What is Domain Name System (DNS)?

As the Internet became larger, the Domain Name System (DNS) was developed, to allow the network expand more easily by assigning names to host computers in a distributed fashion.

The big seven generic top level domain names in the United States are com, edu, gov, int, mil, net and org. In addition, every country his its own top-level domain name. In the United States, these are called country codes. It is easy to track down a listing of all country codes online.

The number of top level domains names is an artifact of the early years of the Internet. In total, including all country codes there are about 150 top level domain names.

It is important to realize that DNS is a distributed naming scheme that follows the boundaries of countries and organizations, rather than those of networks. The DNS represents a key feature of the success of the Internet distributed assignment and record keeping of a database, so that a local authority is responsible for local information. This means that the administrators do not face the impossible task of trying to maintain one enormous central database that would be choke point and would strangle Internet use.

The following are generic top-level domains names.

        Domain Name                           Meaning

                com                          Commercial Business

                edu                           Education

                gov                           Government

                int                             International Entity

                mil                            Military

                net                            Networking Organization

                         org                           Non Profit Organization