The Internet and the Web
Parts of a web address
Take a web address apart into its protocol, its domain name and its path, and say what each part tells the browser.
A web address looks like one long run of letters and punctuation, but it is really three pieces written one after another. At the front is the protocol — the https:// part — which says how the browser and the far machine should talk to each other. Then comes the domain name, which says which site. Then, after a single slash, comes the path, which says which page inside that site.
The first single slash is the join
The two slashes at the front belong to the protocol. The next single slash is the one that matters: everything before it is the domain name, and everything from it onwards is the path. If there is no such slash, there is no path — you have named a site and nothing inside it. The domain name is read right to left, so the last piece of it is the widest: an ending like .org or .in describes the whole site, not one page of it.
Worked example
Take apart the address https://maps.example.org/cities/delhi/roads.html
Chop off the front: https:// is the protocol, and its two slashes are not the join.
Counting those two by mistake is the commonest way of cutting the address in the wrong place.
Try it together
Now take this one apart together: https://results.school.example.in/term2/marks.html
Work left to right, and stop at the first single slash.
1.What is the domain name of this address?
Have a go
Have a go on your own. In the address "https://games.example.org/puzzles/chess.html", what is the domain name?
Ready to practise?
Eight questions on what you have just read. Nothing is timed, and you can play as many times as you like.