People misuse terminology constantly in this field, but if you want to sound professional, the following terms should be used correctly. Also, to have some fun with your nerdy colleagues, see
how to spoof your techie friends and
buffer flush. See also
naming fiascos.
Do Not Mix Up Storage and Memory
Too often, vendors use the term memory for storage. Storage is storage, and memory is where the work gets done. The contents in storage are permanent until erased, which includes hard drives, solid state drives (SSDs) and flash drives. Everything in memory (RAM), where instructions are executed and data are processed, vanishes when the device is turned off. Any new information not saved to storage is lost. See
storage vs. memory and
non-volatile memory.
Bits or Bytes
There are eight bits to a byte and eight pints to a gallon, so saying bits instead of bytes is like saying "10 pints" at a gas station.
Storage is always bytes, but moving bytes from one place to another can be in bits per second or bytes per second. Easy to forget which, so say "gigs" for gigabits and gigabytes and "megs" for megabits and megabytes. Should you need to know all the lingo, see
space/time.
Run, Launch, Load, Start, But Don't Boot
Booting happens when you turn the computer on or select Restart. To run an app in your computer, tablet or phone, say "run," "launch," "load" or "start," but not "boot." See
load and
boot.
Stream or Download
Streaming is live or on-demand broadcast of audio and video content. Although you may be able to pause and continue, streaming is one and done. Downloading stores the file for playback any number of times. Big difference; however, there are also applications that turn streamed content into a file that can be stored. See
streaming and
download.
Installing or Running
Applications are added to your computer wrapped up in an install program, which distributes the files to your storage device. Support people often get the message "my program doesn't run" when it was the installation program that never ran. See
install program.