URLs

A URL, short for "Uniform Resource Locator", is a way to unambiguously identify the location of a resource on the Internet. Some typical URLs look like:

http://www.javasoft.com/
file:///Macintosh%20HD/Java/Docs/JDK%201.1.1%20docs/api/java.net.InetAddress.html#_top_
http://www.macintouch.com:80/newsrecent.shtml
ftp://ftp.info.apple.com/pub/
mailto:elharo@metalab.unc.edu
telnet://utopia.poly.edu

Most URLs can be broken into about five pieces, not all of which are necessarily present in any given URL. These are:

the protocol
the host
the port
the file
the ref, section, or anchor

How do the above URLs split?

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Last Modified July 20, 1997
Copyright 1997 Elliotte Rusty Harold
elharo@metalab.unc.edu