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What are the parts to a domain name?

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Jessica_APLegal

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Domain names can often be confused with URLs by someone who doesn’t understand, but they are not the same. By understanding the domain name structure you can more easily figure out what your choice of domain name(s) could be, alternative choices, and variations that you might prefer. It's really pretty simple to catch on quickly. The general domain name structure is:

SubDomain.SecondLevelDomain.TopLevelDomain

Every domain consists of at least two parts; the Second Level Domain and the TLD or Top Level Domain. Some common TLDs are; .com, .net, .org, etc. The "dot" ( . ) is a period character and is an element of domain name structure which is used to mark the separation of the various name elements of a domain name. A Second Level Domain name is a member of a TLD.

Some clarity for the purpose of making human reading of your domain name(s) might be in order. Among the character set for domain names is the hyphen ( - ) character. You can use a hyphen character to improve clarity for reading. Know also that by adding one or more hyphen characters makes the name an entirely different second level domain name.

A sub domain is a name typically assigned to a server that operates within the addressing scheme of SECONDLEVELDOMAIN.TOPLEVELDOMAIN . Probably the most familiar and commonly used sub domain name is "WWW". Domain-name name elements are counted from right to left. A sub domain is a possible and optional third name element associated with a larger domain name.
 
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