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If you have spent a reasonable amount of time browsing the Internet over the past several years, you may have come across the term "Domain name" more than a few times. Coming across it and knowing what it is are two different things however, and in spite of repeated encounters with the phrase, you may not have come any closer to understanding what it really is. This would be quite understandable because unless you are directly involved in the business of selling web hosting services or are looking to sign up for a web hosting package, there really are not very many reasons for you to be familiar with the intricacies of domain names and its related aspects.
If you fit into any one of the two categories however, that is when you should take a closer look at domain names and how it can potentially affect you.
As you may already know, the Internet, far from being a single humongous entity, is actually an immune and intranet web of computer systems that are linked together spanning the globe. The most visible sign of this huge network is the single computer unit in your office or workspace, which is only one among millions and millions of computers simply linked to the Internet. As you can imagine, it can be quite a formidable task to get all of these computers communicating with each other and this is where the Domain Name System or DNS comes in.
Each network that is connected to the Internet is identified by a unique identifier called the IP address that sets it apart from all the other networks on the Internet. When a request to access any particular page is sent by a user, a DNS server will process this request and route it to the appropriate IP address. From there, the network will then send back the appropriate data to the user who requested it. In this manner, the DNS server functions as a sort of middleman between the user browsing the Internet on one end and the server that provides the data on the other end.
Since the IP address is made up of a string of numbers that are not at all descriptive of the particular site that they are associated with, an additional layer of identification is provided in the Domain name, which makes it easier for users to recognize the name of the site that they are trying to access.
Now domain names are by no means permanently owned. They are typically paid for or rented over a period of several months to a year, or even more. They do expire however, and when this happens, clicking a link to a web site that you previously previously visited will not call up the site that you were expecting at all. This is what is known as a broken link, and you could then be directed to a totally different site-possibly the new owner of the domain name in question-or simply to a page that informs you that the site you were looking for is no longer available.
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