Terms

Activate: The act of making a site active in a ring.
Active Site: An active site is a site which is actually part of the ring. If someone surfs the ring (moves either forward or backward) he will be moved from active site to active site. The list function also generally displays all of the active sites in the ring.

An active site is expected to meet the criteria of the ring. Thus, if the ring is about turtles, then all of the active sites are expected to have some relationship to turtles. In addition, it is absolutely critical for all active sites to have valid ring fragments on exactly the page specified in the ring control panels. This ensures that a ring can be navigated.
Adoption: Occasionally a ringmaster will tire of managing a ring. It is, after all, quite a bit of work, especially a large and active one. Other ringmaster may simply stop maintaining a ring, disappearing from the scene entirely. In this case, the ring slowly decays, but no one is able to do anything about it.

In these instances, it is possible for management of a ring to be put up for adoption. This could consist simply of an existing ring manager sending an email to the ring members, asking if any of them care to take it over. Or, if a ring manager has disappeared, the hosting organization could allow another to take control.

Back in the days of the original Webring, adoption through Webring consisted of a formal vote among the members. This vote was managed by the Webring itself. These days nothing so glamorous exists - adoption tends to be very ad-hoc and is done on the cuff.
Broken Ring: When a ring can no longer be traversed, it is called broken. This can occur when the ring code is not included on the proper page, thus preventing people from moving through the ring. It can also occur if a site is changed or is deleted entirely. Perhaps the most frustrating form of broken rings is when a site is on a free host such as Tripod, and the "monthly bandwidth limit" is exceeded. In these cases even though the site exists and has a valid ring fragment, it cannot be traversed and thus is broken.
Closed Ring: This is a ring which strictly controls the addition of new member sites. The ring will not allow new members except under controlled circumstances.
Controls: A series of hyperlinks in the ring fragment which allow surfers to perform various actions. These include the following:

Home - Go to the ring home page

List - List all of the active sites in the ring

Next - Proceed to next site in the ring

Next 5 - List next five sites in the ring. This was created to give surfers some way to get around the problem of a gap in the ring.

Prev - Proceed to previous site in the ring

Prev 5 - List previous five sites in the ring.

Random - Proceed to a random site in the ring.

Skip - Site the next site in the ring. (proceed to the site following the next site).

For further information see the following articles:

Webrings - Controls This page describes the webring controls and how they are used

Fragment: The ring fragment is a series of HTML tags which define the ring on member sites. The fragment must be on every single site in the ring, and it must be on the page specified in the ring control panel (sometimes the ring system allows separate pages for the fragment and for surfers). It serves multiple purposes:

First and foremost, the ring fragment contains the controls which allow the surfer to navigate forwards and backwards through the ring. Most rings have these and other controls as well.

In addition, the fragment serves as a kind of advertisement for both surfers (to want to surf the ring) and webmasters (to add their sites to the ring). Thus, it is critical that a ring fragment be attractive as well as functional.

The contents of a ring fragment must be recognizable to a ring checking robot. This is a method whereby ring masters can automatically check sites for the presence of the fragments.

See SSNB for a description of another style of ring fragment.

For further information see the following articles:

Ring Fragment If you are going to manage a ring (excluding Yahoo!) then you must create a fragment. Here's how to do it.

Home: Clicking the "home" link in the ring fragment causes the surfer to proceed to the page the ringmaster has defined as the "hub". In some rings this hub is very elaborate, while in others it's just a join page.
Hub: In WebRing.Org style ring, the hub is (if you use the default SSNB) a page at the Webring web site. This page allows surfers and ringmasters to list or control their ring entries.

On other ring systems (and in the non-default SSNB of webring if so desired) the hub is the same as the "home" page.
List: When you list a ring using the "list" control, you show all of the active sites in the ring, one page at a time. This is useful if the ring is broken (a site is missing a fragment or the site is missing entirely) or to surf the ring sites directly.
Navbar: See SSNB.
Netring: Netring is the style of webring used by RingSurf. For further information see the following articles:

Tutorial for Ringsurf style webrings This page describes how to create a RingSurf style webring

Creating the Ring Fragment This page describes how to create a ring fragment for Ringsurf rings.

Creating the join page for Ringsurf This page describes how to create the join page for Ringsurf rings.

Managing A RingSurf Webring How to manage your ringsurf webring

Next: The "next" ring control moves the surfer forward one site in the ring. In most ring systems, the next site is stored in a database, which is automatically maintained.
Next 5: The "Next 5" control is intended to allow the surfer to list the next 5 sites in a ring. It had to be created to allow surfers to skip past missing sites or sites without fragments.
Open Ring: A ring which allows for new sites to be added.
Previous: When the surfer wants to move backwards in the ring, he can click the "prev" or "previous" control. This causes the previous site to appear.
Previous 5: This webring control allows the surfer to list the previous five sites in the ring. The surfer can then choose which one he wants to surf to.
Random: This control moves to a random site in the ring. Only active sites are considered.
Queue: When a site requests membership in a ring, it is placed in a queue until the ringmaster can review it and move it to the active sites. In general, sites will remain in the queue until the prospective ring member has added the ring fragment to the appropriate page. The ringmaster will review the site to ensure it is appropriate for the ring and to validate the ring fragment. Once this is done the site is moved from the queue to the active site list.

Sites may also be moved back to the queue if the fragment becomes invalid or is removed. This procedure can be manual (done by the ring master) or automatic (performed by the ring checker module). This is a good way to keep a ring intact even if a member site becomes inappropriate.
Registered Page: The page in a site which is registered with a ring. This page is expected to contain the ring fragment.
Ring Code: See Fragment.
Ring ID: A code which uniquely identifies a ring within a ring system. Each host uses it's own set of ring ID's. For example, a ring on WebRing.Org might have a ring with an ID (name) of "hellothere". The same ID can also be used on RingSurf and Sitering. In fact, that same ID can be used on each different Ringlink host as well. The only requirement is that the Ring ID be unique on the hosting system.

A ring id must be included in each ring control within a ring fragment. This is because in most cases the ring must be identified.
Ring Logo: A graphic which identifies the ring.
Ring Manager: See Ring Master.
Ring Master: The owner of a ring. A ring is a unique creation of an individual or a group, and that individual or group holds an implicit copyright of the ring. The Ring master is the person (or group of people) who decides which sites will be allowed to join a ring, creates the ring hub (join page) and criteria, and ensures that the ring remains intact. The ring master has a responsibility to his member sites and the success or failure of a ring depends entirely upon him.

The roles of the ring members are controlled by the ring master. Some ring masters do not allow their members to have any say in the ring, while others allow the members full control.

It is up to the ring master to ensure that the ring is a pleasant surfing experience.
Ring Member: A ring member is a person who has one or more sites within a ring. The responsibly of a ring member is to ensure his page (and/or site) meets the ring criteria and to include the ring fragment on the correct page.
Ring Visitor: A person surfing a ring is a ring visitor.
Ringlink: The name of rings which run under the Ringlink CGI routines. For further information see the following articles:

Tutorial for Ringlink style webrings This page describes how to create a Ringlink style webring

Create Ringlink fragments This page describes how to create a ring fragment for Ringsurf rings.

Creating your Ringlink join page This page describes how to make the join page for your ringlink ring.

Managing your Ringlink ring Here you learn how to manage your ringlink ring.

Contacting Ring Members Need to contact ring members of a Ringlink ring? Here's what you can do.

Promoting Your Ringlink Ring Promoting your ring is a fine art in itself. If you want to get people to join, you must advertise it.

Hosting Your Own Ringlink Webring Want to host one or more ringlink rings? This page tells you how to do it.

Ringlink Hosting Instructions Instructions for hosting your own ringlink ring.

Site ID: A code identifying a site within a ring. Each site must have it's own unique code. Some ring systems (such as webring) assign their own site id's, while others, such as Ringlink, allow the site id's to be entered by the ring member.
Site Ring: This is the brand name for the ring system created and managed by Bravenet. Site Ring is a very professional service with a large number of features.
Skip: A ring control which causes the surfer to skip the next site in the ring and proceed to the site following. This is especially useful is the next site in the ring is missing or does not include the ring fragment.
SSNB: Server Side Navigation Bar. This is a concept, first pioneered by Yahoo when it destroyed Webring, by which the ring fragment is actually stored on a central server instead of on each member site. A small piece of JavaScript (in the Yahoo and later Webring implementation) causes the actual fragment to be pulled from the central location.

The advantage of this method is simple. The ring member only has to install the SSNB once. From that point forward, any changes in the navigation code are made on the server. Any changes are immediately picked up on all ring member sites.

The disadvantage to this method is the requirement of a much larger server farm at the central location. For systems such as Ringlink, which do not use an SSNB, the amount of data loaded from the central host is very small. For webring, the SSNB can consume dozens or even hundreds of kilopbytes!
Webring Controls: See controls.
Webring: This word has several meanings. First, it is a generic term for all rings. Second, WebRing.Org has named it's rings Webrings.

For further information see the following articles:

Tutorial for WebRing.Org style webrings This page describes how to create a WebRing.Org style webring

Inviting Others To Join Your Ring The point of a webring is to get people to join, and thus increase traffic. Here is how to ask people to join WebRing.Org style rings.

Customizing the Navigation Bar WebRing.Org rings use a JavaScript navigation bar. Here are instructions for customizing it.

Managing your ring WebRing.Org style rings pretty much manage themselves, but they occasionally need some assistance from a human being.