How does the internet work?

Martin Abend · Post by **Martin Abend** » 22 Mar 2001 12:04 am

Is there a website that explains how the internet or at least the www works? I'm plain stupid when it comes to these technical things, so I'd be glad if someone knows something.

Thanks.

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Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 22 Mar 2001 2:58 am

Martin-- That is a very general question that might require several large books to adequately answer. Here is a good place to start:

http://howstuffworks.com/sc-computers-internet.htm

Have fun!!! --Everett

Bill Terry · Post by **Bill Terry** » 22 Mar 2001 7:40 am

Once you know a little about the technical 'how' it seems somewhat miraculous that it works at all...

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John Paul Jones · Post by **John Paul Jones** » 22 Mar 2001 8:10 am

Martin,

Not knowing something doesn't make you stupid.

JPJ

Bobby Lee · Post by **Bobby Lee** » 22 Mar 2001 8:40 am

Is there a "Proftpd for Dummies" book? I need one right about now.

The internet includes a wide range of things, but the most common uses are web pages and email. The underlying technology is TCP/IP, which stands for "Transfer Control Protocol / Internet Protocol". A protocol is a convention that two entities use to communicate formally with each other.

In TCP/IP, every device has a unique IP address. You may have seen these addresses. Their human readable form is like this: 207.189.56.85 - four numbers between zero and 255, separated by 3 dots.

There are about 4 billion IP addresses (256^4), but each number in the sequence narrows it down quite a bit. In simplified terms, to reach the address above I could send my data to 207.x.x.x where the 207 router would take over. 207, like other routers at its level, handles requests for about 16 million addresses. It would send it to 207.189.x.x which handles about 65,000 addresses. From there it gets forwarded to 207.189.56.x which only has to deal with 256 machines, and then it gets routed directly to the destination machine.

I doesn't really work like that, of course. There are all sorts of smart tricks and shortcuts built into the system, and there are ways for whole networks to share a single IP address. But the system I described above is a convenient abstraction that explains the basic idea.

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Vince Smith · Post by **Vince Smith** » 22 Mar 2001 5:10 pm

Martin,
Ziff-Davis has published a book by Preston Gralla, entitled "How The Internet Works,
Milleninum Edition" . It’s available from Amazon.com.
www.amazon.com
Using the Search function, select "books" and enter the title as the ID.[This message was edited by Vince Smith on 22 March 2001 at 05:14 PM.]

Jeff Agnew · Post by **Jeff Agnew** » 22 Mar 2001 6:22 pm

b0b,

Just to nitpick, it's Transmission Control Protocol

Anything in particular I might be able to assist you with in ProFTPd?

Regards,
Jeff

Martin Abend · Post by **Martin Abend** » 23 Mar 2001 3:35 am

You guys are great, thank you very much!
Most of all I need the infos for the "kid's club" of my church that I'm running. They are very interested (aged 13-16) in stuff like that and since I found nobody that would explain this to them I'll have to do this myself...

Hey Everett,

Howstuffworks.com is just fantastic! They had all the info's I needed, and together with b0b's short explanation I think I can handle the job.

Again, thanks you very much!

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martin abend my homepage chicotarde@web.de
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Bill Llewellyn · Post by **Bill Llewellyn** » 24 Mar 2001 8:56 am

oops...[This message was edited by Bill Llewellyn on 25 March 2001 at 08:56 AM.]

Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 24 Mar 2001 4:39 pm

Martin-- Glad you have what you needed. Yes, that web site really has a lot of info. They cover many subject areas and most articles are very well written. It is nice to hear you are passing the help on to the kids. -Ev

Abe Stoklasa · Post by **Abe Stoklasa** » 25 Mar 2001 11:27 am

It works similiar to a phone. you type/dial a destination, through wires and connections, it takes you there. I guess............

Jonathan Cullifer · Post by **Jonathan Cullifer** » 26 Mar 2001 9:24 am

The Internet is nothing but a bunch of computers, most of them just like yours, connected to each other. Internet Service Providers run network lines out to you and they lay cable and connect their networks to others. Each ISP will do this with more than just one other network. Most do it with at least a dozen. And all of these computers that connect to each other is called the Internet.

Internet is TCP. TCP enables you to look at Web pages because it handles sending out the requests for the page and giving you a response.

Many times more than one physical way to get Internet traffic from one point to another (similiar to roads). The IP protocal is responsible for finding the quickest way, bypassing "rush hour" traffic and getting you the content. However, if all of the "roads" are slow, then your connection will be slowed down.

Jonathan

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Mark Herrick · Post by **Mark Herrick** » 27 Mar 2001 7:58 pm

OK, now explain the 7 layers of the OSI Reference Model...

Bill Crook · Post by **Bill Crook** » 6 Apr 2001 9:24 pm

???????

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 7 Apr 2001 2:47 am

C'mon Mark. I went through the OSI model years ago when I went through training on SNA but I've long forgotten it.

Bill Terry · Post by **Bill Terry** » 7 Apr 2001 9:40 am

Here ya go... WARNING do not read if you're trying to stay awake.
http://www.msic.com/technical/network_protocol/osi_info.shtml

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