Mauz's Active Worlds Pages: Active Worlds Glossary

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z 3

Some terms, words and phrases commonly used in Active Worlds.

A

Account: Citizenship
Action: Field in object's property box for building commands
Activate: Building command that triggers a command with a mouse-click
Active Worlds: The first universe, owned by AWI
Activeworlds Corp.: The company that owned AW until July 2002
Activeworlds, Inc.: Subsidiary of Activeworlds Corp. until July 2002
Activeworlds.com: Former name of Activeworlds company years 1999 - 2001
Administration Tool: Program to run and maintain world server
AFK mode: Away From Keyboard mode, activated from AFK button, that puts letters AFK next to your name on contact list
AlphaWorld: The main world in Active Worlds universe, oldest and biggest
Ambient light: General, absolute light of the environment that has no direction but shines equally on all polygons; natural illumination outside the model
Animate: Building command to make animations
Animation: Moving or changing objects or applying sequences of bitmaps to them frame by frame with animate command
Area is full: See Cell data limit
Astart: Building command to start a stopped animation
Astop: Building command to stop a running animation
Atdump: ASCII representation of the world attribute database, accessible from World Features window: title, backdrop, ground object, refresh rate, caretakers, world rights, home page, object password, welcome message, etc
Attribute database: World attributes accessible from World Features window: title, backdrop, ground object, refresh rate, caretakers, world rights, home page, object password, welcome message, etc
Avatar: 1. Person's or bot's graphical representation, "looks" inside AW, human or non-human; 2. Certain user
Avatar collision: World option that lets avatars bump into each other, instead of going through
Avatar list: List of avatar forms available to wear in the current world
Avatar menu: 1. The menu in the top of the AW window that contains the avatar list; 2. List of commands to perform to a specific user, like Mute, Add To Contacts, Eject, or Whisper, accessible by right-clicking the avatar or their chat line
AW: 1. Active Worlds universe; 2. AlphaWorld; 3. See AWB
AWB: Active Worlds browser, program to use AW
AWC: See Activeworlds Corp.
AWCI: See Activeworlds Corp.
AWCOM: See Activeworlds Corp.
AWEC: Active Worlds Events Committee
AWGate: The default landing spot in AW universe; starting world if no other home coordinates are set
AWHS: The AlphaWorld Historical Society
AWI: See Activeworlds, Inc
AWLD: 1. See Activeworlds Corp.; 2. Stock quote symbol of Activeworlds Corp. in NASDAQ
AWSchool: World for Building School
AWTA: Active Worlds Travel Agency
AWUniv: World for Active Worlds University

B

Backdrop: Stationary background picture, defined in world settings
Backdrop color: Background color surrounding the world, behind backdrop picture
Background music: MIDI files
Bandwidth: Speed of net connection, the amount of data that can be transmitted, in kilobytes per second
Beta: New version of AW that is still under development, tested by citizens accepted in the beta test program
BI: See Building Inspector
Bilinear filtering: RenderWare3 uses 3D card's bilinear texture filtering ability to determine pixel colors by calculating interpolated or average values for them. It makes texture look more blurry but also smooth and realistic instead of blocky
Bot: Automated avatar or utility, usually programmed with AW SDK
Bounding box: Yellow wireframe box that shows up when selecting object, used for collision detection
Building: Adding and changing objects from Object Properties window or with a bot
Building Inspector: Comments made by AW program when building, about not being allowed to encroach, reach cell data limit, use objects that are not in registry, build inside restricted radius, etc

C

CA: Captain America, greeter in America world
Camera: Viewer's view into the scene
Caretaker: World caretakers can change the world rights and other attributes, build within Restricted Radius, change object's owner, edit the ejection list etc
Cell data limit: Capacity of world database cells: 1500 (setting: normal), 2500 (large), or 4000 (huge) bytes of data, consisting of object names, action and description fields
Chat log: Text file where chat is saved. Automatic logging set in Options saves chat window content except telegrams as ASCII text file
Citizen: User with a registered citizenship
Citizen attributes: Window accessible for citizens from Options menu to set citizen name, password, email address for official contacts, privilege password, home page etc
Citizen number: Citizen's registration number
Clamp: RWX textureaddressmode command mode to hold the texture down to the edge color when UV coordinates fall outside the range 0 to 1. Other modes are wrap for tiled textures (default) and mirror for tiled but alternately flipped textures
Clipping plane: A distance beyond which objects are not shown. Restricted by RenderWare3 to 400 meters
Clump: RWX file section
COF: Circe of Fire, changed name to Activeworlds.com in 1999 when bought by Vanguard Enterprises
Collision detection: Algorithm that checks if objects are intersecting
ComReg: Active Worlds Community Register
Contacts: Personal list of max 100 citizens for seeing if they are online, sending telegrams, joining them, getting their home page etc
Coordinate: North/south, west/east and altitude values that determine the location in a world. 1 AW coordinate = 10 meters
Corona: Corona building command for creating halo effects with a transparent image, a bit like sprite
Ctrl: Avatars can move at a faster pace by pressing Ctrl key while moving
Customs Aide: Bot used in Activeworlds company owned worlds to greet, instruct and perform language control
Cy: First avatar in AW
Cy Awards: See The Cy Awards

D

Description: Field in object's property box for object description text; content shows in a yellow tooltip box when mouse hovers over the object
Diffuse: Diffuse component of the surface lighting properties in a model specifies shading or how much light source shines on polygons: more brightly on polygons facing the light source, but not at all on polygons that face away
Directional light: Light source that shines in a particular direction, such as world's main light source
DirectSound: Audio subsystem, part of DirectX
DirectX: A set of API program libraries developed by Microsoft for high-performance applications like games. AW 3.x needs DirectX 7.0 or later
Download window: Shows progress of copying world objects from object server, three at a time. Accessible with F3 key or Show - Downloads

E

ED: See Eminent Domain
Ejecting: Removing avatar from world, blocking them from coming in from a certain IP address for a certain period of time
Eminent Domain: World right to delete properties of other citizens and in non-registry worlds also change an object's owner
Encroachment: Building over somebody else's property. Object registry prevents encroaching
Examine: Building command to allow viewer to rotate the object with the mouse
Expiring: Citizenship or world license running out after a year

F

Facing: After the coordinates in the location information at AW window's title bar, showing the point of compass where one's avatar is looking at
File transfer: Sending a picture, text or other file to some citizen in Contacts list
Filmstrip: JPEG texture which has bigger height than width so that it shows one frame at a time in an animated sequence when displayed in AW
Firewall: Program or equipment to filter or prevent net traffic from accessing the computer freely
First person mode: Viewpoint into AW is like looking with own eyes
Flying: Changing avatar's altitude with numberpad +/- keys
Fog: World property that makes objects' color become more and more the same as the world's backdrop color as they recede into the distance, creating fog-like effect
Frame: 1. Image seen in AW graphics window; 2. One step in animate command animation
Frame rate: Number of animation frames displayed per second; frequency with which image is regenerated
Freelook mode: Viewpoint can be changed with mouse

G

Galaxy: Universe with only one world
Gatekeeper: Volunteer citizen greeting and helping in AWGate and JunoDome
Gesture: Avatar's gesture-like movement or action, automatically or with gesture button
GET: Garbage Elimination Team
GK: See Gatekeeper
Gravity: Property of a world with a ground object that lets avatar fall and climb along obstacles
Grayscale mask: Multibit BMP file instead of monochrome one to let pixels in a texture be just partly transparent
Green world: Open world, world where everybody can enter
Ground Zero: The center point of a world, coordinates 0N 0W (0 North, 0 West), default landing point
GZ: See Ground Zero

H

Home: 1. Landing point when entering AW. Universe or browser specific default world unless set with Teleport - Remember; 2. Keyboard shortcut for first-person mode
Home page: 1. The web page that people see in internal web window when entering world; 2. Citizen's own web page, set in citizen attributes and accessible to others from Contacts list

I

Immigrating: Registering citizenship
Immigration Officer: Program's announcements like universe and world welcome messages
IO: See Immigration Officer
Internal web browser: Integrated custom Internet Explorer control window to the right side of the AW window
IP address: Computer's network address, consisting of four 1 - 3 digit numbers. Either permanent (static) or changing with every connection (dynamic), esp. with modems

J

Joining: Teleporting to the same location as somebody chosen from Contacts list
JunoDome: The default landing spot for Juno users who have downloaded their browser from Juno website

K

Keyboard mode: Moving one's avatar with the keyboard arrow keys

L

Light: Building command to make the object emit light into the surrounding scene
Lightsampling: RWX light sampling type, either facet (flat) or vertex (smooth, gradual)
Local path: Option for AW to check for objects and textures first from a directory on local hard disk before downloading them from the object server
Local teleport: Teleporting to a location in the same world
Login: Entering AW, using citizen name and password,/dd>

M

Mask: A bitmap pattern in BMP format applied to a texture, having shades of darkness to determine which parts of the actual texture appear transparent in AW and which opaque
Message set: File to customize AW's menus, dialogs, buttons, program messages etc for instance into another language. Default message set is Default.awm
MIP-mapping: A texture filtering technique used by RenderWare3 to generate scaled down versions of textures beforehand, and then use a more detailed version when object is close, and a less detailed one when it is further away
Miswhisper: Whispering to wrong person
Model: Computer-generated 3D object simulating some real target, in RenderWare or TrueSpace format
Mouse mode: Moving one's avatar with the mouse
Move: Building command for moving object
MP3: Sound file encoded (compressed) in the MPEG-3 format
MPL: Metatropolis Public Liason
Muting: Command to prevent seeing that user's chat text anymore until they re-enter AW

N

Name: Building command to assign a name to an object so that it can be referenced by an action on another object
Newsgroups: Discussion groups using Network News (NNTP) protocol. The official newsgroups for AW citizens are at news://news.activeworlds.com. There are also other AW related newsgroups, run by private citizens
Noise: Building command to play music file on top of other sounds and just once instead looping

O

o: After name: cyber-engaged or cyber-married
Object: 1. 3-D shape, model; 2. Model used as a building block in AW
Object errors: Object download error notifications printed to the chat window
Object password: Password used for encrypting object zip files
Object Properties window: Shows up when right-clicking an object in a world where object selection is allowed. Editable in building worlds
Object refresh time: Interval how often AW will look for updated versions of the objects
Object path: Web site where objects are downloaded from
Object selection: Getting Object Properties window by right-clicking object
Opacity: Not being see-through, or degree of model's transparency
Operator: Subprogram that announces received telegrams
OpenGL: A 3D graphics program library that may be available as an option in AW 3.2 for Windows NT support

P

Peacekeeper: Volunteer citizen maintaining order and investigating harassment cases
Pitch: Rotation along X axis
Pixel: Picture element with coordinates and color that textures are made of, or rendered onto computer screen by the 3D engine
PK: See Peacekeeper
Polygon: Vertices connected by sides in a model that define a plane in 3D space
Prelight: Pre-light vertex coloring gives values for RenderWare3 to use as starting values when computing the effect of lighting on an object
Private world: World where entering is restricted to certain citizens by Enter rights list
Privilege password: Secret code that a citizen can set for themselves and give others so that when they assume it under Login menu, they get that citizen's public speaking, eject etc rights and can build with their property. Also used for running bots
Propdump: ASCII representation of the world property database
Property: 1. The objects citizen has built; 2. World database cell data like object's builder, building time, coordinates, orientation, file name, description and action field contents
Proxy: Server used by many ISPs (Internet Service Providers) to cache web downloads locally in order to decrease net traffic
PS: See Public speaker
Public speaker: World right that gives bold text when speaking and access to special avatars

Q

Quad: Polygon with 4 vertices or 2 triangles

R

Rating: See World rating
Red world: See Private world
Refresh: See Object refresh time
Registering: Getting citizenship
Registry: List of object names and sizes that prevents builders from building with any other objects or over other people's property (encroaching)
Rendering: Creating a 2D computer image out of 3D data by the graphics engine real-time
RenderWare: 3D graphics library and engine by Criterion that AW models mainly use
Restricted Radius: The limited area around Ground Zero where only caretakers and those with Special Objects right can build or run bots
Reunion: Real world users gathering
RGB: Red, green and blue component of color, from 0 (no color) to 1 (full-on color) or 255 in 8-bit scale
Roll: Rotation along Z axis
Rotate: Building command for rotating object around its axis or axes
RW: 1. RenderWare, abbr.; 2. Real World, abbr.
RWX: Extension for files using RenderWare scripting language

S

Scale: RWX command to change the size of the model
SDK: Software Development Kit, for programming bots and other utilities for AW
Seq: Avatar animation sequence, defined by .seq file
Shift: Avatars can go through objects by pressing Shift key while moving, unless it is disabled in world options
Sound: Building command to attach a background sound to an object
Sound effects: WAV and MP3 files
Special avatars: Five extra avatars that only public speakers can use
Special Commands: World right to restrict who can use move and rotate commands when building
Special Objects: World right to restrict who can build with z objects. People with z object right can also build within the Restricted Radius
Specularity: Glare component of surface properties, making the side directly facing the world light source brighter; similar to diffuse but with a higher threshold. Not supported by RenderWare3 because it would require multi-pass rendering, adding properties in multiple passes
Splash screen: Program's startup picture
Sprite: Facer; axis-aligned model rotated to face the viewer
Standalone mode: Using AW without connection to universe server, so other users can't be seen, telegrams can't be sent, buildings don't stay etc. Entered by clicking Skip button when starting AW
Support: AW's technical help staff at support@activeworlds.com
Surface: RWX command setting surface lighting properties, with ambient, diffuse and specular components

T

Tabs: Vertical list windows to the left of AW screen: Worlds, Contacts, Help, Telegrams, Teleports
Tag: 1. RWX command that tells the avatar parts for the seq files; 2. Animate command argument to apply animation only to certain tagged polygon of the object
Telegram: Max 255-character text message to a citizen, instantly delivered or stored in universe server until the receiver comes online
Teleport: 1. Model that a user can pass through or activate to automatically go to a new place; 2. To change place via teleport object or Teleport menu, Teleports list or Worlds list
Terrain: Continuos, editable ground, that can have raised or lowered sections by modifying its elevation grid
Texture: A bitmap pattern added to a model; image file made up of pixels. AW uses JPEG format
Texture mapping: 1. A bitmap added to a model; 2. Adding a graphic pattern to the polygons of a 3D scene
The Cy Awards: Awards for accomplished users and community groups, voted for by users
Third person mode: Viewpoint into AW is from above and behind from own avatar
Titan's Guild: Old group of object makers and builders, owned Winter world
Title: World title text shown in AW browser's title bar or when a location is saved into Teleports list
Toolbar: Icon button bar in top of AW window with buttons for e.g. teleporting into previous or next scene visited, changing view, or keyboard/mouse movement mode
Tourist: User who has not paid for citizenship or is not logging in as a citizen; can only enter worlds that have enabled tourist access
Trial world: Free world for 30 days, hosted by Activeworlds company
Transparency: Being partly see-through or not visible at all
Triangle: Polygon with 3 vertices
Trigger: Building command about how to start an action: when coming in to view (create), when colliding (bump), when clicking (activate), or when animation ends (adone)

U

Universe: Worlds with common universe server, citizenship database and universe attributes like starting world and browser version. Can be bought from Activeworlds company
Universe server: Computer program that runs the universe keeping track of worlds, citizenships, citizens online, telegrams, avatar locations, universe-wide ejections etc
URL: Universal Resource Locator, web address, often preceded by http://
UTN: Universal Town Network
UV coordinates: Horizontal and vertical texture coordinates. Numbers higher than 1.0 will make the texture tile and negative numbers will mirror it

V

Vertex: Point in a model
Video memory: Amount of RAM memory in computer's graphics accelerator hardware
Visibility: How far you see in a world. Can be set by user between 22 to 120 meters. Even if visibility is set below 120 m, it can rise to that if frame rate is good
VRT: Virtual Reality Time invented and used in AW: GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) - 2 hours, without daylight savings

W

Warp: Building command that teleports inside a world by gradually moving the avatar to the new place
Web window: See Internal web browser
Welcome message: The message that the Immigration Officer says to the people who enter the world
WFS: Waiting for Server message in the lower bar of the AW window, telling that the connection to the world or universe server has been lost
Whisper: Private person-to-person chat. Shows up with blue italics in chat window
Wireframe: Mode or model where only outlined edges of polygons are shown without being filled in
WM: See Welcome message
World: A virtual environment inside AW universe, computer-generated model that can be experienced as if it were a place. (Cf. chat room, IRC channel.) Can be bought from Activeworlds company
World rating: Suggestion about world content, based on MPAA movie rating: G = General Audiences, PG = Parental Guidance, R = Restricted, X = X-rated
World rights: Caretaker can give rights for certain citizens in World Rights dialog: Enter, Build, Eminent Domain, Special Objects, Special Commands, Public Speaker, Eject, Bots, Speak
World server: Program that runs the world, maintains the content database and connects it to the universe server
World size: Distance in coordinates from Ground Zero to the end of the buildable area
Worlds.inc: Creator and previous owner of AW

X

X axis: Horizontal axis

Y

Y axis: Vertical axis
Yaw: Rotation along Y axis

Z

Z axis: Depth axis
Z-Buffering: 1. Algorithm keeping track of the Z-depth of pixels so that hidden parts can be left out before rendering; 2. Intersecting objects or the lag caused by rendering them
Z objects: Objects whose name starts with z, used to restrict certain objects from common builders by a world rights setting

3

3D: Containing Z (depth) axis as well as X (width) and Y (height)
3D Card: 3D graphics accelerator/video card. AW 3.x requires a 3D card to make frame rate faster, because a 3D card can do 3D object handling calculations and texturemapping itself, instead of using computer's processor

Mauz's Active Worlds Pages: Active Worlds Glossary

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