How do I explain this domain! http://to./

[JosephLeo]

Okay, well this might be the first time I wanted to cry about something I didn't know about (not seriously, but metaphorically)

One of my friends found this very strange url shortening service website that has no domain extension! The site- is http://to./

Someone- please help me out here. My friend and I would really like an explaination. Maybe I can write an email to the owner- but I have no idea how to do a whois on this domain!

 

[usacvlr]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.to

 

[PatrickB]

"TO" is a top-level domain that represents the country Tonga. See: http://www.iana.org/domains/root/db/

The most common top-level domain is "COM". The country domain for Tuvalu is "TV", which is being used by a lot of television-oriented websites.

Web addresses all have a top level domain, with a more specific domain to the left and perhaps an even more specific to the left of that, and so on. The top-level may have a website associated with it, or not. TO does, so you get a website when you visit it. COM does not. However, CNet has the COM.COM domain, so if you visit http://com.com/ you will end up at CNet.

Oh, your friend should be visiting http://to/ and not "http://to./". Web browsers will take the trailing period out, but there is no period possible after a top-level domain. That would be like visiting "http://www.technibble.com.".


While we're at it here, the "www." that most websites incorporate is not a requirement for a website. That is just a common convention that most websites use to show that this URL is part of the World Wide Web and not part of a gopher or ftp or other type of resource on the Internet. The Internet has many more resources and it not the same thing as the World Wide Web. WWW is just the part that browsers normally access.

-- Patrick B.

 

[rusty.nells]

...your friend should be visiting http://to/ and not "http://to./"...

The dot, I believe, prevents searching locally for a computer, printer, server etc.

I think his question is "how do you access a web site using a TLD without a domain name?" but I have no answers.

 

[PatrickB]

Any top level domain may have a website associated with.

I have never seen it before as most do not. If you try to go to one without a website associated to it, Firefox advises: "Firefox can't find the server at gov." because there is no web server there. You get the same error at any address that is not associated to a web server.

1) It is possible to have http://<topleveldomain/ point to a website as "TO" does.

2) It is also possible to have http://<domain>.<topleveldomain/. But most websites use one with a subdomain of "www" and have their primary domain forward to the "www" name:
http://noaa.gov/ http://www.noaa.gov/

3) Many websites also have subdomains that point to a particular website:
http://<subdomain>.<domain>.<topleveldomain/ or
http://www.<subdomain>.<domain>.<topleveldomain/
http://www.erh.noaa.gov/
http://www.noaa.gov/

-- Patrick B.