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Digital Literacy How the Web Works The World Wide Web HTTP and HTTPS

Posted by Ryan Foss
Ryan Foss
965 Points

So elaborating on what TJ said. Even Domain name servers have their own IP addresses?

Because Domain name servers use IP addresses to help look up Domain names right?

1 Answer

Logan R
Logan R
22,989 Points
Logan R
Logan R
22,989 Points

Hey!

So your computer knows by default how to send information to any given IP address (and all servers have an IP). The issue here is that given a domain name (for example "google.com"), there is no way to figure out what the IP address is without asking someone. The purpose of a Domain Name Server is to ask a trusted source what the IP address is for a domain name. By default, your computer has a list of trusted Domain Name Servers and the locations of the servers are kept as IPs.

For example, Google's Domain Name Server IPs are 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4. I contact the server at 8.8.8.8 and ask what the IP address is for the server at "teamtreehouse.com". It replies with the IP address for the TeamTreeHouse server and I proceed to contact that IP address.

Ryan Foss
Ryan Foss
965 Points

Thank you logan!