.. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. .. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 **Definition of terms** Different SDOs and communities use different terminology related to NFV/Cloud/SDN. This list tries to define an OPNFV terminology, mapping/translating the OPNFV terms to terminology used in other contexts. .. glossary:: API Application Programming Interface. Cloud Computing A model that enables access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources, such as networks, servers, storage, applications, and services, that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. Edge Computing Edge computing pushes applications, data and computing power (services) away from centralized points to the logical extremes of a network. Instance Refers in OpenStack terminology to a running VM, or a VM in a known state such as suspended, that can be used like a hardware server. NFV Network Function Virtualization. NFVI Network Function Virtualization Infrastructure. Totality of all hardware and software components which build up the environment in which VNFs are deployed. SDN Software-Defined Networking. Emerging architecture that decouples the network control and forwarding functions, enabling the network control to become directly programmable and the underlying infrastructure to be abstracted for applications and network services. Server Computer that provides explicit services to the client software running on that system, often managing a variety of computer operations. In OpenStack terminology, a server is a VM instance. VIM Virtualized Infrastructure Manager. Functional block that is responsible for controlling and managing the NFVI compute, storage and network resources, usually within one operator's Infrastructure Domain, e.g. NFVI Point of Presence (NFVI-PoP). VM Virtual Machine. Virtualized computation environment that behaves like a physical computer/server by (re-)creating the computing architecture of a real or hypothetical computer. Virtual network Virtual network routes information among the network interfaces of VM instances and physical network interfaces, providing the necessary connectivity. VNF Virtualized Network Function. Implementation of an Network Function that can be deployed on a Network Function Virtualization Infrastructure (NFVI). WAN Wide Area Network. .. Revision: b4f736d3dbaa5cc006ee92adbb4f374c7485fb7e Build date: 2016-05-17