A Plain Hill Chronicle

You’re an Inter- spider. How might you make your web – your Interweb?

You’ll have to figure that out yourself; I’ll tell you about the internet, and you can build from there, or go off in your own direction.

First, a metaphorical explanation:

The internet uses cables to connect servers – think dragons who hoard data rather than gold – which house domains – think kingdoms – to other servers. People use the internet to visit different kingdoms on their genies – or browsers. Genies only speak to other genies in numbers, but can understand specific words that people tell them, thanks to translators called the Domain Name System (DNS). If you want to go to the kingdom (or domain) of ‘Superland’, tell your genie, “Superland.com!”, and your genie will begin the journey.

How does your genie know the address of the place called ‘Superland’? The specific words genies understand correspond to kingdoms’, or domains’, addresses. These addresses, according to the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) – think a thoroughfare governed by traffic guards – guide your genie in ethereal form from server to server – from dragon to dragon – until you reach your destination; then your genie will introduce you to the domain called ‘Superland’.

The genie, when in ethereal form – called a ‘packet’ – may have bits of themselves arrive sooner than others. All these bits and bytes of the genie have numbers and instructions on them, so that once they arrive at their intended address, they reassemble properly.

Now, to resolve the metaphor:

Web browsers allow people to visit domains by sending packets, which contain the information you are sending, be it a request to view a domain, receive data, or send data. Packets are sent to domains by either inputting their TCP/Internet Protocol address, or their corresponding alphabetical address, which the DNS will translate into its numerical TCP/IP address for you. The Protocols inform servers how to handle your packets, and ensure they reach the right domain, by passing them along step-by-step, from server to server, with each server layering a little more information to your packets so they may make their way back to you after they reach the target domain. The packets, on their way back, will be stripped of those layers by the servers they travel through; once the packet returns with your requested data, it will only contain the information requested and instructions on how to arrange each packet in their proper order.

Now weave your web, oh spider of nonexistence!