Friday, June 24, 2011

What is a URL?

what_is_a_URL

What is a URL?  That is a fancy way of saying the website address.

 

U is for Universal, R is for Resource, and  is for Locator.

 

What is a URL Address

 

Every page on the internet has its own unique URL address.   Today I’m creating a page named, “What is a URL?” 

We will go over the basics of ‘what is a URL’ is first, and then I will explain what I mean by each page as its own different address.

Most websites start with:  http://            as part of the URL address.   This is called the protocol

 

‘http’ stands for HyperText Transfer Protocol

You would just pronounce it ‘http’ (just the letters – not my quote marks)

The ‘://” part is pronounced: dot dot backslash backslash

 

so together they would be pronounced with letters separately, and then use the words:

 

h

t

t

p

dot

dot

backslash

backslash

 

Most of the time websites start with this protocol.   That is the reason most people do not mention the http:// part when they tell you the website address.  The web browser normally types that automatically for you, so you don’t even have to type it either.

 

If the website HAS a different protocol?  That is when they will mention it to you.  ‘fttp://” would be an example of that.

 

WWW

www.  

is the next part of the URL address, and it stands for world wide web.

 

When you hear people say ‘dot’ they are speaking of the period that you see at the end of the ‘www’.

 

So www. is pronounced:

w

w

w

dot

The next part of the URL is called the:

 

Domain Name

The first thing to keep in mind with domain names in the URL is they tend not to be case sensitive.  In other words, don’t worry about what needs to be capitalized and what is lower case.

 

URL addresses do not use spaces either.  So if someone told you that their website URL is “what is a URL” they assume you realize NOT to use spaces.  In other words, ‘ w w w dot whatisaurl dot com’.  You notice I used NO spaces!

 

whatisaurl is the domain name! 

.COM

.com is called a top level domain.

its is pronounced:

dot

com

 

Remember the periods are referred to as ‘dot’.  Below are examples of other top level domains you may have heard of.

 

  • com - commercial websites or generic
  • .edu - post secondary educational institutions
  • .net - network oriented sites or generic
  • .org - noncommercial community
  • .mil - United States military

    .gov - United States government

     

    Each page on the internet has its own address

     

    Now that I explained, ‘what is a URL’ lets move to what I was talking about when I said each PAGE on the internet has its own address!

     

    I will try to keep this simple, and keep in mind each page’s address may not look JUST like my example.  Its will hopefully give you an idea of what I’m trying to get across with the different URL addresses.

     

    what is a url example


    For this example lets use a layout of our homes. 

    Our domain name may be 123 main street (your address). 

    In the picture of our URL house above we have different rooms we all recognize. 

     

    So our main domain name would be pronounced: w w w dot 123mainstreet dot com

     

    what is a URL different address

     

    Next URL page will have an article called, ‘bedroom’. 

     

    Then you decide you wanted to keep to category of ‘bedroom’ and speak about the bedroom lamp.  Notice the second URL address difference:  bedroom/lamp 

     

    My next URL address change is when I moved into the bathroom as my second category.  The next article we are staying in the bathroom, but use the URL bathtub to speak about bathtubs.

     

    You can do this for every room in the house, and every item for as long as you wish.

     

    Each time a new page is added to the website – it is given a new URL address.  Make sense?

     

    If you have any further questions about ‘what is a URL’ just write me a note, and I will try to help you!

     

    I hope you enjoyed this How-To basic lesson for the computer beginner that covered what is a URL.

     

     

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