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URL stands for Uniform Resource Locator, and this is how things are located on the internet.  EVERYTHING on the internet has one, and by that I mean every piece of text, every image, every ad, every form, every THING on the internet has a URL.This means that not only does each web page have a URL, but each component on that page has a URL.

In web pages, the urls of various components are used to gather up all the pieces of a web page from wherever they are.  The contents of a web page may come from all over the globe, the URL is used to tell the browser where to go get the item from.

Another thing, when you become a web master and go to link to your site be sure to use the HTTP:// before your web site name.  This is more professional and will show that you have your house in order.

Please note, this section has been added in early 2011 and may not all be complete yet.

The page is using a HyperText Transfer Protocol (there are other protocols that do other things, like check mail, transfer files, etc).

The colon tells the browser that the protocol statement has ended.

the two forward slashes in a row tell the browser it is looking for a server  (Techies refer to a forward slash as a "slash", and a backward slash as a "whack", the slash is located beside the question mark, the whack is above the enter key)

Indicates that the page type is a "World Wide Web" document.  This convention has essentially been dropped, and will no longer be required.  For now it is still supported.  You can go to many web sites today without typing in the "www"

the dot indicates that the type statement has ended.

Tells the browser to look for the server that has a folder named stupiddamncomputer on it.  The browser will use DNS for this.

Indicates the end of the folder name

Identifies what type of Top Level Domain "TLD" the site is for routing purposes.  No sense sorting through all those dot-org’s and dot-gov’s if you don’t have to.

The single slash indicates that the browser is looking for page within the folder indicated above.

Gives the browser the name of the page to locate within the folder it accesses.

the dot indicates that the page name has ended

Tells the browser that the page it is retrieving is coded in Hypertext Markup Language.  Some web pages are built in other languages, such as PHP.

A techie would read this address:                http://www.stupiddamncomputer.com/index.html

as follows:         "http colon double slash www dot stupiddamncomputer dot com slash index dot html"

To help you understand the URL, I will use this page you are looking at as an example.

          The green image is called Img-01-welcome.jpg,   

                    and it's URL is http://www.stupiddamncomputer/images/Img-01-welcome.jpg.

          and the writing is called sdc_logo_clear.gif.,        

                    and it's URL is http://www.stupiddamncomputer/images/sdc_logo_clear.gif

          http://XXXXXXXXX..googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js 

                     (sorry for the "x’s", not sure google wants that URL published)