You may have seen many networking terms but you really don’t know about most of them. Networking terms are not self-explanatory so, here is a quick review of the different terms which are used in networking devices.
This is not a depth review of these terms but at the end of the post, you will have enough about the basic terms used for networking.
ISP (Internet service provider)
ISP is the company which is giving you an internet connection. You are paying to that company every month and can also complain about any kind of internet problem there. You can have internet connection from Comcast, Time warner, or any other internet service provider.
IP Address
IP address is also called internet protocol address it helps you to connect to any other computer. IP address is just like a home address so whenever any computer wants to connect with another computer the computer will connect through IP address.
LAN (Local area network)
A local area network is a computer network which is confined to a building, room or group of buildings. You can custom built your own LAN by using network switches.
WAN (Wide area network)
You can extend your local area network to long distances by using telephone lines or radio waves. The network that results after combining so many LANs is called WAN or wide area network.
Router
This is routers duty to pass all the traffic back and forth. You may have wired router or wifi router at your home or office.The working of both types of routers is same, a router passes outgoing traffic from your local device to the internet and passes incoming traffic from the internet to your device. If want to know more, here is a complete guide about wifi routers on ListEnthusiast.com
Gateway
A gateway is a hub or station which routes traffic between networks. For example, if you are using a router at home then this router is a gateway between your LAN and WAN.
NAT (Network Address Translation)
Network address translation is used by the router to share single IP address among many devices connected in your home or office. For example, your ISP provides you only one IP address and your router will create so many IP addresses depending on the number of devices connected to the internet. All these addresses will be temporary.
DHCP (Dynamic host configuration protocol)
This protocol is used by the computers or devices to automatically request your gateway or router to assign an IP address. This is how the router will assign a unique IP address to the requested device and you will not need to set static IP address for connected devices.
Ethernet Cable
Ethernet cable is the most common and standard wired networking technology used in these days. If any computer or router is connected with a wire than it is definitely Ethernet wire. You need to plug in that cable in your computer for internet services.
