The internet first began to take shape in
1969, when the United States Department of Defense
created the ARPAnet, a computer network through
which organisations involved in military research
could exchange information. This network was
vital to the nation's defense.
The communication standard used
with the ARPAnet was called the Internet Protocol,
or IP. Because of its simplicity, the IP standard
made it practical for computers from different
manufacturers to communicate. Universities and
other research centers began to use the Internet
protocol to share information. These inter-network
links were continually expanded as new sites
came online.
Over the years, many tools have
been developed for communicating and exchanging
information over the internet. The program used
most frequently to communicate on the internet
is email, which is used to send and receive
electronic mail. Other programs were created
to exchange information such as news readers,
which is an email-like program used to share
messages like an electronic bulletin board.
Telnet is a program that allows you to connect
like a text terminal to another computer over
the internet.
Then after many years, browser
programs like Mosaic, Netscape, and Microsoft's
Internet Explorer were created to make using
the internet much easier and simpler. New generations
of browsers offer many of these functions built
into one program called a browser suite, like
Netscape Navigator or Internet Explorer.
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