The Internet Book

Download or read book The Internet Book written by Douglas Comer and published by Prentice Hall. This book was released on 2007 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comer, one of the architects of the Internet in the late 1970s, explains in clear, non-technical terms what the Internet is, how it works, how it came to be, and what's in store for the future. Part 1 covers fundamental concepts such as digital and analog communication, introduces packet switching, and explains the LAN technologies that are used in most businesses. Part 2 offers a short history of the Internet research project and how the Internet grew from the ARPANET backbone into today's global information infrastructure. Part 3 explains how the Internet works and discusses the two fundamental protocols used by all services: IP (Internet Protocol) and TCP (Transmission Control Protocol). Part 4 gives an overview of the many services available on the Internet such as browsers, search engines, email, bulletin boards, file transfer, remote desktops, wikis, blogs, and audio and video communication. In each case, the text explains how the service operates and how it uses facilities in the underlying system.