IP addresses are unique numbers used to identify devices that are connected to the Internet. When data is sent over the Internet, they are used to locate their destination and the sender’s address. They are used the same way a mailman uses your address to locate your home.
An ISP provides devices with internet connectivity and assigns IP addresses to the devices tapped into its network. They usually assign dynamic IP addresses to household computers. Dynamic IP address constantly change, in contrast to static IP address that stay the same.
A website’s domain name is mapped to its IP address via the DNS (Domain Name System). Nameservers are the part of the DNS that translates domain names to IP addresses.
Web browsers query the DNS to obtain a website’s IP address (if the browser was unable to locate the IP address in any caches). Once the browser has the address, it can send an HTTP request to the appropriate web server for the web data. If all goes well, the web server responses with the web data and the user sees the webpage!
IP addresses can be static or dynamic, shared or dedicated, and public or private. There are two formats used– IPv4 (the most common) and IPv6 (the newest). IPv4 addresses use a 32-bit range and are written in quad-dotted notation. IPv6 addresses use a 128-bit range and are written in Hexadecimal.
Most operating systems use the ping command to test network connections by sending network packets.