URL -- Uniform Resource Locator
A URL is basically a WWW address:
URL PROTOCOLS
http:// hypertext transfer protocol
ftp:// file transfer protocol
gopher:// gopher server
URL FORMAT
protocol://server&domain/directory/file&extension
http://med-libwww.bu.edu/library/home.html
A URL is an address for a WWW site.  Just as every home has a number, street, city, state address, every WWW page has a URL.  The URL is what you use to locate a particular site when you're on the Web.  The URL provides information that tells your computer (client) exactly where to go (server).

The format is:

protocol://server & domain/directory/file & extension.  So, the URL that's on this slide tells the client to go to the med-libwww server at the boston university (which is an educational institution) domain.  The directory is called "library", and within that directory, is a page or file called home.  The html tag indicates that this file was written in the html language (as opposed to a gif (graphics) or other kind of file.)

At this point, does anyone have any questions or comments about the history and background of the Internet & WWW?