The Internet Protocol (IPv4) assigns a unique address to every device connected to the internet, but IPv6 is being adopted due to the emergence of small wireless devices. The Domain Name System (DNS) links domain names to their IP addresses.
The Internet Protocol is the set of techniques used by many hosts to transmit data over the Internet. The current version of the Internet protocol is IPv4, which provides a 32-bit addressing system.
The Internet Protocol is a “best effort” system, meaning that no packet of information sent over it is guaranteed to reach its destination in the same condition in which it was sent. Often other protocols are used in tandem with the Internet Protocol for data that must have extremely high fidelity for one reason or another.
Every device connected to a network, whether it’s a local area network (LAN) or the Internet, is assigned an Internet Protocol Number. This address is used to uniquely identify the device among all other devices connected to the extended network.
The current version of the Internet Protocol (IPv4) allows for over four billion unique addresses. This number is drastically reduced, however, by webmasters’ practice of taking addresses in large chunks, most of which go unused. There’s a pretty big movement to adopt a new version of the Internet Protocol (IPv6), which should have anywhere from two to one hundred and twenty-eight unique addresses. This number can be represented approximately by a three followed by thirty-nine zeros.
The reason such a virtually unlimited set of Internet Protocol addresses is desirable is due to the emergence of small wireless devices. In the past, it seemed like four billion addresses would be more than enough, but back then, addresses were only used by computers. In the future, it is conceivable that for every human being on earth there will be hundreds, if not thousands, of devices communicating via wireless networks, each of which needs its own Internet protocol address.
Most human users do not use IP addresses directly, but use words to access the servers and computers they wish to visit. The domain names you enter are linked to their Internet Protocol addresses via the Domain Name System (DNS), which keeps a record of all domain names and the IP address to which they are related.
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