URL is short for Uniform Resource Locator or can also mean Universal Resource Locator it depends on what site you go on which determines your answer however both are correct.
A URL can be broken down into parts:
2. What function does it perform in the context of the internet?
The URL are is made of several parts. The first part is the protocol which informs the 'web browser' what sort of web server it will be dealing with in order to fetch the URL. The various parts of the URL depend on the protocol however most URLs will encounter the http protocol.
But exceptions include file URLs that are able to link files to your own hard drive. There are also 'ftp' URLs that work just like http URLs. Instead of linking to web servers they link to FTP servers. Malito URLs are used to invite a user to write an email message to a particular email address.
The most commonly used URLs: http://netforbeginners.about.com/od/understandyourbrowser/a/urls.htm
Example: http://www.whitehouse.gov
Example: https://www.nbnz.co.nz/login.asp
Example: http://forums.about.com/ab-guitar/messages/?msg=6198.1
Example: ftp://ftp.download.com/public
Example: telnet://freenet.ecn.ca
Example: gopher://204.17.0.108
-Katrina
3. Are there any variations or types?
There are nearly a hundred different types of URLs. The common ones include: http, ftp, file, mailto & telnet.
http: this is the most common Web URL. http stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol and is system for transmitting and receiving information across the Internet. It appears at the beginning of the URL: http://server/path. Http is commonly used to access html pages, but other resources can be utilized as well through http. For http URLs to work, several components are needed including the server, the port and the path. For example: http://webserver.mcauley.nsw.edu.au:81/studentmenu/. The default port number for Web page calls is port 80.
ftp: The FTP URL is used to request documents via FTP, which stands for File Transfer Protocol. It has the following format: ftp://user:password@server:port/path; type=typecode. FTP calls require authentication, which means you must have a valid user ID and password to use them, however some do allow anonymous IDs. The default port for FTP connections is port 21.The path, works as a UNIX, which determines what kind of download is being performed. There are 3 types of dowloads: directory downloads, binary downloads, and ASCII downloads, (the default being binary).
file: the file URL specifies a file stored on a local computer without specifying any particular transfer protocol. the designation for the file URL is file://server/path
mailto: The mailto URL allows you to designate a link that will open an e-mail message addressed to the person specified in the link. mailto:address
telnet: The telnet URL opens a telnet session with the requested server. The user must have an account on that server in order to be able to log in. telnet://user:password@server:port/
-Jade
4. Commonly used for..?
A URL is used a system which assists in the finding of resources on the web and are used to identify documents on the internet.
-Shivani
sources;
- http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-url.htm
- http://www.daaq.net/old/xhtml/index.php?page=types+of+url&parent=xhtml+hyperlinks
- http://navigators.com/url.html
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