Acronyms, and other IT terms related to class for March 3rd.

1. NIC - network card, network adapter, LAN Adapter or NIC (network interface card) is a piece of computer hardware designed to allow computers to communicate over a computer network. It is both an OSI layer 1 (physical layer) and layer 2 (data link layer) device, as it provides physical access to a networking medium and provides a low-level addressing system through the use of MAC addresses. It allows users to connect to each other either by using cables or wirelessly.

2. OSI - The Open Systems Interconnection Basic Reference Model (OSI Reference Model or OSI Model for short) is a layered, abstract description for communications and computer network protocol design. It was developed as part of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) initiative and is sometimes known as the OSI seven layer model. From top to bottom, the OSI Model consists of the Application, Presentation, Session, Transport, Network, Data Link, and Physical layers

3. TCP - The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is one of the core protocols of the Internet protocol suite. TCP provides reliable, in-order delivery of a stream of bytes, making it suitable for applications like file transfer and e-mail.

4. Copyright - Copyright – symbolized "©" – is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time. Generally, it is "the right to copy", but also gives the copyright holder the right to be credited for the work, to determine who may adapt the work to other forms, who may perform the work, who may financially benefit from it, and other, related rights. It is an intellectual property form (unlike the patent, the trademark, and the trade secret) applicable to any expressible form of an idea or information that is substantive and discrete.

5. TCP/IP - The Internet protocol suite is the set of communications protocols that implement the protocol stack on which the Internet and most commercial networks run. It has also been referred to as the TCP/IP protocol suite, which is named after two of the most important protocols in it: the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP), which were also the first two networking protocols defined. Today's IP networking represents a synthesis of two developments that began to evolve in the 1960s and 1970s, namely LANs (Local Area Networks) and the Internet, which, together with the invention of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee in 1989, have revolutionized computing.

6. Trademark - A trademark or trade mark[1] or mark is a distinctive sign or indicator of some kind which is used by an individual, business organization or other legal entity to identify uniquely the source of its products and/or services to consumers, and to distinguish its products or services from those of other entities. A trademark is a type of intellectual property, and typically comprises a name, word, phrase, logo, symbol, design, image, or a combination of these elements. There is also a range of non-conventional trademarks comprising marks which do not fall into these standard categories.

7. Packet - In information technology, a packet is a formatted block of data carried by a packet mode computer network. Computer communications links that do not support packets, such as traditional point-to-point telecommunications links, simply transmit data as a series of bytes, characters, or bits alone.