Many people do not understand what the Internet is 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: Class First Number Length
of First No Max No of Hosts A 1-126 1 16,387,064 B 128-191 2 64,516 C 192-223 3
254 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 Com edu gov
int mil net org Commercial organizations Educational institutions Government
bodies and departments International organizations Military sites Networking
organizations Anything else that doesn't fit into any of the other 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 vernacular.
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.