DNS: Domain Name System

This is alpha nerd soup – where I have 30 seconds to explain a seemingly random jumble of letters!

Today: D N S

Domain Name System

To convert human-friendly hostnames, like fivable.com, into the address of a response-producing resource, your computer, your router, and then a series of other hardware and software systems on the internet use DNS. 

DNS address translation information is distributed – so when you type fivable.com into your browser, the browser will first check for a local cache. If that cache doesn’t exist or it has expired, it will check your computer’s cache, then your local network’s cache, then your ISP’s cache. Eventually, an authoritative DNS server – which is defined by the registrar responsible for the domain will return a response. This helps minimize repetitive requests to a small number of servers for a piece of data that is relatively consistent.