about

I have even seen people dropping the "www." part of the net address, & they sometimes connect anyway. What does it all mean?

Let's start with http. It is an acronym for the tongue twister HyperText Transfer Protocol. When you type this in to your web browser, you are telling it that you intend to interact with the web according to a specific set of rules (protocols), & the web will reply in return.

These files could be text & pics. Your browser assembles & displays them according to more rules, this time the rules come from the language of the web, HTML ("Hypertext Markup Language").

Your web browser, such as web Explorer(tm), is program which helps you communicate with the web by sending your requests out & retrieving the files you are seeking. When you search the web or type a URL (Uniform Resource Locator, or web address) in to the address bar of your browser, you are in effect requesting to view files.

When you click on a link, your browser sends out another request, & either replaces the page you are viewing with a new page, or opens an entirely new page & displays the files.

When you navigate to a website, your browser looks for a file named index.htm. This file contains the basic structure of the general site, & tells your browser what other files to look for & how to display them on your screen.

Ms. Browser, use the HyperText Transfer Protocol to access the web & procure files from website.com. Then display them on my screen according to the rules written in the file index.htm, which is written in Hypertext Markup Language.

The immense portion of the web which uses http:// to find sites which in turn use HTML language for displaying files is called the web. Thus the URL http://www.website.com is fundamentally saying: