What is a computer domain name. Must be unique. How to check a domain before registering

Domain ( Domain name) is a website address, consisting of a set of characters or numbers, unique to a group of domain names. A group of domain names means special zones like .ru, .com, .org, .net, etc. The domain is displayed in address bar browser.

If you intend to create a website, it doesn't matter whether personal blog, a portfolio page for a freelancer, an online store, a forum, etc., then first you will need to come up with a name for your project and a domain name. Then you need to place your project on hosting, after which other people will be able to visit your site.

In this article we will figure out how to come up with a name for your future website, what a domain is (domain name), how to choose a domain, how to check it, how to register and set up a domain for your website.

What is a website domain in simple words and why is it needed?

A domain is needed to differentiate sites. Even if the user does not enter the address of your site into the browser, but, for example, gets to your site through the Yandex or Google search engine, then these same search engines somehow need to correctly distinguish between millions of sites and redirect users correctly.

Now let's take a closer look at the address of a website. If you copy the site address from the address bar of your browser, you will see a link something like this:

Let's take it apart piece by piece this domain.

The abbreviation http stands for HyperText Transfer Protocol , "hypertext transfer protocol". If we talk in simple language, then http is like traffic rules on the road, or another way to say it is like a translator between two people speaking different languages. It allows you to connect a user who opens a particular site on his computer and the site itself, which is created according to certain rules.

The HTTP protocol, like a translator, first listens to what one person (the computer user) says to it and then translates it to a second person (the site). As a result, mutual understanding occurs between the first and second person, which is expressed in the fact that the person opens the page he needs and studies necessary information.

There are other protocols, such as HTTPS, which means secure connection. That is, all information will be transmitted in encrypted form. Or the SMTP protocol, which is used to transmit email messages.

What is WWW?

WWW is an acronym that stands for World Wide Web , which translated means The World Wide Web. The World Wide Web is made up of millions of Internet web servers located around the world. A web server is a computer program that runs on a computer connected to a network and uses the HTTP protocol to transfer data.

Actually, web servers host files from various websites. By files we mean various pictures, video, audio, various components of sites and folders in which all this equipment is located. And through the HTTP protocol, various users around the world manage to connect to such web servers and view the content of sites.

But the fact is that in the 90s of the last century and the beginning of the 00s of this century, web servers were very weak, so it was necessary to place, for example, website files on one computer, a mail server for email messages on another, and FTP server for remote access to files on the third. The names of the servers began with the name of the computers on which they were located, and depending on what the person needed, for example, viewing a website or sending mail, they looked like this: www.site.com, mail.site.com or ftp.site.com . In other words, the WWW particle in the site name helped determine what a person needed. IN in this case he needed to look at a website.

But over time, with the development of the Internet, computers, web servers, the emergence of new data transfer protocols, etc., the WWW part was no longer needed. More precisely, the browsers through which we view websites have learned to determine the site address without it. Therefore, now, when we type the name of a site in the address bar, we don’t have to write the www part. and often many sites that we go to, for example, through search engines show the name of the site also without this piece of WWW.

What is a second level domain?

Second level domain name(English second-level domain) - part of the domain name, separated by a dot from the first-level domain immediately following it (Wikipedia).

Why second level? Because the first-level domain in our example is a particle RU, but we’ll talk about it a little lower.

There are also third-level domains and it will look like this: www.client.site. I have a section for clients on this third-level domain. There are also domains of the fourth and fifth levels, but they are extremely rare and are practically not used by anyone.

The second level domain is the name of our website, depicted in this case on English language. The fact is that now you can come up with domains in Russian. In my case it would look like moirubl.rf. Perhaps you have already come across sites on the Internet whose domain name was written in Russian and at the end there was a piece of the Russian Federation.

If you are creating a website, then you can come up with any name for your second-level domain, the main thing is that this name is not taken. Below I will show you how to find out whether the domain name you like is available or taken.

What is a first (top) level domain?

Now let’s look at the final part of the link in question, the RU part. This is also a domain, only the first one, or it is also called a domain top level. An ordinary user will not be able to register a first-level domain, but it’s easy to register a second-level domain.

Top (first) level domain(English top-level domain, TLD) - the highest level in the domain name system (DNS) hierarchy. Is the starting point (from right to left) from which a domain name on the Internet begins.

According to international agreement, each country was allocated a first-level domain name, indicating that the site belongs to a specific state:

.ru – Russia.
.ua – Ukraine
.uk – Great Britain
.de – Germany
.fr – France
Etc.

There are also first-level domains related to the area of activity of the site, for example:

.gov - for US government organizations.
.com - was originally considered as a domain for commercial organizations, but is now used by all types of organizations, including educational institutions (usually private), individuals, non-profit and semi-commercial organizations.
.edu - intended for educational institutions.
.info – intended for information resources. It can be safely used by both individuals and legal entities.
.biz – for business organizations. Such a domain can register both physical and entity, however, the registration may be challenged in the future if the domain owner does not engage in commercial activities in accordance with the domain charter. Domain.biz was created to alleviate the situation with domain.com, which has become incredibly popular and, as a result, is overcrowded.
.net – The name comes from the word “network”, indicating its original purpose - the registration of organizations engaged in network technologies, such as Internet service providers and other companies associated with system administration etc. But now it is used everywhere and in Russia it has become popular among resources involved in the fight against any diseases, social aspects, for example, gepatitu.net, which means NO to Hepatitis, alkogolju.net, which means NO to Alcohol. However, this is a free domain zone for registration by any person, both individuals and legal entities. Moreover, this top-level domain is one of the most popular after.com
.org – originally intended for use by non-profit organizations that do not meet the criteria of other domains. Also available for registration by anyone. A striking example among sites using this domain zone is wikipedia.org
.pro – this domain is intended in many countries of the world for licensed or certified lawyers, accountants, doctors, engineers. In Russia, many domain name registrars also require you to provide documents confirming your affiliation with the type of activity indicated on your website.
.aero – these domains can only be registered by organizations related to air transportation. In Russia, a striking example that uses this top-level domain is Pobeda Airlines (pobeda.aero).

In which domain zone is it best to choose a domain?

If your site is designed for the Russian-speaking population, then first of all it is recommended to select a second-level domain in the .RU zone. This is important primarily for search engines Yandex, Google and others. They will understand that your site is designed for Runet (Russian-language Internet) and will rank your site better in search results.

For more information about what ranking in search engine results is and how a domain name affects it, watch the video below:

However, it may turn out that the variant of the domain name that you came up with is already taken by someone in the .RU zone. If you really like the domain and want to keep it at any cost, then you can check it in other domain zones, such as .com, .info, .net, .org, .рф.

These domain zones come in second place after zone.ru, if you prioritize between them. In third place are the .biz and .pro zones, and this is primarily due to the fact that these zones should be chosen only if you will be engaged in commercial activities and can confirm that your future site belongs to this activity.

To confirm, you may be asked for a Certificate of Registration of Individual Entrepreneurs, as well as an extract from the tax office about the areas of activity you have chosen, a license for the type of activity, for example, if you are engaged in any kind of construction and your website is dedicated to this topic, documents on relevant education, for example, if your site is dedicated medical topics, then you may need a Diploma of completion of any medical institution.

But if you plan to create:

Business card website;
Portfolio website;
Personal blog;
Information site;

Then you should focus on the following domain zones: .ru, .com, .info, .net, .org, .рф.

If you are creating a personal page that will contain a few pages, for example, a portfolio, contacts, reviews, then it makes no difference what domain zone your site will be in.

If you are creating an informational website or personal blog, in which you plan to regularly write articles and thereby attract a large number of visitors from search engines, then the name in the .RU zone will have priority. But if everything cool names are busy, then you can find something for yourself in the zones.com, .info, .net, .org.

If you are creating a one-page website where you will sell something and attract people through advertising, then it does not matter in which zone you have a domain.

If you are creating an online store, then you need to first of all focus on the country where the bulk of your customers will be located. For example, for Russia it is zone.ru, and for Ukraine.ua. But if interesting domains are occupied, then it’s not critical if you choose an option in the .com, .biz or .pro zones.

It’s worth mentioning separately about the zone.RF. This domain zone is best chosen for one-page sites and personal business card sites, but not for information sites with a lot of news. Difficulties may arise technical plan related to the encoding of the Cyrillic alphabet and the adaptability of server software to the Latin alphabet, as well as incorrect display addresses of your pages in old browsers and when displayed in search engines.

What is cybersquatting and domaining?

In the process of coming up with a domain name, which we will talk about in more detail below, as well as in the process of checking the ideas you have come up with, you will be faced with the fact that many interesting names will be busy with other people. But what’s most offensive is that if you go to the selected name, there will be no website there, but you will see an advertisement that this domain is for sale.

This is the very case when the terms cybersquatting and domaining are used.

Cybersquatting- registration of domain names containing trademark belonging to another person for the purpose of their further resale or unfair use. People who practice such actions are called cybersquatters.

For example, imagine that Coca-Cola does not have a website. And then the moment came when they decided to start one. But bad luck, there was someone more enterprising and fast man, who has registered this domain name. Naturally, he did this for selfish purposes, so that he could later resell this domain to the Coca-Cola company for crazy money.

Domaining (English domaining, from domain - domain)- almost the same thing as Cybersquatting - this is speculation in domain names. The idea is to purchase Internet domain names for their subsequent resale for profit.

The main difference is that NOT brands of any kind are registered here famous companies, but good interesting words from the most popular areas of our life, which can be used to create any website and attract a large amount of traffic due to uniqueness of this word.

Most expensive domain

A striking example is the domain Sex.com, which was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the most expensive domain ever sold. Transaction amount: $13 million. Year of sale: 2010.

Here are a few more examples where people made huge capital by selling a domain name:

Vodka.com sold for $3 million in 2006
Business.com sold for $7.5 million in 1999
Hotels.com sold for $11 million in 2001
Pizza.com sold for $2 million in 2008
Beer.com sold for $7 million in 2004
Diamond.com sold for $7 million in 2006
Toys.com sold for $5 million in 2009
Clothes.com sold for $4 million in 2008
CreditCards.com sold for $2 million in 2004
Computer.com sold for $2 million in 2007
Russia.com sold for $1 million in 2009

So, as you can imagine, domain trading can be a very profitable business. If you do not plan to trade domains, but want to create your own website and come up with an interesting and memorable name for it, then you may have problems with this.

According to my subjective estimates, 80% of all interesting names already occupied by cybersquatters. Therefore, you will have to rack your brains to come up with and check dozens, if not hundreds of very different names and their variations in different domain zones.

How to come up with and choose a domain name?

The process of coming up with a domain name can take you anywhere from a few hours to a few weeks. Before starting this process, I recommend preparing some kind of notebook or having special folder on a computer where you will record all the options that come to your mind.

Remember, the domain is chosen once and for all. If, after several years of hard work on your website, you want to change the domain name to something more interesting, then be prepared for the fact that search engines will react negatively to this and this may affect you by a decrease in the number of visitors, and, therefore, loss arrived.

Please also note that the site name and address may vary. For example, the name of my site sounds like “My Ruble”. And its domain name looks like www.site. The meaning of the name of my site and its domain are similar, but the spelling is different. In this case, to write the domain name, I used the English translation of the words “My Ruble”.

In this case, I could use, for example, this option: moyrubl.ru. This method of coming up with domain names is called transliteration - the exact transfer of characters from one script to characters from another script.

There are special services that will help you make correct transliteration, for example this service: http://translit-online.ru/

When choosing a domain name, it is important to decide on the theme of the site for which you will create and register a domain.

If you are a freelancer and want to create a personal page with a portfolio and reviews, then it is recommended to choose a combination of your first and last name, for example ivanov.ru or smpetrov.ru, where the first letters sm will be the initials.
You can also use words that characterize your activity or a combination of such words, including with your first or last name. For example, if you are into design, you can look for domain names that contain word design(masterofdesign.ru, ivanoffdesign.ru, etc.)
If you are going to launch an informational site or blog, then it would be logical to select a domain with the theme of your site. If this is a culinary site, then you need to select a domain name that will reflect the culinary theme.
The domain name for a company's corporate website may contain the name of the company or be based on some keywords characterizing the direction of the company's activities. For example, if your organization is engaged in European-quality repairs, it is logical to choose the name euro-remont.ru. Another example is tur4you.ru or kuda.ru - for a travel company website.

When choosing a domain name, it is advisable to select short options that will be euphonious and will not raise questions with spelling variations, as well as be easy to remember.

Modern “sharks” of Internet business - for example, lenta.ru, artlebedev.ru, gazeta.ru, utro.ru - with just one name they can inform the visitor not only about their topic, direction of activity, but also about the quality of work, the level of information presentation , his target audience and much more. Of course, for your site to stand on par with the Internet giants, you need to work hard on its operation. However, making a website recognizable only through a domain name is quite simple.

Ideally, your name will be within 4-8 characters. But even if the name turns out to be longer, this is not critical. Remember that people will primarily evaluate the quality of the content on your site and its usefulness.

Brainstorm

If you have difficulties with creative imagination and little comes to mind interesting options domain names, I recommend that you follow these tips:

Open any search engine and enter various keywords related to your future site. Then look at the names of existing sites that it gives you search system according to your request and try to come up with an analogue, synonym or play on different parts of words.
Open a catalog of Internet sites, select a topic that suits you, and see what words your competitors use in domain names. Based on this, try to come up with your own version.
Open English-Russian directories and look for translations of keywords that most accurately describe the topic of your site. For example, if you want to create a website sports theme, then look for translations of words such as: sport, fitness, movement, health, healthy image life, vigor, strength, etc. Based on these words, try to come up with a name for your website.

You can learn more about all these options for coming up with domain names in the video below:

How to check a domain for availability?

So, after you've sketched out a dozen or two different options, it's time to start checking the availability of your domain. I usually do domain selection. I then register domains there. For more information about the procedure for checking and selecting a domain name, watch the video:

Checking domain name history

After you have checked the options you have come up with for availability, do not rush to register the domain. Now it is necessary to check the history of the domain, since it could previously have been used by other people, and with bad consequences for its future owner.

The fact is that if you create a bad website and post on it stolen content, then search engines will impose sanctions on such a site. More precisely, they will impose it on the domain name. Sanctions mean the exclusion of pages of a given site from search. This means that people will no longer come to the site from search engines, or they will come, but not soon. To do this, you need to remove all stolen content and replace it with unique and useful content.

As a rule, search engines can remove sanctions in such cases, please note keyword here “can”. And this does not happen immediately, but can take 6-12 months.

At the same time, if you plan to use the domain for a one-page website or a business card website, where people will mainly come not from search engines, but from advertising or links in your profile social pages, then it doesn’t matter whether this domain is banned by Yandex and Google or not.

Domain purity is important primarily for future information sites.

To check the history of a domain name we will use the following services:

Checking Whois history - whoishistory.ru
Checking by URL in Yandex and Google.
Check at archive.org/web.

You can find instructions for using these services in the video Checking domain history:

Domain registration

After all checks have been completed, it is time to register the domain. You can register a domain through a hosting company where your website files will be hosted. This can also be done through a special domain name registrar company.

I recommend registering domains separately from hosting with special registrar companies. It is more reliable and convenient. And you can order hosting services separately from other companies specializing in this. Why?

I registered my first domain and hosting in one place. It was a small hosting company whose services I refused after some time. I chose a different hosting and moved the site. But the domain remained with the first company. Over the past 8 years, I have changed about 5 hosting companies and now host my website on a separate dedicated server. My domain, by the way, is still registered with that first company.

What's so scary about this? I'm not sure about the small hosting company where I originally registered the domain. I periodically wonder what will happen if this company, unable to withstand the competition, closes? What will happen to my domain?

To register domains, I use the services of Reg.ru - this is one of the market leaders.

For instructions on registering a domain name, see below:

The Internet is an integral part Everyday life most people. Taking advantage of the opportunities that the World Wide Web provides, many users do not know or are not interested in how its structure is organized.

In particular, not everyone knows what a domain is and what practical significance it has for organizing a person’s work online. A lot is interesting - from the history of the appearance of these structural elements of the web to the legal aspects relating to their use.

What is a domain name

A domain name is a combination of alphabetic characters and numbers indicating the coordinates of a site on the Internet. In all cases, it is tied to the IP address of the web server on which the web resource is hosted. The domain address begins with the abbreviation http (this means that the connection is via the hypertext protocol), and ends with the designation of the first-level zone (.ru, .com, .org, etc.). Global communication between servers using domain names is carried out by the DNS service. Without it, the functioning of the Internet would be impossible.

Domain name levels

A domain name can be of the first (in this case it can be called a zone), second and third levels. The website address on the Internet is formed based on the hierarchy for each of the three. The sequence of levels in writing a website address is built from left to right and is separated by a dot.

Domains of the first zone, as a rule, belong to individual states, or conventionally designate any global branch of human activity. For example, zone.ru belongs to Russia. The one that.gov is for US government agencies. In turn, .com is a domain that reflects the ownership of the site by commercial structures (although in fact the owners may not be entrepreneurs). The division into zones from the point of view of the status of the owners or the subject of the sites, we repeat, is very arbitrary.

Second-level domains belong to private users (individuals or legal entities) of the Internet. They are necessarily included in the structure of first-level names (zones), and the name of each is unique. That is, at the .com level there cannot be two domains like microsoft.com.

What is a third level domain? In fact, this is just a certain data area on the site, which is located on the second one. Third-level domains thus belong, as a rule, to the owners of zones of the second type (unless any agreements delimiting ownership rights have been concluded). The use of such data areas on a website is usually justified from the point of view of the thematic structure of the web resource. Sections and headings are linked to third-level names, or they are used to personalize data areas (when data areas are linked to individual user accounts). Most often, at the third level, a free domain name is issued. In practice, this can be expressed in the provision of hosting services.

Hybrid domains

There are a small number of domains that de facto have characteristics of the second level - such as, for example, org.ru or co.uk, but from a legal point of view they are equivalent to those that belong to the first. Third-level domains are associated with these zones in the same way (located on the left side of the address bar).

Who registers domains and under what conditions?

The use of first and second level domain names requires registration. It is carried out by an organization with a special status. Such structures are in charge of creating new domain names, as well as extending the validity of existing ones.

Accreditation of organizations whose competence includes domain name registration is carried out by ICANN. For zones of any level there can be either one or several registrars. Now in Russia, for example, there are about 20 of them. The activities of such structures are regulated by a single Coordination center. In some cases, registrars are controlled by authorities. In particular, the .mil domain is administered by the US Department of Defense. In turn, the Coordination Center, which manages organizations that enter Russian domains into registers, was for some time reporting to the Ministry of Communications of the Russian Federation.

Zone recorders perform a number of important technical functions. This could be, for example, control over correct operation a unified database containing information about registered accounts, ensuring the functioning of queries to information in these databases using Whois services, maintaining in working condition DNS servers.

The rules for registering domains at the international and national levels tend to be different. Those that are typical for the former are developed and installed by ICANN, for the latter - accredited organizations (or authorities).

Formalities

To register a domain in Russia, you only need a passport. The cost of the procedure varies depending on which first-level zone the site is being designed in. For.ru, the typical cost of registration is 500-600 rubles. Personal data about domain owners is usually open. In Russia, this is your full name, telephone number (for individuals), and company name (for legal entities).

The validity period of a domain registration is usually one year (but different zones rules may vary). Renewal can be carried out either automatically or upon request. In both cases, the user’s financial balance must have cash, which is enough to pay for the registrar’s services.

What is domain delegation

Domain names are just identifiers. They are intended only to facilitate user navigation on the Internet. Domain names must be associated with a specific site.

The mediator in this interaction is the hosting server on which the web resource is located. The procedure for establishing a connection between a domain name and such a platform is delegation. If this procedure is not implemented, then the domain itself will not be of any value. In its turn, the most important function from the point of view of delegation, the DNS service, which we mentioned above, performs.

How to delegate a domain

The process of linking a domain to hosting is very simple. This happens by entering data about DNS servers into the registrar's database. Typically, users can do this themselves by logging into their account settings. In order for the site to work stably, it is desirable that the hosting provider can provide two DNS servers.

You can check whether a domain is delegated or not using the Whois service. If the procedure is carried out correctly, the response to the request will contain the “delegated” status. If not, then “not delegated”.

Dispute Resolution

If a situation arises in which a dispute or disagreement arises between domain name owners, then a compromise will most likely have to be sought in court. The registrars themselves do not have functions that would somehow contribute to the resolution of disputes arising related to the use of resources. At the same time, these organizations are obliged to comply with all court decisions related to zone management activities.

History of domain.ru

When and how did the domain name.ru appear? There is information that the first connections to networks similar to the Internet were made in the USSR in the 1970s, but all data about this is classified. Therefore, according to some experts, the World Wide Web did not become something revolutionary new for many Soviet and Russian IT specialists. Many Soviet programmers knew in theory what a domain was and the prospects for the development of the Internet. It is known that in 1983 there were international conferences, in which communication between the participants (among whom were scientists from the USSR) was maintained using computer networks. Domain.su was registered in 1990, at the same time the first large computer network, Relcom, appeared.

Zona.ru was registered and entered into the international database reflecting nationality on April 7, 1994. This event was preceded by an agreement signed by the largest Russian Internet providers, reflecting the procedures for joint management of the new domain zone. According to one of the clauses of the agreement, functions related to administration and support technical processes to ensure the functionality of sites in domain.ru, were transferred to the Research Institute for the Development of Public Networks. Until 2000, registration of zones.ru was carried out only by this organization.

The first second-level domains were registered literally on the first day of the appearance of zone.ru. Until that moment, Russian sites worked in connection with the Soviet address.su. Sometimes the opportunity to launch the site vida.com helped out - this domain is in international jurisdiction, its use was not prohibited in Russia. By the way, the.su zone has not lost its relevance to this day - many users and organizations willingly register in it.

Cyrillic domain.RF

In 2009, a new domain name appeared in the Russian Federation - .рф. It, as well as in the second and third level zones associated with it, uses the Cyrillic alphabet. Since November 2010, domain name registration in zone.рф has become available to everyone. Previously, only government organizations or commercial enterprises that officially owned trademarks had this right.

Domains and email

What is a domain from the point of view of the functioning of electronic mail addresses? Their most direct component. No email can exist without a domain. As additional element identification, the @ sign (“dog”) is used here. An email address can be linked to second or third level domains. The history of the emergence of e-mail is interesting.

In 1971, American IT specialist Ray Tomlinson created computer program, which could send messages from one PC to another using network resources. Each of the messages was placed in a specialized file area - a “box” (and from the point of view of structure computer network- to the mail domain).

Tomlinson's program was constantly improved. The author developed special system registration postal addresses. The user (the owner of the “box”) had to use an address to exchange messages with others, consisting of his personalized name (“login”) and the computer domain, which were separated by the symbol @ (in English read “at”, that is, “there ", "over there"). That is, an email address like vladimir@computer12 meant that the letter was sent to Vladimir on PC number 12. Tomlinson also created a program that made it easier sending e-mail ordinary users with low level software skills. It was later improved by an American colleague, Lawrence Roberts.

Mail program as well as organization system email addresses, appealed to users of the ARPANET network (considered the prototype of the Internet). In a matter of years, the bulk of data began to be transferred between users via e-mail. In the mid-70s, the first mailings(most popular topics which was science fiction). In 1975, John Vittal created a program that had almost all the functions that we use today.

Modern writing an email is a username combined with a second and first level domain. Functions mail server can be performed by the user's computer or cloud hosting. Each of these email formats has advantages and disadvantages.

One of the first questions a novice website creator has is what a domain is, why it is needed, where to get it and how to choose it. It is present on absolutely any resource, you just have to look up at the address bar of your browser. A domain name is the name of a website.

Why is it needed?

As a rule, any website is located on the servers of various hosting companies. These servers, like any computer, have their own unique IP address, which consists of numbers in a certain sequence. To search for a site you need to know this combination of numbers.

The problem is that there can be a thousand websites on one IP address (server), and it is very difficult to find the right one. For easy navigation on the World Wide Web and came up with the idea of giving each resource a unique name. Each site is assigned a unique domain name. This greatly simplifies the search for the required resource.

Rules for creating a domain name

This is a combination of characters. There are certain rules for creating it:

The length must be between two and sixty-three characters.
The site's domain name can contain numbers from 0 to 9.
It may contain a hyphen, but not at the beginning or end.
It must not contain spaces.

Any name consists of several parts, which are separated by dots. Each part consists of domains of different levels. As a rule, three domain levels are used for a website.

Domain levels

They are determined by how many dotted words the name contains. First you need to decide on the audience of the resource and choose a name based on this.

For the first level, they can be divided into two types:

Domains that designate a geographic location. They show which country they belong to. For example, domain.ru means that the site belongs to Russia, .ua - Ukraine, .au - Australia, .cz - Czech Republic, and so on.
Determining the type of activity. The .org domain indicates that the site is non-commercial, .info is informational, .com is created for commerce.

It is worth noting that this classification is rather arbitrary; anyone can register for it. For example, a site ending in .cz may have nothing to do with the Czech Republic, but a site with the name .com may not be involved in commerce.

A second-level domain is a unique name for a website. For example, site.ru belongs to an organization or By the way, since the names should not be repeated, when registering, checking the domain name in a certain zone is necessary.

Third level - defines a resource within a second level domain. They are mostly free, but are not very popular among professional webmasters.

What level to choose a domain

If the project is long-term and designed to make a profit, then you should choose a second-level domain. Yes, it's paid, but it doesn't cost that much and eliminates the disadvantages that a third-party domain has. Despite the fact that it is free, it has a number of disadvantages:

The name becomes longer and therefore more difficult to remember.
Typically it is tied to specific hosting, when changing the latter, you will have to change the domain as well.
Since all services are free, you cannot demand anything from the host owners. Anything can happen to the site, and there will even be no one to file claims against.

The third level of the domain can be chosen if the resource is created with the goal of trying one’s strengths and gaining experience.

Also, when choosing, it is worth considering what audience the site is aimed at. If it’s in Russian, then you should choose the domain zone.ru. For international or multilingual projects the best option will.com.

How to choose a name

A domain name is a website, so you shouldn’t approach the choice carelessly.

Firstly, the more concise the name, the better. The name should be memorable and not too long. The name can indicate the type of activity, for example avto.com, and it will immediately be clear what information the user will find on the page. But ivan.ru does not reveal much about the subject of the site, unless it is Ivan’s personal blog. If this is an online store, then the domain must contain its name. A name that contains a keyword works well.

Secondly, the name in the domain is mostly written in Latin, so you need to make sure that it is displayed correctly and is readable. You should not assume that all users know English, so problems may arise with writing letters that are not in the foreign alphabet (ch, sch, yu, ya).

Thirdly, before using them in English, you need to check their correct spelling.

Fourthly, it would not be superfluous to check the domain name to see if there are similar names in other zones. It’s okay if there are some, but when it’s a competing resource, the user may mistakenly go to someone else’s page.

Domain name registration

You need to register a domain only with reliable partners. You should carefully read the documentation and capabilities of the seller. There is no need to save, otherwise troubles may arise later. Domain registration, which costs 99 rubles, looks very suspicious, and in the end, after purchasing it, you may find that, for example, there is no administration panel. Or resale will require you to provide a bunch of documents and perform many steps. As a result, it will take a lot of nerves and strength.

In one of the lessons I talked about what a domain name is and how to get one. I told him in passing, just to get at least some idea. But this topic requires more detailed analysis. This is really important!

A domain is a website address. This is a unique name on the Internet, which, when opened, will open a specific website.

For example, the Internet resource you are currently on has the following address: website

That is, the site is the domain name of our site. By typing it, only our site will open and no other.

How to find out a domain name

To find out the domain name, that is, the address of a particular Internet resource, you need to look at the address bar of the browser when the site is open.

For example, I opened the Yandex website. To find out its domain name, that is, its exact address, you need to look in the address bar. This is what my browser's address bar looks like:

And here is the Yandex address. In my browser it is highlighted in a darker color:

That is, his address is yandex.ru

And here is the domain name of the Google site:

There is always a prefix before the domain name. That is, some kind of introductory part. Most often this is part http:// or www.

In fact, www is an abbreviation. This part of the address is correctly written http://www.

That is, the full address of the Yandex website looks like this: http://www.yandex.ru

In principle, this is the same thing with or without www. We can say that this is the same address, just in two different spellings.

With these different address spellings (“without www” and “with www”), there are certain nuances that professionals in the field of website creation and promotion need to know about. But we won’t go deeper into this.

How to find out the address of a specific page on a website

Since a site is a set of pages, which, in turn, are sorted into sections (categories, headings), each page also has its own address. It is written immediately after the domain name and is separated from it by a slash (/).

IN classical performance Each page URL must have a .html or .htm part at the end, and must consist exclusively of Latin letters. Instead of spaces, you need to use an underscore or a hyphen, and you can also use numbers.

But now this is no longer so relevant, since the Internet in general and search engines in particular understand a wide variety of addresses. Therefore, site pages can have Russian names, and include some characters, and be without any “tail” at all (without html, htm, php or anything else).

To find out the address specific page site, you also need to look at the address bar of your browser when the page is open. For example, this is what you will see if you look at the browser line right now:

The page address is located immediately after the domain name and is separated from it by a slash (/). That is, the address of the page you are currently on is domennoe_imya.html

Since now most sites are “created” on control systems (engines), page addresses are formed by these very systems. And in principle, it is not so important what they are: alphabetic, numeric, different symbols, with or without a tail.

It is also not at all necessary that the address of a particular page reflect its content. This was important before, but now it has practically no meaning.

What are domain names?

A domain name consists of two parts: the name itself and the domain zone.

The name itself is a word or several words that the site owner comes up with independently.

For example, our website has the address site . The word neumeka is what I wanted to name the site. That is, I came up with this word and registered such a domain.

A domain zone is a “tail” in the form of a dot with some set of letters. In my case this is a ponytail .ru

There are not just many domain zones, but very, very many. And there are more and more of them. You can talk for a long time about what they are and the principle of their formation. But it’s better not to bother your bright head with this.

What you really need to know is that there are domains different levels. The easiest way to explain it is this: there are domains with one dot after the name and with several.

With one dot, this is the address of our website:

With several dots - these are addresses that end in .od.am or moy.su and the like.

As a rule, such names are distributed free of charge by other sites (systems). For example, in the lesson “How to make a website for free” I talked about online designers. Let me remind you that these are systems with which you can get your own website completely free of charge and without much difficulty. So these systems give free domain names with several dots.

Typically domain names consist only of Latin letters, without spaces. But there are also exceptions. For example, Cyrillic domain zones: rf, moscow, online, site, rus and others. In this case, the entire site address will be in Russian (except for the http:// prefix).

You can also use numbers and hyphens in your name.

Choosing a name for your site

The first thing to remember: no free domain names. By choosing such a name, you will ruin your site.

The second thing you need is to decide on the domain zone. As I already said, there are a lot of them. Let's look at this in more detail.

Domain zone

There are domain zones that have been in use for a long time. For example, com, net, org.

There are special areas for sites on certain topics. Example: gov (government), mil (military), edu (educational).

Available for sites of certain countries (regions): ru, by, kz and so on.

There are new domain zones for every taste. For example, shop, sport, moscow.

Of course, it's up to you to decide. But when choosing a zone, it makes sense to listen to the advice of professionals:

It is better not to register names of the third level, that is, with two “tails” (ru.com, org.am, etc.).

The exception is the domain zone com.ua - this zone is for Ukrainian sites.

If your site is targeted at residents of a certain country, then it is better to register the name in the national domain zone.

For example, you want to create a website for a company that provides services in Minsk (Republic of Belarus). This means that the name for this site must be chosen with a “tail” .by

If you are creating an international website, without regional affiliation, then it is better to register the domain in the com zone.

For example, you are creating an information site about smartphones in English. That is, visitors to this site will not be from Russia, but from other countries. This means you need to choose a name with a tail.com

If you are creating a website in Russian, without regional affiliation, then it is better to register the domain in the ru zone.

For example, our website. Its visitors are Russian-speaking residents different countries. Therefore, it is located in the ru zone

Name for the site

Let's say you have decided on a zone. Now you need to choose a name for the site, that is, some word or several words that will be its address.

In fact, it doesn't matter what it is. The main thing is that it is. It’s like with a phone number: it’s not so important what it is, the main thing is that it is.

But it’s still better if the name is short, easy to remember, without numbers or hyphens, and reflects the essence of the site. But since each name is unique, that is, it can only belong to one site, there are few such short beautiful names left. You have to use your wits.

The principle is as follows: go to the domain name registrar website and select an address.

It doesn’t matter which registrar’s website you go to - there are very, very many of them. The base is the same for all, only the prices and ease of selection differ. Don’t look at the prices, since you will be buying a domain on another site (with the most affordable prices), the main thing is convenience.

For example, you can choose an address for the site here.

Let your imagination run wild. If the chosen word is taken, add a few letters to it. In general, try to choose a name that is pleasant to both the ear and the eye.

Imagine how it will be written on a business card. Will a person be able to accurately type it by ear (for example, if the address is dictated over the phone).

Checking the domain name

Let's say you have chosen an address for your website. It suits you, and you are ready to buy it. But you should check this name before purchasing.

The fact is that the Internet has existed for a very long time, and along with it, domain names have existed for just as long. Every day thousands of different sites appear on the Internet and thousands close down.

Each of them has its own name. This name needs to be renewed. That is, the name is not bought forever, but for a certain period, for example, a year.

So, when a site closes and its name is not renewed, after a while it becomes free. As a result, anyone will be able to register it, that is, buy it for their website.

Everything would be fine, but by buying such an address, you can say that you are taking away its past. Search engines Yandex, Google and others know and remember the history of each name. And sometimes this “cargo” can be very difficult to get rid of.

For example, you chose a beautiful address, but previously there was a site with prohibited information on it. For search engines, such an address is marked as “bad”, and they ignore it. By purchasing such a name for your site, it becomes invisible to search engines.

Or, let’s say you have a website dedicated to aquarium fish. You buy a name for it that used to belong to an online store selling TVs. Since search engines remember that TVs used to be sold at this address, you may have difficulty promoting information about fish.

Verification methods

There are several ways to verify a name. You can find out if it was once used and see what site was previously at this address.

Unfortunately, there is no way to know the “score” that search engines gave this site. Even if it looked decent and didn't have anything illegal on it, the address could get a black mark.

Unfortunately, there is no way to check this. Usually such things are learned after purchasing and attaching a new site.

So, method number one: we check whether the name has been registered by someone before.

For addresses in any domain zone. We check on the website whois.domaintools.com.

Type the domain name you want to check (in full) and click on the “Lookup” button.

If there are no entries, then everything is fine. This means that this address never belonged to anyone.

If there is a “Whois History” item with a certain number of records, it means that this address already belonged to someone.

For addresses in the ru, su, rf zone. Such addresses can also be checked the previous way, but more full information can be obtained from whoishistory.ru.

However, for this you need to register, confirm your registration by e-mail, and log in.

After this, enter the domain that you want to check without a domain zone - you need to select it in a separate window. Check "Exact match" and then dot "All over" WHOIS history" After that, select some very old date (year two thousand) in the “Registration date (created)” field - “from”. And in the “to” field is today. Then click on the “Find” button.

If there are no entries, it means that this address has not been used before.

If any record is found, it means that earlier given name has already been registered to someone. There you can also see more detailed information (when, to whom, etc.).

Method number two: we check whether there was a site at this address before.

These are the registrars through which I personally have been ordering and renewing addresses for websites for many years. So far there have been no problems. The only thing is that at the first registrar the cost of the domain upon renewal differs from the primary one. Of course, not to the lesser extent. Beget has the same one.

If you are a beginner and have created a website using my lessons, I recommend buying a name on beget.ru, since it is very easy to attach it to the created website.

I can’t say anything about reliability - I’ve never used their services myself. But this office has been operating for several years and they have good reviews. True, sometimes their website hangs, but this does not affect the quality of services.

On the Internet you have often come across the word “domain” in various versions - domain, domain zone, domain name, etc. Today we will deal with these concepts, but I want to immediately warn you that the question is largely theoretical in nature and no matter how hard I tried to present it more simply... However, you be the judge.

So, today the following questions will be considered:

What's happened domain(Domain name)?
What is a domain zone?
What is a second level domain name?
What are level 3,4,5… domains? What are subdomains (subdomains)?
How do a website and a domain relate?
Which domains are more profitable to have: 2nd or 3rd level?
Which domain zone should a novice webmaster choose?
What is DNS
Brief conclusions: everything is the same (items 1-8), but much shorter and simpler

1.What is a domain (domain name)? What are they needed for?

You're about to make your own website, great! But it must have some kind of name - by analogy with a book: You don’t say in the library - “Give me a book.” They will immediately ask you “which one?” The same is true with websites. Every site should have a name so that other people can find it. Your website is a domain, and its name is a domain name.

When you and I said that a site is a collection of files united by one address, we meant that they (the files) are united by a domain name. In other words, a domain name is the address of your website.

For example, my website is also a domain, its domain name is novichkoff. And that’s it, no - ru, org, net after the dot, just - novichkoff, just this one word. But after all, many people from different countries might want to create sites with that name (novichkoff), and in order to somehow place all these sites correctly on the Internet and subsequently differentiate among themselves, they created so-called domain zones.

2. What is a domain zone?

A domain zone is also a domain that unites domain names of a certain level. Unclear? Let's figure it out now.

All domain names are in a certain hierarchy - some are included in others and are parent (senior) in relation to lower-level domains. To make it clearer, I will give the following example: a mother is a mother in relation to her daughter, and she is also a daughter in relation to her grandmother.

The highest level of domain zones is called root, it has no name and is simply designated by a dot (.).. – and the dot after the word ru is an indication of the root domain.

Such an address (with a dot at the end) will be called absolute, in contrast to a relative one - without a dot at the end. The fact is that in everyday life they usually don’t put a full stop, it is implied, since all the domains - absolutely everything - are included in this root domain.

First of all, the root domain includes top level domains. The structure of top-level domains is quite complex - there are general and national domains. TO shared domains top-level ones include, for example, gov – government domains, edu – domains of educational institutions, com – commercial sites, etc. , i.e. here the sites are divided according to their professional affiliation or focus. In addition, general domains include various top-level service domains, which we will not discuss today.

National top-level domains include domains distributed geographically - ru, fr, de (Russian, French, German), etc., regardless of their profession. accessories. National domains top level can also write in the language of this nationality (people), for example, zone of the Russian Federation.

Russia includes three domain zones (geographical) – ru, su and RF. The largest of them is the ru zone: it ranks 10th among all zones (approximately 3.5 million domains) and 5th among purely national domain zones - after DE, UK, CN, NL.

Since January 2012 any Internet user can create his own top-level domain, for example, I can create a top-level domain vaulin, then the addresses of the sites that will be located there will sound like this - novichkoff.vaulin. But this pleasure is very expensive and is intended for transnational corporations. Or megacities. For example, Moscow submitted an application to create such a domain zone.

We will talk about which domain zone to choose below.

3.What is a second level domain name?

Each domain zone of the 1st (or highest) level includes many smaller domains, which, in fact, are our sites. The domains that make up this zone are called 2nd level domains..e. the domain name of the site is indicated, and then the domain zone is written, in our example - ru. They are always separated by dots.

4.What are level 3, 4, 5 domains? What are subdomains (subdomains)?

Domains that are part of a 2nd level domain are called 3rd level domains (sites). They are often called subdomains or subdomains (the latter is rare), although from a theoretical point of view this is incorrect: the domain zone.ru is a subdomain in relation to root domain, 2nd level site - a subdomain in relation to zone.ru, etc.

In everyday life, it turns out that when they say subdomain, they mean the subdomain of the 2nd level site. We will also adhere to this practice.

In theory, a 3rd level domain can also have its own subdomains, they will already belong to 4th level domains, etc. There can be a total of 128 domain levels. And all of them will be written according to the same rule: first a domain of a lower level, then a higher one, then an even higher one, etc., and at the end - an indication of the domain zone .

To make it clearer, I’ll give a practical example: I have training sites on which I practice certain techniques, test plugins, etc. One of them is called test331.site. Now it is clear to you that this is a 3rd level subdomain (test331) of my main site (novichkoff), which belongs to the ru domain zone.

Before finishing this part of our conversation, I will note that 2nd level domain names, as a rule, are paid; they are usually purchased for a period of one year with the right to renew. Subdomains (3rd level domains) are usually free, you can create as many of them as you like - only your hosting provider can limit this (due to the load on the servers or for other reasons).

5.What is the relationship between a website and a domain?

Website and domain are not entirely equivalent concepts. Most often, yes, they are understood as one and the same thing: one site corresponds to one domain name (one address). But this doesn't always happen. One site can occupy several domains and, conversely, one domain can consist of several sites. This vague phrase needs to be clarified.

There are very large sites, they are called portals. Such sites can provide a large amount of information (on various topics) and many services. For example, Yandex is one site, but it occupies many domains (in areas of activity - Yandex.Search, Yandex.Images, Yandex.Webmaster, Yandex.Mail, Yandex.Weather, etc.). Then the Mail domain will be mail.yandex.ru, the Weather domain will be pogoda.yandex.ru, etc.

We see that Yandex itself occupies one 2nd level domain - yandex.ru and many subdomains (3rd level domains).

Sometimes site owners allocate their own sites into separate domains, but in other languages, for example, Google created specifically for Russia separate domain– Google.ru, located even in a different domain zone (ru). It turns out that although from a logical point of view Google.com and Google.ru are the same site, from a technical point of view they are different sites.

Quite often, several or even many sites are united under one domain. This happens, for example, when creating websites on free hosting. Free hosting– is actually a 2nd level domain, and the sites that are located on it are actually its subdomains, i.e. they are 3rd level domains.

6. Which domains are more profitable to have: 2nd or 3rd level?

Disputes about this will never die down, but I am far from thinking of acting as an arbiter in them. Supporters of free websites (and these are usually 3rd level domains) have two arguments:

As a rule, it is free
Indexed no worse than 2nd level sites.

There are also two arguments from supporters of second-level sites:

I am the rightful owner of the domain and no one will ever take it away from me,
The opportunity to earn money on second-level sites is many times greater than on subdomains.

Sometimes the following argument is added: the second level is more solid. But this is only in the eyes of supporters of 2nd level sites, and then: why is Yandex.Search less reputable than, for example, novichkoff?

All these arguments are fair; it’s up to you to decide which camp you join. I'll give my opinion. I am a supporter of autonomy, I don’t like to depend on anyone. Therefore, I always create only 2nd level sites, except for auxiliary ones: among them there are 3rd level sites.

If you are a convinced opponent of making money on a website, then a 3rd level domain is quite suitable for you (it will still be cheaper), but if you don’t mind making extra money, then choose the 2nd level: money for a year of payment for a domain name novichkoff is easily earned on this site in 1 (one) day.

7.Which domain zone should a novice webmaster choose?

There are also many opinions on this issue, although the polarity is not as sharp as the previous issue.

Some believe that the tightening of the screws, which has been observed recently in the RuNet, is forcing webmasters to look for other zones, more democratic ones, for example, com. By nuts I mean the trend when more and more is demanded from a webmaster various documents, for example, now when registering a domain, you now need to provide a scan of your passport, etc. This didn't happen before.

We will look at this issue from a different point of view: search engine promotion site. The main search engine of the Runet, Yandex, directly says that its priority is the ru domain zone and Russian-language sites in general. Since the majority ordinary users Runet uses Yandex, then you should focus on it to a greater extent.

For example, approximately 56% of visitors come to my blog (according to LI today) from Yandex and 36% from Google. Although my data cannot be a reference (my readers are webmasters, including beginners, who use Google more - it has more relevant, i.e. corresponding to the MEANING of the query, results), they still approximately accurately reflect the state of affairs - search Yandex's share is larger today.

And one more important argument in favor of the ru domain zone: registering domain names in it is somewhat cheaper (and sometimes significantly) than, for example, in the com zone.

Based on these two considerations, I advise novice webmasters to register their first site in the ru zone, and then you yourself will know everything and be able to decide for yourself whether to remain in the ru zone or move to some other one.

8.What is DNS

Again, you and I will have to plunge into theory. But this question is worth understanding, at least superficially. Moreover, we're talking about about the principles of functioning of the Internet.

So, what happens when you type an address in the address bar of your browser? That's right, your browser sends this request to the nearest server, and that server... But really, where is your request sent next and how does the search for the desired site occur?

Your server through which you access the Internet sends your request to special server, which is called a DNS server. For what? Then, to translate the address you typed into another form that is more understandable for Internet servers. You write the site address in letters, and the DNS server translates them into numbers - into IP address the site you need (he can also do reverse translation from numbers to letters).

Therefore, DNS servers serve to translate a domain name into an IP address. In general, the term DNS comes from the English expression Domain Name System- domain name system.

It is important to understand that a domain name is not identical to an IP address: there can be several websites on one IP address - this is called virtual hosting.

Let's continue. The DNS server starts querying others DNS servers(and there are a lot of them - a whole hierarchy) where such and such an IP address is located and either finds it, or a response is returned to you that the site was not found. And then everything is simple: having found the server that owns this IP address, you can easily find your site and the requested page of this site.

Therefore, you cannot do without DNS servers on the Internet.

What does all this mean for webmasters in practice? Here's what. You register a domain name with some domain name registrar and your domain name is immediately assigned the IP address of that registrar. The registrar's servers notify the required DNS servers that a new domain name has appeared and that its IP address is such and such.

Next, you buy a place on virtual hosting hosting company, but its servers have different IP addresses. You are (usually in a letter) given these addresses, which you must inform your registrar to make changes (or you change them yourself, it depends on the registrar).

When IP addresses change, your registrar notifies other DNS servers so that they know where to look for your site. It is clear that this takes some time; you will have to wait several hours. Otherwise, even you, knowing the domain name of your site, will not be able to get there.

The same is true when moving a site from one hosting company to another: You will have to rewrite the NS addresses with the registrar.

9. Brief conclusions: everything is the same, but much shorter and simpler

For everyday life, we can think of a domain as a website.
A domain name is the address of a website.
A domain zone is the segment of the Internet where the website is located. It's better for us to choose the ru zone.
It is also better to choose a 2nd level domain - in fact, the highest rank among ordinary domains (sites).
Searching for any site in any domain zone is carried out using special DNS servers.

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