Domain: what it is and why

With the concept of domain face all who deal with the sphere of promotion, creation of sites, etc. It is a universal term, without which no leading expert of the online world can do without. Let's talk about what a domain is.

A domain is the address of a website on the web, represented in the form of letters and numbers. It converts a hard-to-remember IP address into a form familiar to the user. Each name is unique - it is impossible to register identical sequences of symbols. The maximum size of the combination is 63 characters. You can use letters, numbers, and dashes in the name.

The combination may consist of letters of the Latin and Cyrillic alphabet. Different names have different zones of validity.

Why domain names are needed

The word domains means domain. This term is often confused with the concept of a site. But it is not the same thing. A website is a specific web page on which content is placed. In fact, this is the content: articles, pictures, videos and other information. A domain is a unique address that hosts that site. The site can exist without a domain, but only in the network it will not be displayed, and users will not find it. Domain names are needed in order to place the site on the Internet. With its help, people will see your resource and can study the information presented on it.

What a domain name consists of

Domains are organized with a certain hierarchy. They are made up of parts that are called levels. These levels are distinguished with the help of dots.

1. Domains of the first level are the most extensive. Such names are also referred to as domain zones. This is a common name that indicates the territorial and thematic belonging of the resource. It is displayed on the right side after the point. Registration of such a domain is carried out with the participation of an authorized organization ICANN. There are geographic domains of the first level: .ru (Russia), .ua (Ukraine), .kz (Kazakhstan), .de (Germany), etc. There are also thematic domain zones: .photography, .edu, .finance, .money, .travel and others.
2. Second-level domains or subdomains. Displayed on the left side up to a point. Such names can be bought and used by any person or company. A prerequisite for registration is that the user must come up with a unique sequence of letters and numbers.
3. Subdomains of the third and subsequent levels. They are attached to the name of the second category. The owner of the site can create a large number of addresses on the basis of the main name. Such addresses do not need to buy. Pay and renew only the service of the second level.

How the domain looks like

The site address is a sequence of characters separated by a dot. The domain zone is separated from additional subdomains. One name combines several levels. For example, Google services are stored on the domain google.ru. The entry is separated by a dot. This indicates that google is a subdomain. At the same time, .com is the scope, that is, the top-level domain.

The page "google" can not exist without binding to a specific domain zone .ru. The address must necessarily look like this: google.com.

All information about domains of different levels is stored on the DNS-server. The user acquires an address and registers it in the system before launching.

IDN and Punycode

Punycode decoder is a service that allows you to create domain names in your native language. Such names are called Internationalized Domain Names, abbreviated IDN, that is Domain Names in National Languages.

IDN is stored in the format: xn--80ahnhodgl1a.xn--j1amh. For users, this combination is automatically converted by the browser to an adequate record: podarunki.ukr

Punycode converter uses Latin characters from a to z, digits from 0 to 9 and hyphen. A total of 37 characters are used for encoding.

Whois

Whois is a service for checking the owner of a domain. Allows you to find out who owns the address of the Internet site, who registered the domain name and to which DNS-servers the name is directed. Service will help to identify the reliability of the resource, as well as to determine whether it was under sanctions of search engines. The check is carried out online.