Domain Name

Address of a computer, organization, or other entity on a TCP/IP network such as the Internet. Domain names are typically in a three-level “server.organization.type” format.

The top level denotes the type of organization, such as “com” (for commercial sites) or “edu” (for educational sites); the second level is the top level plus the name of the organization (e.g., “britannica.com” for Encyclopædia Britannica); and the third level identifies a specific host server at the address, such as the “www” (World Wide Web) host server for “www.britannica.com”. A domain name is ultimately mapped to an IP address, but two or more domain names can be mapped to the same IP address. A domain name must be unique on the Internet, and must be assigned by a registrar accredited by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). &Seealso; URL.