S

SAP: An acronym that stands for Systems, Applications, and Products in Data Processing. SAP is a large corporation that writes software to help enterprise customers integrate all their business processes. For more information, see the company's Web site at http://www.sap.com.
schema definition: An XML document that defines a schema. Schema definition documents are accessed during processing.
secondary data file: All data files other than the primary data file. Some databases have no secondary data files, while others have many.
Secure Sockets Layer (SSL): A protocol designed to provide secure communications on the Internet. SSL operates by layering a security protocol on top of an underlying reliable connection-oriented transport protocol. The combined protocol establishes a connection with a remote host and then performs a handshake between the two nodes to establish a secure session. After the security handshake is complete, the protocol then encrypts and authenticates data sent from the local host and decrypts and verifies data received from the remote host.
server component: In COM, a synonym for COM component.
server package: A package that runs isolated in its own process on the local computer. Server packages support role-based security, resource sharing, process isolation, and process management (such as package sharing). MTS supports two types of packages: library packages and server packages.
Session object: An object that can be created from several Microsoft technologies, such as Collaboration Data Objects and Active Server Pages (ASP). In ASP, the Session object maintains information about the current user session and stores and retrieves state information.
SGML: See Standard Generalized Markup Language.
Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP): An Internet standard for electronic mail among clients having common access to a server for message storage. The SMTP standard is specified in the RFC 821 document, and the message format is included in the RFC 822 document.
S/MIME: Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions. An e-mail security standard that makes use of public key encryption.
SMS: See Microsoft Systems Management Server.
SMTP: See Simple Mail Transfer Protocol.
SQL: See Structured Query Language.
SQL Mail: A component of Microsoft® SQL Server™ that includes extended stored procedures and allows SQL Server to send and receive mail messages through the built-in Windows NT® Messaging Application Programming Interface (MAPI). A mail message can consist of short text strings, the output from a query, or an attached file.
SQL Server: See Microsoft SQL Server.
SSL: See Secure Sockets Layer.
Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML): An information-management standard adopted by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) in 1986 as a means of providing platform- and application-independent documents that retain formatting, indexing, and linked information. SGML provides a grammar-like mechanism for users to define the structure of their documents, and the tags they will use to denote the structure in individual documents.
state engine: (Microsoft Exchange Server Routing) A state engine governs the ways items can move from one state to another. In Microsoft Exchange Server Routing, the routing engine uses the states of items within a process map, combined with the occurrence of events, to advance the item's state through the process map.
static load balancing: A simple resource-balancing method useful for small networks in which a specific server handles a given client request. No resource monitoring is involved, as in dynamic load balancing.
stored procedure: A precompiled collection of Transact-SQL statements stored under a name and processed as a unit. Stored procedures are available for managing SQL Server and displaying information about databases and users. SQL Server-supplied stored procedures are called system stored procedures. See also extended stored procedure.
Structured Query Language (SQL): A database query and programming language originally developed by IBM for mainframe computers. It is widely used for accessing data, querying, updating, and managing relational database systems. There is now an ANSI-standard SQL definition for all computer systems.
surrogate key: A unique identifier for a row within a database table. A surrogate, or candidate, key can be made up of one or more columns. By definition, every table must have at least one surrogate key (in which case it becomes the primary key for a table automatically). However, it is possible for a table to have more than one surrogate key (in which case one of them must be designated as the primary key). Any surrogate key that is not the primary key is called the alternate key.
symmetric multiprocessing (SMP): The sharing of multiple processors by the same memory. The memory contains a single copy of the operating system, a single copy of any applications in use, and a single copy of the data. The operating system divides the work into tasks, assigning them to whichever processor is free.
sysfilegroups: A table in the master database that contains one row for each filegroup in a database. This table is stored in each database. There is at least one entry in this table, the entry for the primary filegroup.
syslanguages: A table in the master database that contains one row for each language present in Microsoft SQL Server. Although U.S. English is not in syslanguages, it is always available to SQL Server. This table is stored only in the master database.
sysmessages: A table in the master database that contains one row for each system error or warning that can be returned by Microsoft® SQL Server™. SQL Server displays the error description on the user's screen.
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