Things
- Domain Name
- The root part of your website and/or e-mail domain: e.g. fonant.com
- Domain Registry
- The top-level database of domain names, their owner details, and their nameserver names.
- Nameservers
- The computers designated as information sources for connecting to websites and e-mail for the domain. The names of the nameservers are held by the domain registry. Each domain has at least two nameservers, to provide some redundancy. e.g. ns0.fonant.co.uk, ns1.fonant.co.uk
- DNS Records
- Each nameserver for a domain will hold several DNS records: these specify in detail which computers you should talk to to view a website, or send an e-mail, and other things. The DNS records are like telephone book entries: they translate the human-readable machine names (e.g. www.fonant.com) into numerical internet addresses (e.g. 84.234.17.182) that computers use to connect to each other.
- IP Address
- The IP (Internet Protocol) address is the numerical address of the web server on the internet.
Organisations
- Domain Registry
- The organisation with responsibility for allocating new domain names, and holding basic information about each domain.
- For .uk domains, the organisation with responsibility is Nominet
- Domain Registrar
- Submits registration details (contacts, etc.) to the relevant Domain Registries. The Registrar also takes care of paying for the registration and issuing reminders.
- Popular UK-based registrars are UKreg and 123reg.
- DNS Host
- In charge of the domain's DNS records. The DNS host can alter where website and e-mail connections go by changing the IP addresses listed for each type of service.
- Web Host
- In charge of the domain's web server.
- E-mail Host
- In charge of the domain's e-mail servers.
Finding a Web Site
To find a web site at a given domain, this procedure is followed:
- Find the nameservers for the domain from the relevant top-level registrar
- Talk to one of the nameservers, asking for an "A" record
- Talk to the web server using its IP address