standard Tessellation Language

TDD

Test Driven Development

virtual machine

A program that simulates a real system well enough to install a standard operating system and other software in an isolated environment. Commonly used in software testing, or experimenting with operating systems.

YAML

Yet Another Markup Language