Internet

The Internet has gained popularity and emerged as an important and efficient means
of communication. The term Internet is derived from the words ‘interconnection’ and
‘networks’. A network is a collection of two or more computers, which are connected
together to share information and resources. The Internet is a worldwide system of
computer networks, i.e. network of networks. Through Internet, computers become
able to exchange information with each other and find diverse perspective on issues
from a global audience. Most of the people uses Internet for sending and receiving
E-mail and net surfing for retrieving information.

HISTORY OF INTERNET

In 1969, the University of California at Los Angeles and the University of Utah were
connected with the beginning of the ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects
Agency NETwork) using 56 kbit/s circuits, which is sponsored by U.S. (United
States) Department of Defense (DoD). The goal of this project was to connect
computers at different Universities and U.S. (United States) defense.

In mid 80’s another federal agency, the National Science Foundation (NSF) created
a new high capacity network called NSFnet (National Science Foundation Network),
which was more capable than ARPANET. The only drawback of NSFnet was that it
allowed only academic research on its network and not any kind of private business
on it. Now, several private organisations and people started working to build their
own networks, named private networks, which were later (in 1990’s) connected with
ARPANET and NSFnet to form the Internet. The Internet really became popular in
1990’s after the development of World Wide Web (WWW).

WORKING OF INTERNET
The computers on the Internet are connected to each other through small networks.
These networks are connected through the gateways to the Internet backbone.

All computers on the Internet, communicate with one another using TCP/IP, which is
a basic protocol (i.e. set of rules) of the Internet. TCP/IP (Transmission Control
Protocol/Internet Protocol) manages the transmission of data/file/document on the
Internet by breaking the data/file/document into small pieces or parts called packets
or datagrams.

Each packet contains actual data and address part, i.e. addresses of destination and
source upto 1500 characters. Functioning of TCP and IP are as follows:

• TCP It breaks message into smaller packets that are transmitted over the
Internet and also reassembles these smaller packets into the original message
that are received from the Internet.
• IP It handles the address part of each packet, so that the data is sent to the
correct address. Each gateway on the network check this address to see
where to forward the message.

USES OF INTERNET

Internet has been the most useful technology of the modern time, which helps us not
only in our daily lives, but also in our personal and professional lives developments.

Thus, some uses of Internet are as follows:

• E-Commerce (auction, buying, selling products etc.)

• Research (online journals, magazines, information etc.)
• Education (E-learning, distance learning etc.)
• E-Governance (online filling of application, Income Tax, Sales Tax etc.)
• E-Reservation (online reservation, online ticket booking etc.)
• Online Payments (credit and debit card payments etc.)
• Video Conferencing
• Exchange of Views (files, music, folders etc.)
• Social Networking Sites (facebook, twitter etc.)
• Entertainment (play music, videos, games etc.)

Advantages of Internet

1. Greater access to information reduces research time.

2. Allows you to easily communicate with other people.
3. Global reach enables one to connect everyone on the Internet.
4. Publishing documents on the Internet saves paper.
5. A valuable resource for companies to advertise and conduct business.

Disadvantages of Internet
 1. Cyber frauds may take place involving credit/ debit card numbers and details.
2. Unsuitable and undesirable material is available that sometimes can be used
by notorious people such as terrorists.
3. It is a major source of computer viruses.
4. Messages sent across the Internet can be easily intercepted and are open to
abuse by others.
5. It is difficult to check the accuracy of information available on the Internet.

Who Governs the Internet?

Internet is not governed by any single organisation. Some volunteer groups had
been formed to help, co-ordinate and wrist with the development of the Internet.
These organisations are as follows:

• Internet Architecture Board (IAB) It is a technical advisory group of the Internet

society and is chartered to provide oversight of the architecture of the Internet,
its protocols and resources.
• Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) It develops and maintains the Internet’s
communication protocols.
• Internet Research Task Force (IRTF) It looks into long-term research problems
that could be critical in five or ten years.
• Internet Network Information Center (InterNIC)
It provides various registry services needed for the Internet to operate
effectively.
• World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) It develops standards for the evolution of
the Web.
• Internet Society (ISOC) It concerns with the growth and evolution of the
Internet and the way in which the Internet can be used.

CONNECTING TO THE INTERNET

There are mainly three ways of connecting to the Internet, which are as follows:

1. Dial-up Connection
It is a temporary connection, set-up between your computer and ISP server.
Dial-up connection uses the telephone line (Public Switched Telephone Network-
PSTN) and modem to connect to the Internet. The modem connects the computer
through the standard phone lines, which serves as the data transfer medium. When
a user initiates a dial-up connection, user need to enter the password and specify a
username and modem dials a phone number of an Internet Service Provider (ISP)
that is designated to receive dial-up calls.
The ISP then establishes the connection, which usually takes about 10 sec and is
accompanied by several beeping and buzzing sounds.

2. Broadband Connection
The term broadband commonly refers to high speed Internet access that is always
ON and faster than the traditional dial-up access. It is the short form of broadband
width, that uses a telephone line to connect to the Internet. Speed of broadband
connection is measured in Mbps (Megabits per second).
Broadband access allows users to connect to the Internet at greater speed than a
standard 256 Kbps (Kilobits per second) modem or dial-up access. Broadband
access requires the use of a broadband modem.
Broadband includes several high speed transmission technologies, which are as
follows:

Digital Subscriber Line (DSL)

It is a popular broadband connection which provides Internet access by transmitting
digital data over the wires of a local telephone network. It uses the existing copper
telephone lines for Internet access.
A special modem is necessary in order to be able to use a DSL service over a
standard phone line.
Faster forms of DSL, typically available to businesses are as follows:

• High Data Rate Digital Subscriber Line (HDSL)

• Very High Data Rate Digital Subscriber Line (VHDSL)
• Asymmetrical Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL)
• Symmetrical Digital Subscriber Line (SDSL)

Cable Modem
This service enables cable operators to provide broadband using the same co-axial
cables, that deliver pictures and sound to your TV set.
A cable modem can be added to or integrated with a set-top box that provides your
TV set for Internet access. They provide transmission speed of 1.5 Mbps or more.

Broadband over Power Line (BPL)

It is the delivery of broadband over the existing low and medium voltage electric
power distribution network. Its speed is comparable to DSL and cable modem
speeds.
BPL can be provided to homes using existing electrical connections and outlets. It is
also known as power-band. BPL is good for those areas, where there are no
broadband connections, but power infrastructure exists, e.g. in rural areas.
 • ARPANET was the world’s first operational packet switching network.
• An Internet backbone is a point, where one or more networks are connected.
• ISP refers to the company that provides Internet connections to the users.
• A modem changes the digital data into analog data and vice-versa at source
computer in a format that can be carried by telephone lines. Modem stands for
Modulator and Demodulator.
• Bandwidth is the amount of data that a circuit or a signal can carry.
• TCP/IP was designed in 1973, which in 1983 became the standard for
communicating between computers over the Internet.
• Some popular ISPs of India are:
o Data Communication Ltd.
o Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd. (MTNL)
o Airtel
o Reliance

3. Wireless Connection
Wireless broadband connects a home or business to the Internet using a radio link
between the customer’s location and the service provider’s facility. Wireless
broadband can be mobile or fixed. Unlike DSL and cable, wireless broadband
requires neither a modem nor cables.
The distance between the’ devices connected to each other through a wireless
Internet connection does not affect the rate of data transfer between them.
Some ways to connect the Internet wirelessly are as follows:

Wireless Fidelity (Wi-Fi)

It is a universal wireless networking technology that utilises radio frequencies to
transfer data. Wi-Fi allows high speed Internet connections without the use of cables
or wires. Wi-Fi networks can be designed for private access within a home or
business. It can be used for public Internet access at ‘hot spots’ that offers Wi-Fi
access such as restaurants, coffee shops, hotels, airports, convention centres and
city parks.

Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX)

Today, it is one of the hottest broadband wireless technology. These systems are
expected to deliver Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) services upto 31 miles (45
km) for fixed stations and 3-10 miles (5-15 km) for mobile stations.
WiMAX It would operate similar to Wi-Fi but at higher speed, over greater distances
and for a greater number of users. It has the ability to provide services even in areas
that are difficult for wired infrastructure to reach. Also, it has the ability to overcome
the physical limitations of traditional wired infrastructure.

Mobile Wireless Broadband Services

These services are also becoming available from mobile telephone service providers
and others. These services are generally appropriate for mobile customers and
require a special PC card with a built-in antenna that plugs into a user’s laptop
computer. Generally, they provide lower speeds in the range of several 100 Kbps.
Some advantages and disadvantages of different connection types are as follows:

Connection

Advantages Disadvantages
types

(a) Easily available.

(a) Slower than broadband.
(b) Available at low cost.
(b) Needs expensive set-up.
Dial-up
(c) Can be used through fixed or cellular
(c) Phone remains busy.
phone.

(a) Telephone can be used with Internet

(a) Expensive than dial-up.
connection.
(b) Not available in all areas.
Broadband (b) Faster than a dial-up connection.

(c) Needs expensive set-up.

(c) Always on type of connection.
 (a) No phone line required. (a) Vulnerable

(b) Easy and inexpensive to set-up. (b) Not much secured.

Wireless (c) No limitation of location. (c) Limited security mechanisms.

(d) Connectivity is never a problem. (d) Medical disadvantage can cause one c

Satellites which are orbiting around the earth, provide necessary links for telephone
and television service. They can also provide links for broadband. Satellite
broadband is another form of wireless broadband and is also useful for serving
remote or sparsely populated areas.

WORLD WIDE WEB (WWW)

It is a system of Internet servers that supports hypertext and multimedia to access

several Internet protocols on a single interface. It is often abbreviated as the Web or
WWW. It is a way of exchanging information between computers on the Internet,
trying to tie them together into a vast collection of interactive multimedia resources. It
is only a portion of what makes up the Internet, but it is the fastest growing part of
the Internet.
The Web lets people, organisations and companies publish information for other
people to see. This makes the Web a very useful tool for finding information about
any topic.

Protocol
It refers to a set of rules that co-ordinates the exchange of information. Both the
sender and the receiver should follow the same protocol to communicate data.

Protocols of the Web

• HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) A protocol that transmits hypertext over

networks. It is the stateless protocol of the Web.
• SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) It distributes E-mail messages and
attached files to one or more electronic mail boxes, e g. atmail
• FTP (File Transfer Protocol) It transfers files between a server and a computer,
e.g. Filezilla.
• VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) It allows delivery of voice communications
over IP networks, e.g. Skype.
• POP (Post Office Protocol) It is the primary protocol behind E-mail
communication e.g. Outlook.
• IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) It is a standard protocol for
accessing E-mail from your local server, e.g. broadband mechanisms.
WWW Attributes
WWW provides various attributes, which are as follows:

• User-friendly The WWW resource works smoothly with most Web browsers,
such as Internet Explorer, Firefox etc.
• Multimedia documents WWW allows users to create and display Web pages
that contains various graphics, audio, video, animation and text.
• Interactive WWW provides interactivity using hyperlinks and input boxes (i.e.
textboxes and checkboxes).
• Frames WWW supports frames that allow users to display more than one
independent section on a single Web page.

HyperText and Hyperlinks

Hypertext is the text that appears on the page, on which we can click and reach to
another page with which it is linked. Hypertext is also a combination of hyperlinks
and multimedia. Hyperlink or dynamic link i simply called a link, may be an icon,
graphic or text in a document that links to another document.

WEB PAGE

The backbone of the World Wide Web is made up of files or documents called pages
or Web pages, that contain information and links to resources both text and
multimedia. It is created using HTML (HyperText Markup Language). The Web is a
collection of large number of computer documents or Web pages that are stored on
computers around the world which are connected to one another using hyperlinks.

WEBSITE

A group of related Web pages that follow the same theme and are connected
together with hyperlinks is called a Website. In other terms, “A Website is a collection
of digital documents, primarily HTML files, that are linked together and that exist on
the Web under the same domain”.
A Website displays related information on a specific topic. Each Website is accessed
by its own address known as URL (Uniform Resource Locator).
e.g. http://www.carwale.com is a Website, while http:// www. carwale.com/new/ is a
Web page.
Two terms that are associated with a Website are as follows:

Home Page
The main or first page of a Website is known as home page.
Advantages of Home Page

• It helps viewers to find out what they can find on that particular site.
• It helps in the Publicity of on individual or community.
• It makes the visitors more comfortable with the website.
Web Portal
It is a Web page that combines useful information and links.
Advantages of Web Portal

• Easy for users to customize personal places.

• It provides communication between portals (i.e. between different applications).
• It provides flexible content and layout.

WEB BROWSER

It is a software application that is used to locate, retrieve and display some content
on the World Wide Web, including Web pages. These are programs used to explore
the Internet. It is an interface that helps a computer user to gain access over all the
content on the Internet.
We can install more than one Web browser on a single computer. The user can
navigate files, folders and Websites with the help of a browser.
There are two types of Web browsers, which are as follows:

Text Web Browser

A Web browser that displays only text-based information is known as text Web
browser, e.g. Lynx.

Graphical Web Browser

A Web browser that supports both text anu graphic information is known as graphical
Web browser. e.g. Internet Explorer, Firefox, Netscape, Safari, Google Chrome,
Opera.

Some Popular Graphical Web Browsers

NETSCAPE – It was introduced in 1994. Netscape comprises the major portion of

the browser’s market.
INTERNET EXPLORER (IE) – It is a product of Microsoft. This is the most
commonly used browser in the world. This was introduced in 1995 alongwith
Windows 95 launch and it has passed Netscape popularity in 1998.
SAFARI – It is a Web browser developed by Apple Incorporation and included in
Mac OS X. It was first released as a public beta in January 2003. Safari provides
good support for latest technologies like XHTML, CSS2 etc.
FIREFOX – It is a new browser derived from Mozilla. It was released in 2004 and
has grown to be the second most popular browser on the Internet.
GOOGLE CHROME – This Web browser was developed by Google. Its beta and
commercial versions was released in September 2008 for Microsoft Windows.
OPERA – It is smaller and faster than most other browsers, yet it is fully featured. It
is the most popular mobile Web browser.

• WWW was introduced on 13th March, 1989.

• The first graphical Web browser was NCSA Mosaic.
• Web portal is a Website that has hyperlinks to many other Websites.
 • Intranet is a collection of private computer networks within an organisation. It is
also known as corporate portal or private business network.

WEB SERVER

It is a computer program that serves requested HTML pages or files from the Web
client. A Web client is the requesting program associated with the user. The Web
browser is a client that requests. HTML files from Web servers.

Every Web server that is connected to the Internet is associated with a unique
address, i.e. IP address which is made up of a series of four numbers between 0 to
255 separated by periods!.), e.g. 68.178.157.132 or 68.122.35.127.

Web server software generally requires a fairly robust operating system like Unix,
Windows NT. Every Website need to be stored on a computer called the Web server
from which it can be accessed. Currently, there are five major Web servers
commonly used for hosting Websites as follows:

WEB ADDRESS AND URL

Web is a collection of documents (Web pages) stored on computers around the

world. Each Web page has an address describing where it can be found. This
address is known as Web address or domain name. A Web address identifies the
location of a specific Web page on the Internet, such as http://www.1earnyoga.com .
On the Web, Web addresses are called URLs. It is the Web address for a Website or
a Web page. The URL specifies the Internet address of a file stored on a host
computer connected to the Internet.

Parts of URL
The URL contains three parts, which are as follows:

1. The name of the protocol to be used to access the file resource.

2. A domain name that identifies a specific computer on the Internet.
3. A path name with hierarchical description that specifies the location of a file in
that computer, e.g.
Types of URL
Common types of URL are as follows:

• Absolute URL It specifies the exact location of a file/directory on the Internet.

Absolute URL identifies that each absolute URL is unique, which means that if
two URLs are identical then they point to the same file. It uses the following
format:
scheme://server/path/resource.
• Relative URL It points to a file/directory in relation to the present file/directory. It
locates a resource using an absolute URL as a starting point. It typically
consists of the path and optionally, the resource but no scheme or no server.

DOMAIN NAME

It is the text name corresponding to the numeric IP address of a computer on the

Internet. Internet users access your Website using your domain name. It is a way to
identify and locate computers connected to the Internet. It must be unique. Domain
name always have two or more parts, separated by periods (dots).
e.g: google.com, yahoo.com etc.

Domain Abbreviation
Domain are organised by the type of organisation and by the country. A three letter
abbreviation indicating the organisation and usually two letter abbreviation indicating
the country name. Most common domain abbreviations for organisation are as
follows:

info Informational organisation

com Commercial
gov Government

edu Education

mil Military

net Network resources

org Usually non-profit organisation

Some domain abbreviations for country are as follows:

in India

au Australia

fr France

nz New Zealand

uk United Kingdom

Domain Name System (DNS)

It translates domain names (computers host names) into IP addresses. It also stores
and associates many types of information with domain names. It provides world wide
keyword based redirection service.
DNS can be quickly updated and specifies the technical functionality of database
service. The naming scheme by which servers are identified is known as the domain
name system. e.g. the domain name www.example.com might translate to
198.105.232.4.

Numeric Computer IP Address

IP addresses are in aaa.aaa.aaa.aaa format, where each aaa is a number from 0 to
255. The length of IP address is 4 bytes. IP addresses identify the host computers,
so that packets of information reached to the correct computer, e.g. 162.192.1.89
The IP address has the following characteristics:

• IP addresses are unique.

• No two machines can have the same IP address.
• IP addresses are also global and standardised.
• All machines connected to the Internet agree to use the same scheme for
establishing an address.

E-MAIL ADDRESS

E-mail stands for ‘Electronic Mail’. It is a paperless method of sending messages,

notes, pictures and even sound files from one place to another using the Internet as
a medium. It is an individual name, which is used to send and receive E-mail on the
Internet. It is used to specify the source or destination of an E-mail message.

The format of an E-mail address is user@domain. Where,

• the first part (user) identifies a unique user name.

• “@” separates the user from the domain, which identifies the mail server.
e.g.

Some sites which provide the E-mail services are Gmail, Yahoo! mail, Rediffmail etc.

HYPERTEXT TRANSFER PROTOCOL (HTTP)

It is the protocol used to transfer data over the World Wide Web. It defines how
messages are formatted and transmitted and what actions should be taken by the
Web servers and browsers in response to various commands.
e.g. when you enter a URL in your browser, this actually sends a HTTP command to
the Web server directing it to fetch and transmit the requested Web page. The other
main standard that controls how the World Wide Web works is HTML, which covers
how Web pages are formatted and displayed. HTTP is a stateless protocol because
each command is executed independently without any knowledge of the commands
that came before it.

HYPERTEXT MARKUP LANGUAGE (HTML)

It is used for designing Web pages. A markup language is a set of markup (angular
bracket, <>) tags, which tells the Web browser, how to display a Web page’s words
and images for the user. Each individual markup code is referred to as an element or
a tag. The text placed between a pair of angular brackets (<>) defines an HTML
element.

HTML elements have two basic properties, i.e. attributes and content.
Attributes are used to apply the desired style on the text and content refers to the
text that you want to display on the browser. When a Web page is opened in a Web
browser, then the formatted content is displayed.

SEARCH ENGINE

It is a Website that provides the required data on specific topics. It turn the Web into
a ppwerful tool for finding information on any topic. Search engine allows users to
enter keywords (queries or terms) related to particular topics and retrieve information
about the Websites containing these keywords. It is a program designed to search
for information on the Web through a database of Web pages queries or keywords.

When search query is submitted in the search engine by user, the software used for
search algorithm scans the index to find Web pages over the Internet.
Some of the most popular search engines are as follows:

Google http://www.google.com

AltaVista http://www.altavista.com
Yahoo http://www.yahoo.com

Hotbot http://www.hotbot.com

Lycos http://www.lycos.com

Excite http://www.excite.com

Web Crawler http://www.webcrawler.com

Working of a Search Engine

Search engine works with three elements, which are as follows:

1. Web Crawler It is a software that browse the Internet in a systematic manner. It

retrieves the information, which follows every link on the site that are stored by
Web search engines. It is also known as spider, ant, automatic indexer or Web
scutter.
2. Indexing Software It is a software that receives the list of Web documents and
addresses collected by Web crawler. Some search engines provide proximity
search which allows users to define the distance keywords.
3. Search Algorithm It is a concept based searching, where the research involves
using statistical analysis on pages containing the words or phrases you are
searching for.

Locating Sites using Search Engines

A search engine is an information retrieval system designed to find information
stored on the WWW.
For searching any particular information, following steps are to be taken:

Step 1 – Go to the home page of the search engine.

Step 2 – On the home page, a textbox will appear somewhere.
Step 3 – In that textbox, type a keyword that you want to search.
Step 4 – After that, there will be a button that looks like an image and has the word
(such as Google Search, Web Search etc.) search written on it. Clicking on that
button, search will start and will bring up a new Web page with a list of Websites
related to that topic.
Step 5 – Clicking on one of the links in the list will access that Website.
 FILE TRANSFER PROTOCOL (FTP)

It is a set of rules that enable a users to transfer files between those computers that
have Internet connection. It is a protocol through which Internet users can upload
files from their computer to a Website or download files from a Website to their PC.

FTP is the easiest way to transfer files between computers via Internet and utilities
TCP (Transmission Control Protocol)/IP (Internet Protocol) systems to perform
uploading and downloading tasks.
Objectives of FTP are as follows:

• To promote sharing of files (computer programs and/or data).

• To encourage indirect or implicit (via programs) use of remote computers.
• To shield a user from variations in file storage systems among hosts.
• To transfer data reliably and efficiently.

Some freely available FTP softwares are FileZilla, Kasablanca, gFTP, konqueror etc.

Working of FTP
FTP works on the principle of a client/server model. A FTP client program enables
the user to interact with a FTP server program in order to access information and
services on the server computer. To access FTP server program, users must be able
to connect to the Internet or interact with FTP client program.
FTP based communication makes use of the following two channels:
 1. Control channel (A channel for commands) Remains open for the entire
session between the client and the server.
2. Data channel (A channel for data) Open and close only when data has to be
transferred between the client and the server.

Advantages of FTP

1. FTP is the fast and efficient way of transferring bulk of data across the Internet.
2. It has an automatic backup. Whenever you edit your files in your local system
you can update the same by copying it to the host system in your site.
3. FTP gives you control over transfer. The data can be transferred either in text
files or in the binary form.
4. You can work with the directories on the remote systems, delete or rename the
remote files while transferring data between two hosts.
5. While using FTP, tools like macros can also be used to make your work more
efficient and easier.

Disadvantages of FTP

1. FTP was not designed to be a secure protocol.

2. Encryption of data can’t be done in FTP.
3. FTP causes spoof attacks during the transfer of data.
4. Filtering active FTP connections is difficult.