Internet Essay, Research Paper

The Internet: How it Works and How it Effects the World

Many people do not understand what the Internet is and the power that it has over the world. The Internet is an extraordinary learning and entertainment tool that, when used properly, can significantly enhance a user’s ability to gather information.

Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) started the Internet. It was a project under taken by the Department Of Defense (DOD) in 1969. It started as an experiment to link together DOD and military research including Universities doing military-funded research.

“The reliable networking part involved dynamic rerouting.” (Levine 12) If one of the computers was under enemy attack, the information could be automatically transferred to other links. Fortunately, the Net is not usually under enemy attack.

The ARPANET was very successful, and every university in the country wanted to sign up. Because so many people wanted to use the Net, ARPANET started getting hard to manage, especially with many university sites on it. Therefore, it was broken into two parts: MILNET, which had all the military sites, and ARPANET, which had all the nonmilitary sites. “The two networks remained connected, however, thanks to a technical scheme called IP (Internet Protocol), which enabled traffic to be routed from one net to another as needed. All the networks connected by IP in the Internet speak IP, so they can all exchange messages.” (Levine 12)

Even though there were only two networks at that time, IP was made to allow thousands of networks. The IP is designed so that every computer on an IP network is compatible. That means any machine can communicate with any other machine.

The Internet, also called the Net, is the world’s largest computer network. The Internet is the “network of all networks.” (Levine 7) The networks are connected to big companies like AT&T, as well as to home computers. About 1,000 networks join each month.

Every computer that is attached to the Internet is called a host. Hosts can be super computers with thousands of users, regular PC’s with only a couple of users, or specialized computers, like routers that connect networks together or to terminal servers that let terminals dial in and connect to other hosts.

Each computer has its own host number. “Being computers, the kind of numbers hosts like are 32-bit binary numbers.” (Hayden 32) Here is an example of a binary number: “1011010010010100100100101000″ Binary numbers are easier to remember by breaking them up into eight 4-bit groups. “Then each group is translated into it’s Hexadecimal equivalent.” (Levine 18) So the number above would translate into this: “B.49.49.28″ This number is easier to use and remember.

Every four digits in the binary number stands for one hexadecimal number. Below is a list of each four binary numbers and its hexadecimal equivalent.

To figure out the binary number in the example into its Hex equivalent is in this way: 1011 is the first four digits of the binary number. Looking at the table, it can be determined that its hexadecimal equivalent is a “B”. The second set of four binary numbers is 0100. That changes into 4 and so on.

The first four numbers of a host number tells you what class the network is. The chart bellow states classes and sizes:

ClassFirst NumberLength of First Num.Max No of Hosts

A1-126116,387,064

B128-191264516

C192-2233254

Big companies like IBM and Apple usually have class A networks. “For example, IBM has network 9, and AT&T has network 12, so a host number 9.12.34.56 would be at IBM, and 12.98.76.54 would be at AT&T.” (Levine 19) Medium sized companies and universities have class B networks. “Rutgers University has network 128.6 and Goldman Sachs has network 138.8″ (Levine 19) Small organizations use class C networks. Network 192.65.175, for example, is used by a single IBM research lab.

To make it easier the Internet uses names, not numbers. “For example, the machine we have heretofore referred to as 140.186.81.1 is named chico.” (Levine 21)

When ARPANET first came out, they had simple names; the machine at Harvard was called HARVARD. But since there are millions of names on the Net they had trouble coming up with different names.

To avoid this problem they created the Domain Name System (DNS). Host names are strings of words separated with dots. For example, MILTON.IECC.COM.

The part at the right of an Internet name is called a zone. In this example the part at the right is com. Com means it is a commercial site, rather than educational, military, or some other kind of zone.

The next part of the name is iecc. IECC is the name of the company. The part to the left of the company name is the name of the host machine inside the company. So a computer inside of IBM could be milton: milton.iecc.com.

Name zones are divided into two categories: the three-letter kind, and the four-letter kind. The three letter zones are made by organizations. Below is a table stating all the zones:

Zone:Meaning:

ComCommercial Organizations

EduEducational Institutions

GovGovernment Bodies and Departments

IntInternational Organizations

MilMilitary Sites

NetNetwork Organizations

OrgAnything that won’t fit in these categories

There are also two letter zones. These zones are for national countries. Some of these zones are AU for Australia and AT for Austria.

There are a few other zones. Even though the ARPANET is not in use any more, a few sites are still there for historical reasons. They have names ending in arpa. Names for some computers on the UUCP and BITNET networks, have names ending in UUCP and BITNET. These names are not real zones, but a lot of systems still route mail to them anyway. Any BITNET or UUCP site can get itself a real host name.

Some parts of the Internet have rules of conduct. The strictest rules are for the NSFNET, which does not allow any commercial use. In late 1993, most educational places in the United States were attached directly to the NSFNET, but then they moved to commercial networks.

What the Internet does, is transmit data from one computer to another. Each time a host wants to send a message to another host, either the receiver is on a network where the first host is directly connected (then the message will be sent directly). Otherwise the sender would send the message to a host that can forward it. The forwarding host delivers the message directly or they can pass it to another host. Usually messages are sent to more than a dozen forwarders on its way from one part of the Net to another.

To transfer a file from one computer to another the file transfer is enabled. There are two different kinds of programs available for this feature. They are: FTP and RCP. File Transfer Protocol (FTP) originated in 1971. The Internet designers decided on a protocol to copy files from one place to another on the net. Many people wrote programs that fulfilled the protocol and called them FTP. Another way is via Remote Copy Protocol (RCP)

It is very easy to copy a file from one computer to another. It is done in the following way: Log onto another computer from FTP and tell it what you want to copy and where to copy it to.

The Internet has spread to many businesses and family rooms throughout the world. Since computers mainly operate using the English language, the Internet usually does as well. For example, if you browse through a site located in the Netherlands, there will most likely be an option to change between English and Dutch. This is usually the case throughout the world. An example of one of these sites is at http://www.dhp.nl/. This link will take you to the Dutch Home Page.

Current events have showed that there are certain governments in Europe that wish to have the language of the Internet changed to their own respective language. The ISP’s, Internet Service Provider which is a company that gives you access to the Internet for a nominal fee, in these countries are willing to alter the language of the Internet to meet the governments desires. This however would cost each user ten dollars more per month, therefore many Internet consumers are weary of this plan.

One of the many great aspects of the Internet is that each user has the option of remaining anonymous. Doing so would diminish the amount of prejudiced remarks said to one another. Therefore there could be no prejudices against a person who is using the Internet. The Internet is a way for many different religions, societies, and races to meld together and share views, experiences, and new inventions across thousands of miles. Once you enter the Cyber-world, everybody is equal, deserves the same respect, and the same rules apply to all users.

In my opinion the Internet is very resourceful. You can be entertained or it can be used as a teaching aid. I use the Internet all the time to either talk to people, transfer files, or to look up information for school reports or projects. There are many different ways that you can log onto the Internet. The most commonly used is through an ISP. Some of which are AT&T WorldNet, Spectra.Net, and IBMNet. You can also access the Internet through on-line programs such as America On-line, Prodigy, or CompuServe. These three programs are the most popular and widely used. The Internet can be used by anyone who has a computer, modem and an Internet program. The Internet is a necessary tool for any student who needs to do papers and reports that need the information that Internet can provide. Many schools have the Internet in class to learn from and have fun at the same time.

Work Cited

Levine, John R. and Carol Baroudi. The Internet For Dummies. A.: IDG Books Worldwide, 1993.

Hayden, Neil L. Surfing The Internet. NY: Putnam, 1992.