See an unfamiliar term? Check the newsletter glossary.
newsletter://mv.com
December 2001
On Internet Domains
Since we have some new options for registering domain names, we
thought we'd take take some time to review just what domain names are and
what they can do for you, who can have them, how you can get them, and a
little bit about what's needed to make them work.
You don't HAVE to read all of this to have a domain. We can help you
register a domain name in one of the major naming groups, and we can take
care of the technical details for you. But if you don't know much about
them, this brief overview can help you learn why the names look like they
do, that there are several facets of owning a domain name, and that a
domain name is not the same as a web site. (If you are familiar with this,
we trust that you'll forgive some of our simplifications.)
Why have a domain?
Primarily, having a domain name accomplishes a fundamental thing: it
provides you with an Internet name that identifies you (your company, your
organization, your family). It can potentially be used to identify your
web site(s) and can be used for your email addresses. A domain name is
registered by you and associated with you, so it gives you a consistent
identity even if you (gasp) change ISPs, so long as you make sure the
domain name is handled properly wherever you move to.
What's in a domain name?
A domain name, for example "mv.com", has 2 or more parts separated by
dots (periods) -- each part is a sequence of letters, digits, and hyphens.
The parts are formed in hierarchies, where you can consider that each part
"belongs" to the names to the right of it. In "mv.com" the "mv" name
belongs to the higher level "com" name. In "www.mv.com" the "www" name is
a conventional name that's used for the web site belonging to "mv.com" .
You can think of it as working the same way that street addresses do in the
real world: in the address "55 Bridge Street, Manchester NH" the grouping
is the same. The entire address provides the detail you are looking for,
but each part of the address belongs to the next higher level in the
address. (Bridge Street is a part of Manchester, NH; Manchester is a part
of NH). Think of this when you see a more complex Internet domain name
such as "www.ci.concord.nh.us" -- "www" is the conventional name for a web
site; "ci" is for the city government; "concord" is the name of the city
within the state "nh" within the country "us".
From this you can see that the rightmost part of a domain name is the
highest level. These highest level names are known as "Top Level Domains"
-- TLDs for short. Two-letter names are associated with countries and are
known as country code top level domains (ccTLDs) - a couple of examples are
"us" for the United States and "jp" for Japan. Apart from a few other spe-
cialty TLDs, there are also "generic Top Level Domains" (gTLDs). Of the
original gTLDs, "edu" is for educational institutions and "gov" is for US
Government entities. More familiar may be "com" and "net" and "org" --
"com" is for commercial entities, "net" is for Internet networking compa-
nies, "org" is for organizations and other things that do not fall within
the other categories.
Some progress has been made in making some other gTLDs available; some
of these names are beginning to be deployed now. We are working with our
affiliate registrar to have access to registration in some of them.
How can you get a domain name?
Anybody can have a domain name as long as it's not already taken and
is a name that you are entitled to use. You should understand that there
are three different parts to having a domain name:
Registration: you deal with a domain name registrar to acquire and keep
the domain name of your choice. This registration gets you the rights to
use the domain name -- it does not actually do anything with the name other
than reserve it for you. There is typically a yearly fee for this; you
must make sure your registration is paid up in order to keep your domain
name. MV Communications is an affiliate with the OpenSRS registrar and can
economically provide domain registration services for COM, NET, and ORG
gTLDs and, as mentioned, we are working on providing access to several oth-
ers as well. You can of course use other registrars if you choose, or if
you need to register in a TLD that our registry services do not provide.
Nameservice: your domain name has to be visible to other Internet users.
When an Internet user wants to find out where your website is, or where
your mail is supposed to go, that information has to be available. Name-
service provides this information for your domain, and in fact you must
have nameservers for your domain in order to register it. Where we list
our domain hosting fees, we refer to this nameservice function. When you
register a domain name through our registration service, we take care of
setting up the nameservice for you.
Operation: once you have a domain name, you can use it in various ways.
For instance, you may wish to have a web site, or you may want to have mail
sent to you using your domain name. These operations have to be imple-
mented. Some of these functions (such as mail mapping) may be provided as
part of your account; others (such as a website) may have an additional fee
associated with them.
If you would like more information about domains, or wish to register
one or add nameservice to your account, please give us a call or visit
http://home.mv.net.
DSL/V modem price reduced
We have obtained an alternate source for the Westell 36R516 Wirespeed
DSL modem that has allowed us to provide them to you at a lower cost than
before. The new price for this modem is $175. Please go to
http://dsl.mv.com/ for more information about our DSL offerings.
Speaking of modems
We still have a large archive (that is, boxes gathering dust) of old
standalone modems that we used to provide dialin access prior to our move
to V.90 digital modem equipment. These modems are Microcom Deskporte Fast
V.34 (mostly 33.6Kbps, but some older ones are 28.8Kbps). Some of them are
more "experienced" than others -- including a few whose plastic cases have
been warped or scorched by heat. None of them have manuals, and although
we believe they are all in good working condition, we make no guarantees.
If you would like one of these relics, for example as a memento of one
of the oldest ISPs around, it can be had for the cost of shipping it to
you. Send us $5 along with a note saying that you'd like one (or two!) and
a shipping address, and we'll send it to you. And if you have a strange
preference for one of the warped ones, please note that too.
If you know of a worthy organization that for some reason needs these
kind of modems, let us know and we can make special arrangements.
MV Communications, Inc. PO Box 4963, Manchester, NH 03108 (603) 629-0000