1.1 Glossary

This document uses the following terms:

A1: A reference style in which each column is identified sequentially from left-to-right with a letter or series of letters in alphabetical order. Column headings are ordered A-Z, then AA-AZ, BA-BZ... ZA-ZZ, AAA-AAZ, and so forth. Each row is numbered sequentially from the top down.

ActiveX Data Objects (ADO): A data access interface that connects to, retrieves, manipulates, and updates data in Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) database-compliant data sources.

add-in: Supplemental functionality that is provided by an external application or macro to extend the capabilities of an application.

American National Standards Institute (ANSI) character set: A character set defined by a code page approved by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). The term "ANSI" as used to signify Windows code pages is a historical reference and a misnomer that persists in the Windows community. The source of this misnomer stems from the fact that the Windows code page 1252 was originally based on an ANSI draft, which became International Organization for Standardization (ISO) Standard 8859-1 [ISO/IEC-8859-1]. In Windows, the ANSI character set can be any of the following code pages: 1252, 1250, 1251, 1253, 1254, 1255, 1256, 1257, 1258, 874, 932, 936, 949, or 950. For example, "ANSI application" is usually a reference to a non-Unicode or code-page-based application. Therefore, "ANSI character set" is often misused to refer to one of the character sets defined by a Windows code page that can be used as an active system code page; for example, character sets defined by code page 1252 or character sets defined by code page 950. Windows is now based on Unicode, so the use of ANSI character sets is strongly discouraged unless they are used to interoperate with legacy applications or legacy data.

assembly name: The name of a collection of one or more files that is versioned and deployed as a unit. See also assembly.

Boolean: An operation or expression that can be evaluated only as either true or false.

bounding rectangle: A frame that encompasses an object. A bounding rectangle is not rotated and, therefore, always aligns along the x and y axes.

class name: The name that is used to refer to a class module that provides an implementation of a behavior.

color space: A system that describes color numerically by mapping color components to a multidimensional coordinate system. The number of dimensions is typically two, three, or four. For example, if colors are expressed as a combination of the three components red, green, and blue, a three-dimensional space can describe all possible colors. Grayscale colors can be mapped to a two-dimensional color space. If transparency is considered a component, four dimensions are appropriate. Also referred to as color model.

connection string: A series of arguments, delimited by a semicolon, that defines the location of a database and how to connect to it.

culture name: A part of a language identification tagging system, as described in [RFC1766]. Culture names adhere to the format "<languagecode2>-<country/regioncode2>." If a two-letter language code is not available, a three-letter code that is derived from [ISO-639] is used.

data provider: A known data source that is specific to a target type and that provides data to a collector type.

data source: A database, web service, disk, file, or other collection of information from which data is queried or submitted. Supported data sources vary based on application and data provider.

data type: A property of a field that defines the kind of data that is stored in the field, or defines the kind of data returned by an expression when the expression is evaluated.

drawing: A collection of drawing objects, such as shapes, curves, or WordArt, that are viewed together as a single image.

embedded image: An image that is stored within a document rather than being linked to a source file that is outside the document.

Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML): A declarative XML-based language that is used to represent a tree of objects. XAML markup is stored in .xaml files or, for workflow schemas, .xoml files.

field: An element or attribute in a data source that can contain data.

floating-point number: A number that is represented by a mantissa and an exponent according to a given base. The mantissa is typically a value between "0" and "1". To find the value of a floating-point number, the base is raised to the power of the exponent, and the mantissa is multiplied by the result.

font: An object that defines the graphic design, or formatting, of a collection of numbers, symbols, and letters. A font specifies the style (such as bold and strikeout), size, family (a typeface such as Times New Roman), and other qualities to describe how the collection is drawn.

font family: A set of fonts that all have common stroke width and serif characteristics. For example, Times Roman and Times Roman Italic are members of the same font family.

globally unique identifier (GUID): A term used interchangeably with universally unique identifier (UUID) in Microsoft protocol technical documents (TDs). Interchanging the usage of these terms does not imply or require a specific algorithm or mechanism to generate the value. Specifically, the use of this term does not imply or require that the algorithms described in [RFC4122] or [C706] have to be used for generating the GUID. See also universally unique identifier (UUID).

header row: A row in a table, typically the first row, that contains labels for columns in the table.

hue-saturation-luminance (HSL): A color model that defines a color by using three dimensions: hue, the color itself; saturation, the purity of the color; and luminance, the amount of light that is either reflected or absorbed by the color. See also color scheme and color space.

language code identifier (LCID): A 32-bit number that identifies the user interface human language dialect or variation that is supported by an application or a client computer.

list: A container within a SharePoint site that stores list items. A list has a customizable schema that is composed of one or more fields.

Office data connection (ODC) file: A file that stores information about a connection to a data source, such as an Access database, worksheet, or text file. This file facilitates data source administration.

OLE compound file: A form of structured storage, as described in [MS-CFB]. A compound file allows independent storages and streams to exist within a single file.

OLE DB: A set of interfaces that are based on the Component Object Model (COM) programming model and expose data from a variety of sources. These interfaces support the amount of Database Management System (DBMS) functionality that is appropriate for a data store and they enable a data store to share data.

Open Database Connectivity (ODBC): A standard software API method for accessing data that is stored in a variety of proprietary personal computer, minicomputer, and mainframe databases. It is an implementation of [ISO/IEC9075-3:2008] and provides extensions to that standard.

pixel: A discrete unit of display on a computer display device.

Portable Network Graphics (PNG): A bitmap graphics file format that uses lossless data compression and supports variable transparency of images (alpha channels) and control of image brightness on different computers (gamma correction). PNG-format files have a .png file name extension.

primary key: A field or set of fields that uniquely identifies each record in a table. A primary key cannot contain a null value.

query: A formalized instruction to a data source to either extract data or perform a specified action. A query can be in the form of a query expression, a method-based query, or a combination of the two. The data source can be in different forms, such as a relational database, XML document, or in-memory object. See also search query.

range: An addressable region that is in a workbook. A range typically consists of zero or more cells and represents a single, contiguous rectangle of cells on a single sheet.

red-green-blue (RGB): A color model that describes color information in terms of the red (R), green (G), and blue (B) intensities in a color.

reference style: A system that is used in formulas to specify cells or ranges of cells. A reference style specifies a cell in a two-dimensional table by identifying the row and column that contain that cell or range of cells.

refresh: A process that retrieves values from a data source and populates a workbook with those values.

row: A collection of columns that contains property values that describe a single item in a set of items that match the restriction specified in a query.

rule: A condition or action, or a set of conditions or actions, that performs tasks automatically based on events and values.

sheet: A part of an Excel workbook. There are four types of sheets: worksheet, macro sheet, dialog sheet, and chart sheet. Multiple sheets are stored together within a workbook.

storage: An element of a compound file that is a unit of containment for one or more storages and streams, analogous to directories in a file system, as described in [MS-CFB].

stream: An element of a compound file, as described in [MS-CFB]. A stream contains a sequence of bytes that can be read from or written to by an application, and they can exist only in storages.

Structured Query Language (SQL): A database query and programming language that is widely used for accessing, querying, updating, and managing data in relational database systems.

Unicode: A character encoding standard developed by the Unicode Consortium that represents almost all of the written languages of the world. The Unicode standard [UNICODE5.0.0/2007] provides three forms (UTF-8, UTF-16, and UTF-32) and seven schemes (UTF-8, UTF-16, UTF-16 BE, UTF-16 LE, UTF-32, UTF-32 LE, and UTF-32 BE).

Unicode code point: Any value in the Unicode codespace, which is a range of integers from "0" to "10FFFF16". Each code point is a unique positive integer that maps to a specific character.

Uniform Resource Identifier (URI): A string that identifies a resource. The URI is an addressing mechanism defined in Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) Uniform Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax [RFC3986].

Uniform Resource Locator (URL): A string of characters in a standardized format that identifies a document or resource on the World Wide Web. The format is as specified in [RFC1738].

view: See form view (Microsoft InfoPath), list view (SharePoint Products and Technologies), or View (Microsoft Business Connectivity Services).

whitespace: A character that can be found between words, including a space (" "), a carriage return in combination with a line feed (newline), and a tab character.

workbook: A container for a collection of sheets.

zero-based index: An index in which the first item has an index of "0" (zero).

zoom level: The degree to which a portion of an image, document, or other screen object is made to appear closer or farther away relative to its default appearance. This value is usually expressed as a percentage of the default appearance.

MAY, SHOULD, MUST, SHOULD NOT, MUST NOT: These terms (in all caps) are used as defined in [RFC2119]. All statements of optional behavior use either MAY, SHOULD, or SHOULD NOT.