Project Manager’s Total Guide to Web Dev Terminology
At Dodgy Code, we pride ourselves on speaking frankly and clearly with eachother and our clients. Even so, web development can come with some fairly technical vocabulary and a lot of accidental overlap with other industries!
We hope this guide serves well as a quick reference, especially to all the fledgling PMs entering our field 🖤
A/B Testing
“We’re looking to do some A/B testing for the new sign-up page”
In order to trial changes to a web product, A/B testing involves releasing two versions of an experience and measuring the success of each.
Accessibility
“Accessibility is really important to us and our site users.”
Web accessibility is an important aspect of creating websites and other web products. It refers to methods, patterns, and rules websites needs to follow in order to provide a usable and positive experience to all users, regardless of their abilities or limitations. Accessibility is wrongly associated with only blind or deaf users, but it actually encompasses a wider net of concerns. A common social media tag for accessibility content is #a11y.
Different certifications, regulations, and laws apply to accessibility. The major sources for this are WCAG (Global), ADA Compliance (American), 508 Compliance (American). Evaluate accessibility needs based on your client’s locale and the input of an accessibility expert.
Adobe
“Can you send over an Adobe file for the designs?”
Adobe is a software suite used by designers to create images, page designs, and other elements. Programs include: Illustrator, Photoshop, InDesign. Your employer (or clients) may use Figma, Affinity, or others instead.
Affinity
“We use the Affinity suite for our designs”
Affinity is a software suite used by designers to create images, page, designs, and other elements. Your employer (or clients) may use Adobe, Figma, or others instead.
Analytics
“We need to put analytics on the website, can your team help?”
Analytics is the collection of data, most notably data that provides context to how users are interacting with the product. Analytics can be performed using custom data collection, or through the use of analytics applications, trackers, and integrations.
Common analytics providers include: Google (GA4), Plausible, Fathom, HotJar, Heap, and Matomo.
API
“We’re using an API to connect Salesforce to the website.”
APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) are a way for two or more applications to communicate. This communication can be one-way or bi-directional between the two. APIs have documented methods and rules for interacting with them.
Apple
“Apple doesn’t support the technology yet / It looks broken on Apple”
Apple is the manufacturer of MacOS (desktop), iOS (mobile), iPhones, Macbooks, Mac Computers etc. They also are the developers of the Safari browser. When clients say “Apple” you’ll typically need to get specifics on what devices they’re referring to, and when developers say “Apple” they’re generally referring to the company itself.
Artificial Intelligence (AI)
“We want to add AI to the website.”
AI is the new hot trend in technology spaces, however the term is often used very loosely. Many clients hear about the trend and don’t fully understand what it is, and what value is can or can’t add. Types of Artificial Intelligence in our field include: ChatGPT (generates text content, answers questions), Image Generation, Image Manipulation, and Chat Bots.
Marketing AI solutions involve teaching the AI program from a set of already available information, and the AI forms patterns from that information. The AI is limited to what it’s been exposed to (which can be collected both ethically or unethically).
Developers and data experts use the term AI differently than marketing teams, and some translation may be necessary. To the scientists, AI is technology that can make decisions on its own, and Models (often Large Language Models or LLMs) are the ChatGPTs, Chat Bots, and similar.
Asana
“We added the issue to Asana / Can you join our Asana project?”
Asana is a program used for Project Management. It supports both internal-only project management and allows for inviting clients into projects, or vendors into the client’s Asana account.
AVIF
“The photo is an AVIF”
AVIF is a format for image files, just like PNG, JPEG, WEBP. It’s a newer format that’s smaller in size than traditional .png and .jpeg images, this is a good format for web loading speeds but some systems may not recognise it yet as an image when uploading.
Backend
“We’re still working on the backend, as our backend dev was on vacation.”
Backend refers to the portions of the web product that are not visible within the web browser. This typically includes logic, data storage and manipulation, and functionality. Some clients or staff refer to “backend” when they actually mean the management panel of a CMS.
Basecamp
“We’re on Basecamp if you want to log the issues there.”
Another online project management tool, with capabilities to add contributors or share with clients.
Bug
“We found a bug on the homepage”
Bugs are broken portions of a website. They can be visual bugs (things seen on the page) or functionality bugs (incorrect or unexpected behaviour when interacting). Sometimes clients confuse bugs with requests for new functionality, or mistake features for bugs.
Project Managers should triage whether the request really is a bug, and inform the developer of what happens, where they can observe it, which devices are impacted, and what behaviours lead to exposing the bug.
Blockchain
“Our program uses blockchain technology”
Blockchain is a hot trendy word in the 2020s, and it refers to technology that was originally developed to manage cryptocurrency. Some surprising industries have adopted it for their own uses, but all you really need to know is that it isn’t really considered website development (progams and web apps may develop using it), and it’s a way for information to be submitted in a very secured, transactional ledger, way.
Block Builder
“We made a block builder tool for that section”
Block building web tools have earned widespread recognition, particularly with the “DIY” style of web programs like Wix and Squarespace. Block builders are authoring tools provided for content management where the author is expected to add content blocks with pre-made fields. They re-order, edit, remove, and add blocks at will within the tool. These blocks are coded to make web elements appear on the site, matching the selections and field data input by the content author.
Breakpoints
“There’s a few breakpoints where things look bad”
Breakpoints are specific browser window sizes where a site’s design breaks down into a new format (due to the limitations of width and height). Some programmers develop using specific screen sizes to indicate when different formatting should be used, while others take more fluid approaches. Dodgy Code takes the fluid approach.
Burnout
“We want to make sure that we don’t cause burnout”
Listen, we know that you already know… burnout is when folks are overworked, overscheduled, exhausted, and fed up. But we’re including it because our Project Managers have the biggest impact on burnout.
Check up on your team, proactively move due dates to give breathing room, pad your timing promises, and do your best to keep a “how can I help?” tone with your assignees. This will prevent burnout and make you our favourite PM, with better quality results too!
Cache
“I think the webpage must be cached”
Caching is a method in which data is rendered or calculated and then stored as-is. Instead of re-rendering or re-calculating, the originally stored data is retrieved. Browsers cache data and webpages, and many websites also cache imagery and other elements. Clearing the cache will force the web application to create fresh data. Caching can be implemented on several levels: browser, application, or network.
Call to Action (CTA)
“We need to add a CTA to the program pages”
There’s some slight differentiation on this one depending on where you work, but we all agree that it involves an attention grabbing link.
Dodgy Code parks in the camp of “A CTA is the combination of elements, such as text, images, etc. that grabs the user’s attention and directs them to act. The act is most often to click on a button or link provided with the other CTA elements”. Some places think a CTA is just the link/button itself, which seems silly to us.
ChatGPT
“We can use ChatGPT instead of hiring a Copywriter”
ChatGPT is a specific text generating program that is used as the catch-all term for any text generating AI (much like Kleenex with tissues). It is able to form answers to questions and generates content based on the data in its system. Your mileage may vary, in terms of its success.
Code Repository (“Repo”)
“I just need to push that change onto the repo”
Code repositories are where code edits are stored. They are often version controlled, and accessible by multiple developers. Most modern repositories are stored on cloud-based applications.
Content Delivery Network (CDN)
“The page loads really slow for the UK team, maybe we need a CDN?”
CDNs are networks of interconnected servers that speed up webpage loading for data-heavy applications. Instead of delivering data from one potentially far away server, it is instead loaded from the geographically nearest server. This makes the browsing experience consistent for all users, and much faster for farther away users.
Content Management System (CMS)
“You’ll need to edit that in the CMS”
Content management systems are web programs created to allow people to edit web content in a control panel. The content they add to the panel is hooked into the editable portions of the website, applying changes in realtime once saved. Some systems have advanced features that assist with managing website elements outside of content (redirects, functionality, SEO etc). A CMS can be either purchased from a company that creates them, installed as an open-source program, or built from scratch.
Examples of CMS: Wordpress, Shopify, Craft CMS, Statamic, Kirby, Contentful, Webflow, Drupal, Magento, Umbraco, Sanity, 11ty, etc.
Component
“We should add a component for displaying videos”
Components are collections of on-screen information that form an identifiable design pattern. Components can be standalone or a collection of smaller elements that create one cohesive group.
Compositions (“Comp”)
“This page doesn’t match the comp”
The comp is a reference file created by designers to show how the product should look. Developers use the comp as their guide for translating the design into a real online interface. The best design comps account for responsive layouts, have well-thought hierarchy and patterns, and contain measurements for elements and text.
Cookies
“The site uses cookies to determine if the user already has a cart”
Cookies are small packets of data that a website creates and stores for the duration of a user’s interaction with a web based product. They can be used to facilitate functionality (remembering a user is logged in, keeping a a shopping cart populated across page visits…) or for marketing data. There are several laws and regulations, depending on locale, that impact the collection and storage of cookie data.
Copy / Copywriter / Copywriting
“I need new copy for the About pages”
Copy refers to text content. Copywriters are people who create text content, and Copywriting is the action of making text content.
Cron Job
I’ve added a cron job that runs every friday at midnight”
Cron jobs are server-side commands that automatically run on a schedule.
Cryptocurrency
“We want to add cryptocurrency as a payment option”
Let us a take a moment to acknowledge that Dodgy Code does not support the use of cryptocurrency, and has a moral stance against its creation and usage. That said, cryptocurrency is digitally created money that is mined from electronic efforts. Forbes has an entire article that gets into the nitty gritty: https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/cryptocurrency/what-is-cryptocurrency/. As a PM, some payment processors can handle it, some can’t. Refer to your dev team and company policies.
Change Order
“We’ll need a change order before we can start development”
Change orders are add-on agreements to the original scope. Ideally, they’re made in writing and signed off by the client to act as a contracted extension of the original scope requirements.
CRM Software
“We’re integrating their CRM with the contact form”
CRM software is used by sales teams and marketers for the storing of user information and the management of sales leads. CRM is the abbreviation for “customer relationship management”.
Common CRMs include: Hubspot, Salesforce, Marketo, Mailchimp, etc.
CSS (Stylesheets, Sass, Less)
“We need to update the CSS for those logo elements”
How a site or application looks results from its “styles”, which are coded either directly on the webpage or in a set of reference files called “style sheets”.
CSS (cascading style sheets) is the code format for writing style sheets, and is often used as a broad term for the project’s style code as a whole. Modern development has resulted in a few frameworks for expanding on CSS, examples of which include Sass and Less.
Database (DB)
“We need to backup the database, and then add a new table for the users.”
Many, but not all, forms of web development involve storing data on a database. The “SQL” used in database naming is often pronounsed “sequal” or as the individual letters. The “DB” is pronounced as letters.
Commonly Used Web Databases:
MySQL, PostgreSQL, MSSQL, SQLite, MongoDB, Redis, MariaDB
DDOS Attack
“We think the site is being DDOS’d please help!”
DDOS Attacks are a type of cyber attack made where intentionally huge amounts of traffic are sent to a site all at once. This overloads the server and prevents the site from working, causing errors or infinite load times. DDOS can be pronounced as letters or as “D-doss”. Seek immediate assistance from a server provider or specialist.
Deliverable
“We need a list of deliverables and when they’ll be received”
As the name implies, deliverables are the “things that will be delivered”. These can range from a document, feedback, or design all the way to a fully built website or application.
Deployment
“We’re ready for deployment, once the client gives the go ahead”
Deployment is when code is sent from one environment to another, usually to push changes live. Most modern development uses deployment tools to automate all the steps involved with securing new changes.
Design System
“We’ll add this element to the existing design system”
Design systems are documented catalogues of components and styles used within a product, with clear intentions on how and why each should be implemented.
DevOps
“Once we finish the DevOps tasks, we can start building the app”
DevOps is a short hand form of “Developer Operations” and refers the the server and networking portions of development. For many, DevOps is a separate skillset from either Backend or Frontend development.
Digital Divide
“To combat the digital divide, we ensure sites work on slower networks”
The digital divide refers to a gap in experience between those with access to high performing technology and internet access, and those without. We have a 2023 conference talk devoted to this subject, feel free to check it out:
“Mind the Gap: What’s left behind when we build for the cutting edge?”
https://craftcms.com/events/dot-all-2022/sessions/mind-the-gap-whats-left-behind-when-we-build-for-the-cutting-edge
Div
“I’m probably missing a div or something that’s causing it to break”
Web developers often toss out web elements in their vocabularly, forgetting that PMs probably don’t know what they are. This one happens a lot, Divs refer to the <div> element. These are used in code to provide separation of elements, and a lot of styling relies on their placement and usage.
DNS
“The site went down because the DNS was setup incorrectly”
DNS (Domain Name System) is the internet’s address book for connecting domain names to IP addresses. It’s responsible for connecting browser requests to websites, by taking the URL and using it to locate the network server address for the website.
Domain
“We’re changing our domain from .net to .com”
The domain is the core portion of a web address, and must be purchased and renewed to claim ownership. Domains are assigned to server addresses, making it possible to reach websites using them.
https://medium.com/p/5e1f7e14b5b
For this webpage, the domain is medium.com
Dropbox
“We can send you the files through dropbox”
An online tool for file sharing, which requires an account to use.
Encryption
“Passwords are encrypted”
Encryption is a security method used to scramble data and prevent it from being usable if it’s ever snatched by hackers. It requires a “key” or cipher to unscramble, so advanced methods can sometimes still un-encrypt things.
End of Day (EOD)
“This should be done by EOD”
Welcome to the nuances of the digital age! If you work with remote teams, especially remote developers, establish what EOD is for the developer. For many, this could be midnight in their timezone. This field has a lot of members that adjust their quiet coding time around the best focus times, and clearing this up can save on stress.
Figma
“The designer shared a Figma with us for the new site”
Figma is an online application used for creating designs. It competes with Adobe software for use in creating website compositions.
First Party
“We only approve first party plug-ins”
First-party is a term used when referring to add ons or plug-ins. It indicates that the add-on code is provided and maintained by the team responsible for the original application.
Framework
“Their frontend developers rely on the TailwindCSS framework”
Frameworks are collections of coding (or design) patterns used as a method of standardising or speeding up development. Frameworks exist for all aspects of development — from backend code setups, to frontend layouts, and design patterns too. Developers and designers can become very heated in their defense or hatred of particular frameworks.
Frontend
“That’s a task for our frontend developer”
Frontend refers to development aspects involved with styles, layouts, interactivity, animations, and other visual user concerns.
Full-Stack
“The new hire is a full-stack developer”
Full-Stack developers are those who have developed expertise in all three areas of web development: Backend, Frontend, and DevOps.
Git
“I’ve merged the edits on Git, and just need client approval”
This is the most common platform used for making code repositories. It provides robust version control for code edits.
GDPR
“How can we make the site GDPR compliant?”
GDPR is the European data privacy law that has influenced the creation of similar data privacy laws on a global level. GDPR impacts the collection and treatment of user data, and is enforced by individual data protection agencies across European countries. Fines can be severe.
Hamburger Menu
“I’m not seeing the hamburger in the navigation bar”
We wish this was real hamburgers. Alas, it is only the typical three-line menu icon used to indicate a website menu. You see these mostly on mobile but sometimes they can be used on desktop sizes too. Hamburger is three horizontal lines, there’s some other ones too.
Headless
“Maybe a headless solution would work best for this?”
Headless refers to the development practise of creating a product without a native user-interface or CMS attached. The application or site instead connects to data using an API.
Hero
“The contact page’s hero is too large”
On web pages, the hero is the area containing the page’s top headline and any other elements grouped with it. This region can vary from basic text, to images and video, or components with buttons and links.
Homebrew
“Their old site was a homebrew setup”
Homebrew refers to a setup that is custom created, but has the quality of home-made or DIY. This term is not often used in a positive way.
Hosting
“We need to discuss hosting costs for the new website”
Hosting refers to the server setup for a web product, including any tools or accounts needed to make the product appear publically online. This can include networking, servers, CDNs, domains, deployment tools, etc.
HTML (“Markup”)
“We think the issue is in the markup, not in the styles”
HTML is a markup language in which web pages are written. It provides the structure to which styles are attached, and is the core structure of any website or application.
Integration
“They’ve asked us for an integration with Spotify”
Integrations are tools and/or custom code that allows one application to interact with another. This can be done through the use of APIs or other means, but do note that not every platform is compatible with others.
Jank
“That new image gallery is too janky, we need to re-do it”
Jank describes subpar functionality in a web interface that hinders or disrupts user activity. Long loading times, delayed movement, jitter, lags etc. are all forms of jankiness.
Javascript (JS)
“I have styles done, but still need to do the JS”
Javascript is a coding language used on websites to provide interactivity, dynamic content, animations, etc. It can interact with and change both HTML and CSS on a webpage.
Jira
“Would you be able to join our Jira?”
Another project management tool with the ability to add contributors.
Jumplink
“We’d like to add some jumplinks at the top of the page”
Also referred to as anchor links, these are links on a web page that connect to content on the same page. This causes the browser to seemingly “jump” to the connected content. Anchor urls are identified by the ‘#’ in their url, and take the format of https://website.com#anchor
Lazyloading
“Maybe we can use lazyloading to help with the slow pages”
Lazyloading is the practiced strategy of loading content on-demand for a web interface. This allows for the prioritisation of critical content before beginning the process of loading low-priority content, thus making the page appear to load “faster” to the interacting user.
Master Service Agreement (MSA)
“Did the new client sign their MSA yet?”
MSAs are long-running agreements that outline how the vendor and client will interact with eachother for the duration of the agreement. This contract is typically used in conjunction with individual project contracts that outline specific work.
Mega Menu
“The designer added a Mega Menu, which is out of scope”
Designers often create the “mega menu” design pattern for navigation tools. In this design pattern, the menu contains a large content area consisting of links, text, and potentially other elements like videos and images. These large navigation menus can be both complex and slow loading, but they remain popular.
Middleware
“This is an app that acts as middleware between the site and its APIs”
While web products often integrate with systems and tools through an API, sometimes that integration is a middleware. With middleware, the middle app communicates between two technologies and bridges the gap to move information across.
Modal
“We’ve designed a modal that includes a reminder to subscribe”
Modal is the fancy term for a pop-up. They can either be triggered by clicking on an element, or programmed to appear on their own.
No-Code Solutions
“That agency uses no-code solutions, they’re a Webflow partner”
No-code solutions are website building tools that are meant to be used without the need for a programmer. No-code development (developers cringe at this terminology) is performed in a user interface.
No-code options include: Webflow, Bravo, Mailchimp, Bubble, Airtable, Coda, Gumroad, Zapier, Typeform, Glide, Softr
Opengraph
“Let’s get opengraph data working before going live”
Opengraph is a protocol that outlines data that should be used by search engines and social media when a link is displayed. The format is used to provide code within the web product that instructs these platforms on what to display when a link is shared.
Open Source
“The library is open source”
Open source software is software with source code that anyone can inspect, modify, and enhance. It is licensed for re-use by others.
Performance
“There’s some major issues with performance on the homepage”
Web performance refers how quickly a page loads, how well it behaves, and how well it meets the objective it’s meant to achieve. Various tools are used to measure performance, including page speed tests, core web vitals, and auditing tools. The golden rule: pages must load in under 3 seconds (and even that’s usually too long).
Privacy
“We can’t add that as it violates privacy laws”
Web privacy encompasses the collection and use of user data. This includes how data is handled, where it is stored, and how it is collected. Many laws and regulations exist globally for how to handle user privacy concerns.
Query
“The URL is missing a query, and that’s why the results are wrong”
The query portion of a URL is the portion that occurs after a question mark, it is used to pass parameters to the code from the URL. These parameters can include search terms, page numbers, and other identifying information.
https://medium.com/?tag=marketing
In this URL, ?tag=marketing is the “query string”.
Redirect
“We audited the site and found a lot of 302 redirects”
Redirects intercept traffic meant for one web address, and send it to another. 301 redirects are permanent, indicating the requested page has been removed and indexes should update to reflect the new address. 302 redirects are temporary, indicating the index does not need to update the address reference.
Responsive
“We’re committed to providing responsive websites”
Responsive refers to how a web interface reacts to the resizing of the browser window. To code responsively means to account for all the stretchy sizes of browser and screen sizes, rather than focusing on several key breakpoints. This concept is also referred to as “mobile responsive”.
Reactive
“They want to make the search results more reactive”
Reactive programming is a modern method of web programming that relies on reactions to user interactions. This method is heavily reliant on Javascript, and framework libraries meant for reactive programming
Common Reactive Setups: Vue, React, Alpine, HTMX, Nuxt, Next
Retainer
“Let’s get the client onto a retainer for next month”
Retainers are vendor/client agreements for long-term work. Retainers are written to cover a set time period (often 6 months, or a year) and feature a set billing scheme that recurs each month. Hour amounts are part of the contract, and each month is pre-paid by the client for the duration of the agreement.
Sitemap
“Looking at the sitemap, the blog should be located under About Us”
The sitemap is a file provided on a website that instructs any indexing bot traffic of the site’s organisational hierarchy. It’s also a team strategy tool for mapping out parent/child relationships for pages within the web product.
Scope of Work (SOW)
“Unfortunately, a new calculator isn’t part of the original SOW”
The scope of work is the contracted agreement of what tasks and activities are included for a given project.
Scope Creep
“The newest requests are scope creep”
Scope creep refers to requests that push the boundaries of what the agreed project scope is. Project managers are responsible for monitoring requests, and flagging ones that are outside the bounds of the contracted scope. Without diligent attention, even small tasks can add up to big overages.
Search Crawlers
“Make sure the testing site is blocked from search crawlers”
Search crawlers are the bot applications run by SERPs (such as Google) to index webpages for their search results.
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
“Using correct HTML tags is important for SEO”
SEO is the process of improving web content, structure, and format to improve search indexing and ranking on search result pages. SEO is subject to varying schools of thought, methodologies, and has become it’s own field of the web industry.
SERP
“SERPs don’t factor description data into result rankings”
SERPs refer to search engine results pages. These are what’s returned when using Google, Bing, Yahoo, and others.
Staging
“The edits were pushed to staging, but aren’t live yet”
Developers often setup a staging environment for reviewing changes with clients, before pushing them live. The staging site is usually a subdomain of the live version, is protected from search indexing, and is used for testing.
Technical Debt
“We can’t meet the new request because of the existing technical debt”
Technical debt is what accumulates when a system is not modernised or updated over time. This debt is often the result of prioritising speedy development or putting off necessary upgrades until they can no longer be ignored. Much like financial debt, there is additional time and cost to managing debt the longer it sits.
Third Party
“I think we can use a 3rd party tool instead of re-inventing the wheel”
Third-party is a term used when referring to add ons or plug-ins. It indicates that the add-on code is provided and maintained outside of the original application, by unrelated organisations.
Transform
“The reason images look weird is an issue with the transform we’re using”
Transforms are treatments applied programatically to images to change their size, format, aspect ratio, or other attributes.
Web App
“Are we making a website or a web app?”
A web application is computer software accessed through a web browser, often connected to a database to provide an interactive experience. Web apps differ from standard websites in that the functionality is far more interactive and complex.
Webp
“We’ve setup all the images to be webp”
Webp is a format for image files, just like PNG, JPEG, AVIF. It’s a newer format that’s smaller in size than traditional .png and .jpeg images, and is great for improving webpage speeds. This format is widely accepted.
Whitespace
“There’s not enough whitespace between the images and text.”
Whitespace (or negative space) is the empty space around web elements and content. It’s used to balance page design, organize content, and improve the user’s visual experience.
Looking for a development team that can bring your project to life?
Find us at https://dodgyco.de and let’s get started!
