The World Wide Web turns 20 in August 2011, from the beaches of Acapulco to the top of Mount Everest, there is almost nowhere left on Earth where you can\t connect to the internet!.

How The Internet Works...

Type 'FreelanceComputers.co.uk' into your browser's address bar and you'll be reading the latest information on my website in seconds, so how does the magic work?

1) Browser...

Hit return and a server is connected, which cross-references the URL with a list of IP addresses. Your browser then contacts the computer at that address and opens a TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) connection with it.

2) Web Server...

Once the connection is made, your browser sends an HTTP command to request the homepage from the server. At its most simple, this will be "GET / main.html". The server sends back an HTML file.

3) Back To Browser...

Your browser reads through the HTML and follows up by asking for any extra assets it comes across, such as images. It will then begin running any applications it finds, for example, Flash-banners or java animations. There may be dozens of exchanges between your computer and the server for a single page, each travelling thousands of miles, and all happening within seconds.

4) Web Page Appears...

While pictures and videos are being processed, the browser will render the page onscreen. Many factors can affect the speed at which this happens including your browser, computer, connection and complexity of the page. Still it is way faster that it was 20 years ago.

Jargon Buster...

IP Address - A unique Internet Protocol address, assigned to each device on a network.

TCP/IP - Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol. These govern how packets of data are routed and computers communicate on the Internet.

HTML - Hypertext Mark-up Language; a set of instructions for how to format text, images, links, video and audio in a web page.

URL - A Uniform Resource Locator, also known as a web address, made up of the protocol type, domain name and file path.

HTTP - Hypertext Transfer Protocol; the rules that define how computers share HTML resources.