What different terms mean the same thing (or don't, but people think they do)?

Question

One of the pitfalls I run into on a daily basis is customers saying one thing while meaning another. Usually, this is just due to a miscommunication somewhere, but occasionally they are, in fact, saying the same thing I am just using a different term.

For example, one of my customers the other day mentioned a feature he called, "find as you type." Being a little confused, I asked him what he meant, and he described the feature in Google where, once you start typing a search query, Google suggests other, popular queries that match the letters you have typed.

Click! He meant AutoComplete! He was not wrong, it is just that I had never heard that term before.

In the spirit of reducing confusion, what terms can you think of that are different but mean, essentially, the same thing?

Also, what terms do people think mean the same thing, but don't. Please differentiate between the two.

Please only one set of terms per answer, so we can vote on the best ones.

Answer 1

hard disk drive = computer

Answer 2

"CPU" = tower

A favorite term I have heard customers use.

Answer 3

"Client" is the big, perennial classic term that means so many things, all within the context of almost every development project.

Answer 4

System == Library == Framework == Program == Application == Software

Answer 5

computer == system == workstation == machine == box

Answer 6

parameter == argument

Parameter is the variable in the declaration of function or method.

Argument is the actual value of this variable that gets passed to function.

I like this one because it happens even to programmers

Answer 7

Drop down = Combo box

Answer 8

Client == End User

They can be the same person, but more often then not the one writing the check to you is not the one that uses the thing you built.

Answer 9

Users often confuse "web browser" with "the Internet." I'll hear them say "I'm going to the Internet," which means "I'm launching a web browser."

Answer 10

Hyperlink = Link = Anchor

I've run across people who use these terms interchangeably, and of course, they aren't the same thing.

Answer 11

Whenever dealing with Departments of Education you must learn that "system" means software and "technology" means hardware.

Answer 12

Host == Server

.. Which is untrue :)

Answer 13

"open source" == "free software"

If you watch Revolution OS, you'll hear Richard Stallman use the term "free software" and others like Linus Torvalds and Bruce Perens use "open source." After watching the film, I think they're talking about the same thing, but disagreeing (vehemently in some cases) on what to call it.

(I hope none of them are reading this.)

Answer 14

There are 180 pages of preferred terms in the "Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications," which is a great book for technical writers, but I think programmers should have it too.

Many of the entries mention unacceptable (or outdated) equivalents.

Example: "system tray Do not use. Use notification area instead."

Answer 15

Value Object == Value Type

Value Objects are classes representing immutable attributes, as in Domain Driven Design.

Value Types are variables whose values are held on the stack (int, bool, struct, etc). These are spoken of in relation to Reference Types, which live on the heap and have memory pointers.

Answer 16

Also Architecture is a term that requires constant clarification. It means topology to some. To others it means class diagrams, the product of software engineering. To others it is just a catch all for the above and umpteen other concepts.

Answer 17

I once heard a junior dev use NULL and VOID interchangeably.

Scariest thing I'd ever heard.

Answer 18

Operating System == Kernel who manages hardware and gives a very basic API vs. the whole software distribution

Answer 19

Hard drive space != RAM

Answer 20

History and Travellog (as applied to webbrowsers).

• History is the list of all websites you have visted ever (or for the last N days).
• Travellog is the list of sites in your current session that are accessible via Back and Forward. And yes, I realize the JavaScript object for this is called history.

Answer 21

AJAX and Javascript.
A lot of times I hear semi-technical people interchanging the two terms. Like: "Can't you animate that image using AJAX". Which is of course just plain javascript.

Answer 22

Programmer == Developer == Software engineer

You need developers, not programmers by Eric Sink

Answer 23

Verification == Validation

From wikipedia:

It is sometimes said that validation can be expressed by the query "Are you building the right thing?" and verification by "Are you building the thing right?". "Building the right thing" refers back to the user's needs, while "building it right" checks that the specifications be correctly implemented by the system. In some contexts, it is required to have written requirements for both as well as formal procedures or protocols for determining compliance.

Answer 24

PowerPoint != the projector

It really bothers me when people say "I'll just put it up on the PowerPoint" and then they go to Microsoft Word or something instead.

Answer 25

I've seen this a few times on this site:

Authentication != Authorization

Authentication: Your identity
Authorization: Your privileges

Answer 26

I've had this one come up when trying to explain Cocoa development

Apple != Mac != Mac OS

Apple is a company

Mac is a brand

Mac OS is an operating system

The same is often true for

Microsoft != Windows

Answer 27

Scope != Lifetime

Scope :: is the collection of statements where a variable can be referenced. Those statements are called the referencing environment of that variable.

Lifetime :: is the association between a variable(the name) and its place of storage in memory(address).

Answer 28

Wiki != Wikipedia. (As in, "Well I looked it up on Wiki, and it says...")

This one is not really programming related, but it could cause a problem for someone working at a company that had their own internal wiki.

Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:About

Some wikis that are not Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wikis

Answer 29

"Inconceivable"

I do not think it means what you think it means.

Answer 30

From non-embedded software engineers:

• RAM == program memory == data memory

For typical lower-end embedded processors (e.g. PIC, STM32, etc), code and constant data are stored in, and normally accessed from, flash; non-constant data is stored in RAM.

• 1 Mb == small

For these kinds of processors, 1 Mb of flash is a lot (though not as much as it used to be). For example, the STM32 that I'm using currently using has 128 Kb of flash, and 8 Kb of RAM.

At the other end of the spectrum, the smallest PIC10F has 384 bytes of flash, and 16 bytes of RAM.

Answer 31

Bug - Incident - Failure - Error - Defect - Problem - Issue

Answer 32

Compiler == Programming Language == IDE

Answer 33

process = procedure = plans

Answer 34

Memory == Hard Drive as in "My PC has 30GB of memory!"

Answer 35

Google == Internet

also

Google == Search

Talked to many people that think Google IS the internet. If Google shutdown, that would be the end of being 'online'.

Where did you find xyz? Oh, on Google. Where is xyz stored? In Google.

Note: This also says a lot for Google's ability to sell their brand. When your company's name is well known as a verb 'to Google' you know you are successful.

Answer 36

Some users will use the term "downloading" to generally mean "transferring" instead of distinguishing between "downloading" and "uploading." So, if they say "The error happened right after I downloaded the data," it might refer to another part of the process than what a tech person would take it to mean.

Answer 37

Java == Javascript

Answer 38

"Find as you type" == "incremental search": The feature in Firefox and some other programs where, as you are entering your search term in a Find dialog/field, the document jumps to the position of the position of the next search result based on what you have entered so far (without you actually having to click a "Search" button to initiate the search action).

This is primarily handy to avoid typing (for example) "incremental search[enter]" when typing "incr" is probably good enough to find what you're looking for!

This came to mind as a meaning of "find as you type" different than the example given in the original question!

Answer 39

C# .Net (Ahhhhh!)

Answer 40

Pass values by reference != pass references by value.

Pass values by reference in C++:

struct Bar
{
   int X;
   Bar(int x) : X(x) {}
   Bar &operator=(const Bar &rhs) { X = rhs.X; }
};

void foo(Bar &b, Bar &b2)
{
    b = Bar(1);
    b2.X = 1;
}

int main()
{
    Bar b(0);
    Bar b2(0);
    foo(b, b2);
    cout << b.X << ", " << b2.X; // prints 1, 1
}

Pass references by value (C# / Java)

class Bar
{
   public int X;
   public Bar(int x) { X = x; }
}

void foo(Bar b, Bar b2)
{
    b = new Bar(1);
    b2.X = 1;
}

int main()
{
    Bar b = new Bar(0);
    Bar b2 = new Bar(0);
    foo(b, b2);
    Console.Write("{0}, {1}", b.X. b2.X); // prints 0, 1
}

Answer 41

Closure == lambda. In reality, they are distinct things: lambda is any anonymous function, and may or may not close over some variables; closure is any function that closes over some variables, and may or may not be anonymous. For example, the original Pascal had no lambdas, but it had closures (in form of nested functions).

Answer 42

Q: "Where did you get this file?"
A: "I got it offline."

Answer 43

Declaration != Definition

I heard so many times people confusing the two that now I confuse them myself.

Answer 44

Hang == crash == some error message the user didn't even read.

Answer 45

IDE != framework

Q: "What frameworks do you consider yourself to be proficient in?"

A: "Visual Studio"

Not mine, but a friend told me this yesterday. About died, both from laughing too hard and crying over the sad state of humanity.

Answer 46

One that really turned my head around was someone in my QA department referring to a null value and a blank value as being one and the same. I smiled and asked if they were serious and they said, "of course they're the same." I tried to explain as simply as I could that they were not the same and it just didn't register with them.

/matt

Answer 47

Search box != Address Bar

Time after time, people type a Url in the search box ( be it Google, Yahoo, Bing, Teoma )

Answer 48

PowerPoint Presentation == Any Computerbased Presentation (not necessary made with PowerPoint)

Always when I hear People talking about a presentation made and presented with computer and projector, they say "PowerPoint presentation" because they haven't got any term which is more general. Most of them use OpenOffice, in fact.

Answer 49

PC != Windows

PC means personal computer. Apple invented the PC. But, now it's taken a life of its own as anything that has Windows on it.

In this same vein, people tend to compare "Mac" or "PC" when it should be "OS X" or "Windows"... or "Mac vs. ThinkPad/Satellite"

Of course, that would be more difficult to put into an ad.

Answer 50

In many video-games, I see computer controlled players labeled "CPU".

CPU != Bot

Answer 51

I get this one way too often:

"Specification" == "Suggestion"

When you're on a hardware team and you have software teams treating your hardware specs as "optional guidelines", it makes you want to slap somebody.