zlacker

I did not study computer science so anything I know I learned from reading what was available in textbooks and on the internet itself. I learned DNS exists because the number of hosts was growing too quickly to keep updating a HOSTS file. The HOSTS file permits me to assign semantic meaning, i.e., names, to IP numbers. I can name hosts however I choose, and in practice I still do, because I like very short names. A simple analogy perhaps might be assigning names, images, sounds, etc. to different stored contact numbers on a mobile phone. The owner of the phone can control the semantic meaning assigned to the number, rather than delegating all control over this to someone else.

DNS, as I see it, lets someone else assign the names, i.e., the semantic meaning. Thus, assuming I am an internet user in the pre-DNS era, with the advent of DNS, I do not have to keep updating a HOSTS file when new hosts come online or change their address. This reduces administrative burden. The semantic meaning was already controllable pre-DNS, via the HOSTS file.

Many times I have read the criticisms of IP addresses as justifications for DNS. For example, IP addresses are (a) difficult to type or (b) difficult to remember. I simply cannot agree with such criticisms. As time goes on, and the www gets continually more nonsensically abstracted, I like IP addresses more and more.