The SAM Jargon Buster

What is a Web Server?
A Web server is a software application that can be installed on the aggregation server to run the SAM Web site.

What is a Workstation?
Workstations are computers that a student uses to access one of our products or a teacher/administrator uses to access SAM. The SAM client will be loaded on teacher and administrator workstations. Applications such as READ 180 will be loaded onto student workstations.

What is LAN?
A Local-Area Network is a relatively small group of computers running on a network inside a building. Products powered by SAM can run on a LAN.

What is WAN? Does SAM work on a WAN?
A Wide-Area Network is a large group of computers running on a network within a finite set of connected buildings. Centrally hosted applications, such as curriculum software and/or a Web browser are accessible from anywhere within the WAN. Products powered by SAM are WAN-ready. That means they are capable of being centrally hosted and running well across the WAN. However, performance can vary greatly depending on a district’s network infrastructure and the bandwidth of the network connection. We recommend a minimum of a T1 network speed.

What is SIF?
The Schools Interoperability Framework (SIF) brings together vendors, government agencies, state departments of education, and other industry leaders to ensure that K–12 instructional and administrative software applications can share information seamlessly (www.sifinfo.com). SIF is not a product, but rather an industry-supported technical blueprint for primary and secondary (K–12) software that will enable diverse applications to interact and share data now, and in the future.

What is ZIS?
A critical component of SIF is a Zone Integration Server (ZIS), which serves as the data integration broker between SIF-compliant applications.

Is SAM built to SIF standards?
Yes. Scholastic is in the process of developing a SIF agent that will allow easy export of SAM data to a SIF compliant database.

Acronyms at a Glance:
HTTP = HyperText Transfer Protocol—primary protocol used by the World Wide Web.
JBOSS = open source implementation of J2EE (Java 2 Platform Enterprise Edition)
JDK = Java Development Kit—a Software Development Kit (SDK) for producing Java programs
LAN = Local-Area Network
MySQL = open source database server (Structured Query Language)
SAM = Scholastic Achievement Manager
SIF = School Interoperability Framework
SIS = Student Information System
SRC = Scholastic Reading Counts!
SRI = Scholastic Reading Inventory
T1 Carrier = Dedicated telephone connection line supporting data rates of 1.544Mbits per second
TOC = Total Cost of Ownership
WAN = Wide-Area Network
XML = eXtensible Markup Language
ZIS = Zone Integration Server