THE INTERNE

TTHE INTERNET IS A GLOBAL COMPUTER NETWORK CONNECTING

MILLIONS, ALMOST EVERY, COMPUTER WORLDWIDE. IT IS DEFINED BY THE OXFORD ENGLISH DICTIONARY AS: A GLOBAL COMPUTER NETWORK PROVIDING A VARIETY

OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION FACILITIES, CONSISTING OF INTERCONNECTED NETWORKS USING STANDARDIZED COMM

UNICATION PROTOCOLS.

LINK BETWEEN A DOMAIN NAME AND IP ADDRESS• A domain name is the name of the website, or what a website is known

as, so for example for ‘ http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/’ the domain name would be ‘bbc.co.uk’.

• An IP address is made p of four number separated by dots, the numbers are from 1 to 255, an example of this is 74.39.256.11

• Humans refer to host names as domain names but computers need IP address’ to recognise where the webpage is.

• To convert a domain name into an IP address, a compliant software will ask a domain name server to do this conversion, this process is called a domain name lookup.

DATA PACKETS AND PACKET SWITCHING• A data packet is a unit of data made into a single package that will travel along a

network path. When information is being sent from one computer to another, like and email, this information is broken down into small parts known as packets. Each packet includes: where it is from, where it is going and how to reassemble it.

• Packet switching is what some computer networks use to deliver data over a local or long distance communication. Examples of packet switching protocols are Frame Relay, IPand X.25.

THE FUNCTIONS OF ROUTERS• Internet routers are specialized computers that

determine where to send information. They send everyone's messages to the right place. They make sure that certain information doesn’t get lost or go to the wrong place. If it does end up going to the wrong place then it could clog up the connections of people computers.

• It also makes sure that the information get to the right computer(s). Routers are extremely important in the internet and if we didn’t have them, random information could end up anywhere.

Sourceshttp://datacombasic.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/packet-switching.htmlhttp://www.homeserverland.com/2009/05/securing-your-whs-and-network-part-8/http://picture24gallery.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/local-domain-name-localhostlocaldomain.htmlhttp://computer.howstuffworks.com/internet/basics/internet-infrastructure3.htmhttp://whatismyipaddress.com/domain-namehttp://www.teach-ict.com/technology_explained/packet_switching/packet_switching.html