Services of the Internet

The internet is a network of networks, which has grown from a small project to the huge network of today. It has become a huge source of information, entertainment, business, news and education. Some important services of the internet are discussed below:
World wide web
The world wide web (www) is the most important service available on the internet. It was created in 1990 European particle Physics Laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland to exchange and share data through the internet using a protocol known as a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP). A hypertext document is a specially encoded file that use hypertext links or hyperlinks in the document. HTTP and hypertext links are the foundation of the world wide web. www presents text, image, animation, video, sound and other media through a single interface. The www is often referred to as the internet. Actually, they are two different concepts: internet is the network of networks or a global network whereas the web is a collection of documents or web sites, which are shared by different users using the internet.

Electronic mail (E-mail)
Electronic mail or e-mail is one of the most popular services provided by the internet. It is now the world’s largest electronic mail system. More then 25 million people are directly connected to the internet and can send and receive electronic mail. The main advantage of e-mail is it is faster and cheaper then traditional mailing system. It has some disadvantages: minor mistakes in e-mail address may deliver the mail to a wrong address. Since, it passes through a vast electronic network, it may be seized in between. The popular e-mail programs include Eudora, Microsoft outlook and Netscape Messenger.

If you have an account with an ISP or if you are a member of the domain, then you can create an e-mail address. This unique address enables other to send a massage to you and enables you to send a massage to other users. An internet electronic mail address has two parts: the user name and the domain name. the user name identifies the person who receives the mail; the domain name identifies the computer system on which the user has an account. These parts are separated by @sign. An example of an e-mail address is: sanjay@wlink.com.np