x callback

glossary of terms

Terms I came across learning about computers

• glossary of terms
• X-callback
• URL encoding
• Base64 encoding
• Webhooks
• Hashing and salting

X-callback

X-callback is a standardized protocol used in software development for communication between apps on mobile devices. It allows one app to trigger actions or pass data to another app and then receive a response or data back. This protocol is often used to enable deep linking, which lets users navigate directly to specific content or features within an app from another app or source. It's commonly used in automation workflows and enhancing user experiences by enabling seamless interactions between different apps.

URL encoding

Percent encoding, also known as URL encoding or percent-encoding, is a way to represent characters in a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) or URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) that may have special meanings or could cause issues if used directly. It involves replacing reserved or unsafe characters with a "%" symbol followed by their hexadecimal ASCII code.

For example, if you want to include a space in a URL, you would encode it as "%20". Similarly, the percent sign itself is encoded as "%25". This ensures that URLs remain valid and correctly interpreted by web browsers and servers.

Percent encoding is used to handle characters that have special meanings in URLs, such as spaces, punctuation, non-ASCII characters, and reserved characters like "/", "?", "&", and "=".

Overall, percent encoding helps ensure the proper functioning and accuracy of URLs across different web systems and applications.

Base64 encoding

Base64 encoding is a method used to encode binary data into a text-based format that is safe for transmission over text-based protocols or storage in text-based formats. It is commonly used to represent binary data, such as images, files, or binary messages, as a series of ASCII characters.

In Base64 encoding:

1. The binary data is divided into groups of 3 bytes (24 bits).
2. Each group of 3 bytes is converted into a set of 4 ASCII characters using a predefined mapping table.
3. If the total number of bytes is not divisible by 3, padding characters ("=") are added to make the data length a multiple of 3.

The mapping table consists of 64 different characters: uppercase letters (A-Z), lowercase letters (a-z), digits (0-9), and two additional characters, often "+", and "/", which represent the values 62 and 63. These characters are chosen to ensure compatibility with various text-based systems and protocols.

Base64 encoding is used in various applications, such as:

1. Sending binary data via email attachments or URLs.
2. Storing binary data in JSON or XML files.
3. Representing binary data in data URLs for embedding images in web pages.
4. Encoding data in cryptographic applications.

When you see a Base64-encoded string, it may look like a random series of characters, but it actually represents the original binary data in a text-based form. Decoding the Base64-encoded string restores the original binary data.

Webhooks

Webhooks are a way for one application to send real-time data to another application over the internet. They are typically used to notify or trigger actions in response to events that occur in the source application. When an event happens, the source application sends an HTTP POST request with relevant information to a predefined URL (the webhook endpoint) of the receiving application. This allows for seamless communication and integration between different systems, enabling automated processes and data synchronization.

Hashing and salting

Hashing is a process of converting input data (like a password) into a fixed-size value (the hash) using a mathematical function. It's often used in security to store passwords securely, as the original input can't be easily derived from the hash.

Salting is the practice of adding a random value (the salt) to the input data before hashing. This adds a layer of security by making it more difficult for attackers to use precomputed tables (rainbow tables) to crack passwords.

Together, hashing and salting enhance data security, making it harder for malicious actors to reverse-engineer passwords from stored hashes.