WEBBITS
explains the Internet:
Connecting to the Internet
How
to connect:
Here are four ways:-
-
A direct connection to the Internet
backbone uses a dedicated machine (a gateway).
Companies may decide that they want their own gateway to the Internet.
This is expensive, but gives full access.
-
Connection through someone else's
gateway. Schools often provide this
kind of access.
-
Using a direct service provider.
Your machine accesses another company's gateway
to the Internet, and you use a dedicated high-speed line for fast access,
e.g. UUNet Technologies.
-
Using an independent service
provider. Individuals usually subscribe
to a service provider who provides the gateway. These are known by
the term ISPs. Here you have two choices:
-
online services such as CompuServe,
MSN and AOL which offer extra services, and are easy to use, or
-
a smaller service provider who
offers limited service, but is usually cheaper. In Canada, there
are many independent service providers.
Internet Architecture
In the diagram of the Internet
below, the backbone
is a set of high-speed telephone lines (such as T3 lines running at 44.736
megabits per second, or DS3, OC3c, and OC12c lines ).
Gateways are
dedicated powerful computers that handle the traffic onto and off the backbone,
as well as passing the traffic along the backbone to the next gateway.
Routers
are the hardware networks and communication software used to find the path
to a destination.
Home
Top of this page
The bird illustration,
adapted by me for use here, is from the IBM DOS User's Guide, 1983
The diagram
of the Internet is from "Using the Internet" by M. A. Pike (Que), 1995
Copyright on
text and layouts (C) 1997 Margaret Brown
