Quick answers to real classroom technology questions. An online service of the Educational Technology Clearinghouse.
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What is a URL ? Addresses for web sites are called URLs (Uniform Resource Locators). Most of them begin with the protocol used to access web pages, http (HyperText Transfer Protocol), followed by a colon and two slashes. Many web addresses include www, but this is not always the case. For example, the URL for FIRN's web site is http://www.firn.edu and the URL for the Florida Center for Instructional Technology is http://fcit.usf.edu/ . The different parts of a URL are divided by a period. Each part of a URL contains certain information. The first field is the host name, identifying a single computer or organization. The last field is the top-level domain, describing the type of organization and occasionally country of origin associated with the address. Below are some common Top Level Domains (TLD's): .com .edu .gov .mil .net .org Commercial Educational US Government US Military Networking Providers Non-profit Organization Current domain name country codes include, but are not limited to: .au .de .fr .nl .uk .us Australia Germany France Netherlands United Kingdom United States Some URL addresses include a directory path and a file name. Consequently, the addresses can become quite long. For example, the URL of a web page may be: http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/default.htm . In this example, "default.htm" is the name of the file which is in a directory named "holocaust" on the FCIT server at the University of South Florida. A convention used when creating websites is that the first page created for the site is named index.html or default.html. Web browsers are configured to access this file if a specific file name is not included in the URL used to access a site.			Additional Websites The Internet: Ideas, Activities, and Resources Internet 101 net.Tutor A Teacher's Guide to School Websites Making the Connection Technology at Harvard Law: RSS 2.0 Specification Podcasting and iTunes The WebQuest Page
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Site Map | Submit a Question | About Tech-Ease | Privacy Policy | ETC Home Tech-Ease for Mac is your source for just-in-time answers for classroom technology questions. A companion Tech-Ease for Windows site is also available. This collection is a part of the Educational Technology Clearinghouse. Funding for Tech-Ease content development has been provided by the USF College of Education and various grants from the Florida Department of Education. Copyright 2009 by the Florida Center for Instructional Technology, College of Education, University of South Florida.