This section defines frequently used terms relating to web applications.

An application server

Software that helps a web server process web pages containing server-side scripts or tags. When such a page is requested from the server, the web server hands the page off to the application server for processing before sending the page to the browser. For more information, see How a web application works.

Common application servers include ColdFusion, Macromedia JRun Server, the Microsoft .NET Framework, IBM WebSphere, and Apache Tomcat.

A database

A collection of data stored in tables. Each row of a table constitutes one record and each column constitutes a field in the record, as shown in the following example:

A database driver

Software that acts as an interpreter between a web application and a database. Data in a database is stored in a proprietary format. A database driver lets the web application read and manipulate data that would otherwise be undecipherable.

A database management system

(DBMS, or database system) Software used to create and manipulate databases. Common database systems include Microsoft Access, Oracle 9i, and MySQL.

A database query

The operation that extracts a recordset from a database. A query consists of search criteria expressed in a database language called SQL. For example, the query can specify that only certain columns or only certain records be included in the recordset.

A dynamic page

A web page customized by an application server before the page is sent to a browser.

A recordset

A set of data extracted from one or more tables in a database, as in the following example:

A relational database

A database containing more than one table, with the tables sharing data. The following database is relational because two tables share the DepartmentID column.

A server technology

The technology that an application server uses to modify dynamic pages at runtime.

The Dreamweaver development environment supports the following server technologies:

• Macromedia® ColdFusion® from Adobe

• Microsoft ASP.NET

• Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP)

• Sun JavaServer Pages (JSP)

• PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor (PHP)

  You can also use the Dreamweaver coding environment to develop pages for any other server technology not listed.

A static page

A web page that is not modified by an application server before the page is sent to a browser. For more information, see Processing static web pages.

A web application

A website that contains pages with partly or entirely undetermined content. The final content of these pages is determined only when a visitor requests a page from the web server. Because the final content of the page varies from request to request based on the visitor’s actions, this kind of page is called a dynamic page.

A web server

Software that sends out web pages in response to requests from web browsers. A page request is generated when a visitor clicks a link on a web page in the browser, selects a bookmark in the browser, or enters a URL in the browser’s address text box.

Popular web servers include Microsoft Internet Information Server, Microsoft Personal Web Server, Apache HTTP Server, Netscape Enterprise Server, and Sun ONE Web Server.