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The Internet is a worldwide community of hundreds of thousands
of machines which can communicate with each other via a suite of
protocols which includes the UNIX mail protocol. The Internet is
the proper name for an internetwork of networks partially funded
by the the National Science Foundation and supported by many research,
commercial, and educational institutions.
The Internet is divided into a number of root domains.
These domains are given names based on the types of organizations
within them. For instance, the ``edu" domain is comprised of
universities and other educational institutions, the ``com"
domain consists of commercial organizations, the ``mil" domain
contains U.S. military stations, and so on. Each foreign country
also has a two letter country code. All machines on the Internet
fall into a specific root domain.
The Internet is further divided into subdomains. For
instance, because Boston University is an educational institution,
it falls into the edu domain of the Internet. BU has chosen the
subdomain name ``bu" to distinguish it from other organizations'
networks within the ``edu" domain.
Given these two pieces of information, we can form an Internet
address for any person using an Internet-connected machine. While
larock@math is adequate for sending mail to Tim LaRock
from any computer on campus, people not at Boston University need
to use the larock@math.bu.edu address. In order for us
to send mail to other Internet sites, we must know what their domain
and subdomain is.
Tim Kohl
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