What Is DNS (Domain Name Service)?

Imagine that you want to write your local newspaper a letter, you pull out paper and pen, write the letter and stuff it it an envelope.
Now, when it comes to addressing the envelope you simply write Anytown local newspaper.

You stamp the envelope and put it in your mailbox.

The mail-person arrives at your mailbox, pulls out the envelope and makes a phone call. The mail-person is calling a DNS (Domain Name Service) company. The DNS company tells the mail-person what the real, technical, address is and away it goes. Pretty cool..
. you didn't need to know or remember the exact address, just the "friendly name".

Six months later the newspaper moves to another city.
They will call the DNS company and adjust the account to the new address.
Since they have done this, you, when writing another letter to them, are none the wiser.

.

. you simply keep addressing the envelope to Anytown local newspaper as always.
Pretty cool.
All websites, such as Google, Yahoo, etc, are "hosted" on a server (or multiple servers). These servers have these addresses that uniquely identify them on the Internet (much like our postal address uniquely identifies our residence). These addresses would be difficult for you and I to remember. DNS (Domain Name Service) is a way of resolving or translating user friendly names (like Google.
com) to their technical addresses (173.

194.115.

82). It is much easier for us to remember Google.com than 173.
194.

115.
82. There are many many DNS servers around the world that coordinate their information with each other. The goal is that no matter where you are you can always reference a website by its user friendly name.

If, as in the example above, an address changes, they say that it can take up to 72 hours for all the DNS servers to have the correct address. Are you curious and want to find out the technical address of a website? Simply pull up a DOS screen and ping the "friendly name". To get to a DOS screen hold down the Windows key on your keyboard and press R.

This will bring up the Run dialog box. Type in CMD and press the Enter key. A black window with white lettering will appear.

.

. type in: ping and press the Enter key.

You'll see something like: Pinging www.
Google.

com [74.

125.227.

209] with 32 bytes of data: Reply from 74.125.

227.209: bytes=32 time=38ms TTL=57 Reply from 74.125.

227.
209: bytes=32 time=38ms TTL=57 Reply from 74.

125.227.
209: bytes=32 time=38ms TTL=57 Reply from 74.125.227.

209: bytes=32 time=37ms TTL=57 Ping statistics for 74.

125.
227.209: Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss), Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds: Minimum = 37ms, Maximum = 38ms, Average = 37ms The technical address is 74.

125.227.209. The ping command will "resolve" the friendly address to its technical address while pinging it.