Bob Explains: How Does The Internet Work? - Comments Page 1

Great and concise article; thank you.
Fresh out of engineering college, I was invited for an interview at IBM CHQ facility. At the time, all my friends told me not to interview, as they all warned me that "IBM people wear white shirts and ties everyday." Little did I know that the engineering position I finally accepted and for the ensuing 30+ engineering years, I did nothing but wear expensive clothes and ties but NEVER a white dress shirt!

One of the best explanations I have read in some time.

Great article again written in the Rankin style of translating the complex into the understandable for us without the technical knowledge. Sure wish people who write the manuals for equipment we buy could learn to write them in your style!!

Well written Bob and even understandable by an oldie. Many thanks

Thank you for explaining this in a way that I can understand.

Clear, concise and coherent, as usual. Thanks for the informative tour of the internet expressway.

Thank you for the lesson. Greatly appreciated!

Great "AH HA" moments in this article for me! Thanks

I was an early user of ARPANET when employed at a Navy lab. I don't think anyone --NOT anyone--could onceive of what followed that development.

I understand how the DNS servers supply the correct IP address for a destination -- but how is the routing from my ISP to the destination handled?

My router has a gateway address -- the address of where all my WAN requests will be referred. But, how is routing handled beyond that? Doing a TRACERT will give many IP addresses between myself and the destination -- but how are those determined? And, consider they are dynamic -- always changing depending upon loads along the way.

Bob K: In theory, Internet routing is simple.
Your ISP router received data packets from you with an destination IP address. That router has a "Routing Table" which indicates which direction the packet should be sent, say North, South, East or West if the IP address used directions.

It simply passes the data on in the direction it's router table says to go. The next router in the chain does the same thing. Eventually the packet gets to a router that 'owns' the destination IP, e.g., the computer with that IP is directly attached to that router.

That's one-way; return traffic just reverses the path. But note the data packet itself only carries the destination IP and the source IP, it does not have any information about the path from one to the other. The job of routing the data packets from source to destination is the job of the ... duh ... routers.

And that's part of the genius of the Internet.

Damn it. "its router table" not "it's router table". I should know better.

Thank you Bob! I'm a 70 year old general contractor. I can still hammer a nail or dig a big hole. I spend much of my time these days on my desktop computer. When I have a problem I call one of my 8 kids who all know how to fix my mistakes.
Since subscribing to your seemingly unlimited computer knowledge my kids have noticed I don't need to call or have them come over as often. Haha
They think I'm getting smarter. I'm not! Your articles are perfect and I'm actually learning a little bit about this miracle I'm sitting next too.
Thanks again, and best wishes!

Long time reader (and elderly retired geek) here.

Outstanding article! You are one of the best explainers and writers on the Internet. Forwarding this to friends.

A semesester long Data Communiications course, in 15 minutes!

Poorly, very poorly at times.

I always had an idea about the net, but as i read this, it really puts footprints to the road!

thanks Bob. Great job as always.

PS: Still remember "Website Wednesday Nite" on WGN Chicago around midnight. So informative.

Brian

Ah, but how does all the data/information that we see get put on the internet? Who does all this? The minutiae that we ask Alexa or search with Google? Who has time to upload all of this stuff.The volumes of books from the library; the scientific literature, etc. That's what really boogles my mind!

Thank you once again for taking the complex and making it understandable to the general public....you are very adept at that!

Very nice job on this article. I would to send this to everyone I know, everyone that has ever asked me this same question. Good work.