An Internet address can be one of two types:
An IP address consists of four groups of numbers separated by periods as shown below:
The first number represents a geographic location. The second, an organization. The third represents a specific network, and the fourth a specific machine on a specific network.
Since an IP address is so hard to remember the Internet also supports domain name. This uses a group of names separated by periods as shown below:
The www indicates a Web server computer. The second indicates an organization. The third name represents the organization type. Finally, international Web sites also include a country code.
All domain names are registered the domain name system or DNS. This is stored on domain name servers which is a type of Internet computer. This server uses the domain name to look up the specific IP address.