"N. Miller" <
[email protected]> said:
I do not deny being a dummy about networking. I have read all kinds of
things in all kinds of places, over and over again. It's interesting that
almost anyone who gets networking invariably assumes that one who doesn't
understand it is a total lazy ass who never attempts so much as to lift a
finger. I've seen that so many times in so many places it's nausiating.
The basic information is out there. If you didn't grasp it from the basic
information available, I don't know what to think. Despite the claims of
publishers of OSes and networking hardware, networking isn't easy. Deity
knows I see all kinds of troubles people get into because they thought the
manufacturers claims of "ease of use" were factual. All the Wizards on all
of the D-Link, Linksys, and Netgear install disks are often no help when a
newbie gets into trouble.
But, if you had truly "read all kinds of things in all kinds of places", you
would not have made this basic error:
"An IP address on the internet is a destination to look for."
Most people don't look for a destination, they already know it, in the form
of a "Fully Qualified Domain Name" (Google it, and learn something new). If
they don't know a destination, they search (Google) using key words, not IP
addresses. The finding of IP addresses is a, largely, transparent ("behind
the scenes") operation of the ISP DNS servers. End users, even experienced
ones, generally don't worry about IP addresses in the normal course of
surfing the Internet.
Technically, (and, having "read all kinds of things in all kinds of places",
you should have known this) an IP address is a unique device address on an
IP network. Every device on an IP network must have a unique IP address.
Including the one from which requests are made to other machines, using
either FQDNs, or IP addresses (if known).
Surely you can find something clever and derogatory to say about the fact
that I literally can't remember 5% of what I read any more. I'll not
explain why, because that invites a whole new level of sneer about
something that can't possibly be grasped by those who haven't been there.
The "* for Dummies" series of books is a time honored series of primers,
written with self-deprecatory humor, which taught my parents much about
computers. My mother recently shipped off her "MS DOS for Dummies" and
"Windows for Dummies" books to the Goodwill. Maybe some other, less
sensitive, newbie will find them useful. The authors of the books start out
from the premise that they, themselves, are among the "Dumbest Dummies" to
lay hands on whatever the topic of their book is about.
