A web address is known as a URL (Universal Resource Locator). A URL consists of a number of parts. Take for example the following web address:

**https://www.w3.org/MarkUp/historical.html**

Let's break it down into its three main parts:

• Protocol: Type of transfer being used
• Host: Location of website host - also known as the "Domain name"
• Resource path: location of resource on host computer.

Protocol

The protocol shown is "HTTP" (HyperText Transfer Protocol). This indicates a standard web page. This is so commonly used that you can usually leave this off the web address you type into a browser.

Other protocol types may include

• FTP: File Transfer Protocol
• HTTPS: HTTP Secure

Host

The host name is the location of the server where the website is stored. It contains information about the type of organisation and the site's country of origin. The host name is managed by the DNS (Domain Name System) which remembers the IP (Internet Protocol) numerical addresses that are associated with Domain Names (such as 192.0.34.166 for http://www.example.com).

Domain names are commonly registered with one of these top-level domains (TLDs):