• Remember: Every home page has a unique address.

How do people know where you live? Right, your street address tells exactly where you live. Well, computers on the World Wide Web also have addresses--they are called IP addresses (IP stands for Internet Protocol). An example of an IP address is 172.17.1.27. In fact, that is the IP address for RoseNet.

• Remember: The unique address is a set of numbers called an IP address.

We humans have a really hard time remembering strings of numbers like this, so the Domain Name System (DNS) was developed. A typical domain name is www.rose.net. The computer translates the domain name into the IP address of a home page. You rarely have to be concerned with IP addresses.

• Remember: The domain name is equal to the IP address.

On the World Wide Web, a complete home page addresses isindicated by a URL, Uniform Resource Locator. A typical URL would be http://www.rose.net. This is the URL for RoseNet. URLs often contain additional information, but one thing you will notice is that each URL always starts with http://. This lets your web browser know that you will be accessing a home page somewhere on the World Wide Web. The rest of the information in the URL indicates the location (the address) of a home page on a specific host computer on the World Wide Web--the domain name.

• Remember: The URL points to the location of a home page on the World Wid Web.

OK, that wasn't too bad! But how do you know the URL of a home page you are looking at? Look up at the top left side of the screen and you will find the Location Field. This field always indicates the URL address of the home page you are viewing. The example shows the URL for your previous lesson. For those of you who are interested, all of the information after the domain name (home.rose.net) shows where the file is located on the web server computer.

• Remember: The Location Field shows the URL of the current home page.

One more bit of information about URLs. (Oh my!) The domain name always ends in a code that tells the "type" or "purpose" of the organization that is presenting the web page. Common codes include com (commercial), org (organization), edu (educational institutions), net (networks), gov (U.S. government), and mil (U.S. military). And sometimes you will see a country code as part of a domain name, such as us (USA), fr (France), or de (Germany).

• Remember: Domain names end with organization codes and sometimes country codes.

You've done it. You now know that:

1. Every home page has a unique address.
2. The unique address is a set of numbers called an IP address.
3. The domain name (in letters) is equal to the IP address.
4. The URL points to the specific location of a home page on the World Wide Web.
5. The Location Field shows the URL of the current home page.
6. Domain names end with orgainization codes and sometimes country codes.

• Site 1
• Site 2
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• Site 4

Send your answers to me via e-mail.

Competencies: After completing this assignment, you should know that every home page has a unique address called an IP address. The IP address is a set of numbers. The domain name written with lettes is exactly the same as the IP address written with numbers. URLs are the addresses of home pages on the World Wide Web. The Location Field shows a home page's URL. Organization codes and sometimes country codes are also part of a URL.