www (World Wide Web) vs Internet
www and internet are two widely known and used terms. This is the age of the internet and billions all over the world make use of it daily for various purposes. However, a vast majority of people think that World Wide Web and internet are synonymous. They tend to use the terms interchangeably which is wrong. Though the terms are related, there are differences between the two.
Internet
Internet is a massive network of networks that connects millions across the globe daily. It helps create a network in which anyone sitting in any remote corner of the world can get connected to any other person thousands of miles away. The only requirement for these two people to connect with each other is a computer and an internet connection. Millions of websites containing a sea of information are there on the internet and this information travels at the speed of light literally through various languages known as protocols.
When we talk of internet, we are talking about the hardware, the computers, the routers, cables etc that make up this network. It is in the realms of physical world over which various protocols are used to distribute a sea of information across the world.
World Wide Web (www)
‘www’ is a way of getting to the information available on the net. It is a model for sharing information that sits atop internet. The World Wide Web (www) makes use of HTTP protocol, which is one of the languages used over the net to transmit information. The web utilizes browsers such as Chrome, Internet Explorer, and Firefox to get access to millions of web pages. These pages are linked to each other via hyperlinks in an amazing manner. It is not just text; web pages are full of graphics, images as well as videos.
Web, or www, is just one of the many ways information is distributed on the internet. It is internet and not web that people use to send and receive emails. These emails depend upon SMTP, instant messaging, FTP, and Usenet news groups.
It is thus clear that web is just a subset of the internet and not a synonym of internet. Though closely related, the two terms cannot be used interchangeably.
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In brief: • Internet is a massive network of networks while www is a generic name for HTTP which is one of the protocols used over internet • There are many other services similar to web that people do not know about • Web is a part of internet and not a substitute for net
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