What are Domain Name Servers or DNS?

Article Details
URL: http://www.w3helpdesk.com/index.php?_m=knowledgebase&_a=viewarticle&kbarticleid=69
Article ID: 69
Created On: 13 Apr 2010 4:06 PM

Answer
Short for Domain Name System (or Service or Server), an Internet service that translates domain names into IP addresses. Because domain names are alphabetic, they are easier to remember. The Internet however is really based on IP addresses. Every time you open a website in your browser a DNS service must translate the name into its corresponding IP address. For example, the domain name www.example.com might translate to 210.23.8.50.

The DNS system is in fact its own network. If one DNS server does not know how to translate a particular domain name, it asks another one, and so on, until the correct IP address is returned.