Uniform Resource Locator
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Uniform Resource Locator (URL) is another name for a web address. It is a simpler way to remember the identity of a computer on the Internet. URLs often contain www. (which stands for World Wide Web). URLs consist of several parts:
- A protocol. Very often, this is the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP).
- Some separation characters: ://
- The address of the host
In some cases, the URL may also contain
- The path to a document or script.
- In the case of a script, additional parameters
- Username and password needed to access a certain page
The URL of this page is http://simple.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Uniform_Resource_Locator
- http is the protocol
- simple.wikipedia.org is the web site
- /w/index.php is a script. That script gets parameters, title=Uniform_Resource_Locator
[change] Extensions
These are at the end of the domain name which has a period mark before it. At first there were six main extensions:
- .com - Commercial use
- .net - network / Internet Service Provider use
- .org - Organizational use
- .edu - Educational use (Schools and universities)
- .mil - Military use
- .gov - Governmental use
- .eu - Europeanal use
Today, there are many other URL extensions. These are usually either a top level domain or interest grouping. Each country has its own top level domain, for example, .ca for Canada, .us for the United States of America or .co.uk for the United Kingdom. Many countries have a government-only extension, for example the United States uses .gov or .fed.us, .gc.ca for Canada and .gov.uk for the United Kingdom. Interest group domains would include .tv (television), .pro (professionals) and .xxx (pornography). These are not used as often as the original extensions.
