Knowledge Base

More terms in brief

Short explanations of technical terms used on our pages.

Backend

The part of an application in the background that stores and processes data. In a shop it also includes the administration where products and orders are managed.

Cache and caching

A temporary store for data that is needed often. Instead of working it out again each time, the system serves the stored copy, which saves time.

Checkout

The last part of buying in an online shop: entering the address, choosing shipping and payment, and placing the order.

Consent

A visitor's agreement, for example before a website stores or analyses certain data. It is usually requested through a consent window.

Conversion rate

The share of visitors who complete a desired action, such as buying something or sending an enquiry. It is usually given as a percentage of all visits.

Crawler

A program that visits and reads websites on its own, for example for a search engine. It follows the links from page to page.

Cross-selling

Showing further products that go with a chosen item, such as a case for a phone.

Deployment

Delivering a new version of software to the server it runs on.

End of life

The point from which the maker no longer maintains a piece of software. After that there are no more security updates.

Flow Builder

A tool in Shopware for setting up processes without programming: when something happens, such as a new order, a chosen action follows.

Frontend

The visible part of an application that people work with, such as the pages in the browser.

Fulfilment

Everything that happens between an order and its delivery: storing, packing, shipping and handling returns.

Landing page

A page with one specific goal, where visitors arrive after clicking an advert, for example. It covers one topic and leads to one action.

Legacy

Older software or technology that is still in use but hard to maintain or extend.

Lighthouse

A testing tool from Google that checks a page for loading speed, accessibility, search engine readiness and good practice.

Mapping

Matching fields between two systems: which field in one program corresponds to which field in the other, such as item number to item number.

Monitoring

Ongoing checks on servers and applications. If something fails or slows down, the system raises an alert.

Omnichannel

Selling through several channels that work together: online shop, marketplaces and store use the same data on products, customers and orders.

Open source

Software whose source code is open. Anyone may read, use and change it under the terms of its licence.

OpenSearch

An open source search engine for your own data. A shop can use it to search large ranges quickly and tolerate typing errors.

PageSpeed

How fast a page loads. PageSpeed Insights is a measuring tool from Google that rates it and suggests improvements.

Patch

A small change to software that fixes a bug or a security flaw.

Plugin

An add-on that extends software with a feature without changing its core. A shop can gain a new payment method this way, for example.

Prompt

The instruction or question given to a language model. How precisely it is worded affects the answer.

Ranking

The position of a page in a search engine's results for a search term.

Redirect

Forwarding from one address to another. Anyone who opens the old address ends up at the new one automatically.

Redis

A fast data store that keeps data in memory. It often serves as a cache or a queue.

Responsive design

A page adapts to the screen size. On a phone, for example, content is stacked; on a large screen it sits side by side.

Rule Builder

A tool in Shopware for combining conditions into rules, for example for prices, shipping costs or discounts for certain customer groups.

SaaS

Software you do not run yourself but use over the internet, usually paid monthly. The provider looks after servers and updates.

Shopping Experiences

The page designer in Shopware: pages are put together from blocks such as image, text and product list, without programming.

Sitemap

A list of all pages of a website. The XML sitemap is meant for search engines and helps them find every page.

Storefront

The part of a shop that customers see: home page, categories, product pages and cart. The administration behind it is not part of it.

Structured data

Extra information in a page's source code that tells search engines what the content is, for example a product with a price or a question with an answer.

Symfony

An open source framework for applications in the PHP programming language. Shopware is built on it.

Template

A pattern that sets out how a page or part of a page is built. The content is filled into the template when the page is shown.

Theme

The design package of a shop or website: colours, fonts, spacing and the arrangement of the page parts.

Token

Two meanings, depending on context: for interfaces, a digital key that grants access; for language models, a small piece of text that the text is split into.

Tracking

Recording and analysing how visitors use a website, such as which pages they open. In shipping, tracking also means following a parcel.

Twig

A template language for PHP. Shopware uses it to build the pages of its storefront from templates and data.

Webhook

An automatic message from one system to another as soon as something happens, for example when a payment has arrived.

Wireframe

A simple sketch of a page without colours or images. It shows where content and controls are meant to go.

Workflow

A fixed sequence of work steps that runs in the same order each time, fully or partly automated.