Plain-English definitions
The vocabulary behind Sourcemap Explorer — short, useful entries for anyone arriving with unfamiliar jargon.
The vocabulary, in one place
Reading a website like source sits at the intersection of build tooling and technology detection, and that corner of the web has a small but slippery vocabulary — source maps, bundles, minification, fingerprinting — where each word means something precise that everyday usage tends to blur. This glossary pins those meanings down.
Every entry leads with a plain-English definition and then, where it matters, the Sourcemap Explorer angle — how the concept surfaces in the extension or why it changes what you can detect. If you're new here, the two ideas the whole tool rests on are source maps and website fingerprinting; the rest builds on those.
Source map
A source map is a JSON file that maps compiled or minified JavaScript (or CSS) back to its original source — typically including the full original file paths and their complete contents.
Website fingerprinting
Website fingerprinting is the practice of identifying the technology stack — frameworks, libraries, CMS, hosting, analytics — a website uses, by cross-referencing signals in its HTML, headers, cookies, scripts and runtime behavior.
FAQ
Are these definitions specific to Sourcemap Explorer?
No. They're the standard meanings of web build-tooling and tech-detection terms — source maps, bundles, minification, fingerprinting — written in plain English. Where a term bears directly on what the extension shows you, the entry notes it, but the definitions stand on their own.
How do source maps and website fingerprinting relate?
They're two ways to answer 'what is this site built with?'. Fingerprinting infers technologies from surface signals — headers, cookies, asset URLs, global variables. Source maps go further: when a site ships them, they expose the original file paths and bundled package.json files, so you read the exact library and version instead of guessing. Sourcemap Explorer uses both.
Do I need to know these terms to use the extension?
No — the popup labels everything in context. But understanding source maps, sourcesContent and minification makes the results easier to interpret, especially when you're judging whether a detected version is trustworthy.