The Internet History And Growth

What is Internet?
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to serve several billion users worldwide. It is a network of networks that consists of millions of private, public, academic, business, and government networks, of local to global scope, that are linked by a broad array of electronic, wireless and optical networking technologies.

Where does the Internet come from?

Created by the US government’s Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) in the 1960s, the ARPANet was originally used by academic and government institutions. TCP/IP, or Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol, was introduced to the ARPANet in 1983, at which point the Internet as we know it came to be.

TCP/IP makes it possible for computers everywhere to share data.  Under TCP/IP, a file is broken into smaller parts called "packets". Each packet is given the IP (Internet Protocol) address of the computer it has to travel to. As the packet moves through the global network, it is "switched" by a number of servers and routers along the way towards its destination.

The IP address tells those servers which way to switch the packet. Each time the packet is switched, a "wrapper" is added to the packet – this way we can tell how many computers and which computer handled the file while it was in transit.

The packets do not necessarily travel together on the Internet. Packets from the same file may travel via different paths through different servers, but always towards the same destination.

Internet Timeline

What is domain name?

Domain names are used to identify one or more IP addresses. For example, the domain name microsoft.com represents about a dozen IP addresses. Domain names are used in URLs to identify particular Web pages. For example, in the URL http://www.pcwebopedia.com/index.html, the domain name is pcwebopedia.com.

Every domain name has a suffix that indicates which top level domain (TLD) it belongs to. There are only a limited number of such domains. For example:

Names	Entity	Notes
.aero	air-transport industry	Must verify eligibility for registration; only those in various categories of air-travel-related entities may register.
.com	commercial	This is an open TLD; any person or entity is permitted to register. Though originally intended for use by for-profit business entities, for a number of reasons it became the "main" TLD for domain names and is currently used by all types of entities including nonprofits, schools and private individuals. Domain name registrations may be challenged if the holder cannot prove an outside relation justifying reservation of the name, to prevent "squatting".
.biz	business	This is an open TLD; any person or entity is permitted to register; however, registrations may be challenged later if they are not held by commercial entities in accordance with the domain's charter. This TLD was created to provide relief for the wildly popular .com TLD
.net	network	This is an open TLD; any person or entity is permitted to register. Originally intended for use by domains pointing to a distributed network of computers, or "umbrella" sites that act as the portal to a set of smaller websites.

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