What is a URL?

A Uniform Resource Locator (commonly known as a URL) is a link or a string that is used to reach a particular web page. A URL is made up of three parts:

• Protocol
• Hostname
• Resource location

Explanation

URLs are not as simple as they appear in the above illustration.

Suppose a user wants to buy a course on educative.io.

• The user would first type educative.io in the browser’s address bar.
• Once the user hits enter, the URL becomes https://www.educative.io/, and the user is directed to the site.
• If the user wants to explore the Educative website, they will click on, say, “Explore”. The URL becomes https://www.educative.io/explore, i.e., the “explore” section (a webpage) is appended to the URL.
• Finally, when the user clicks on the course named "Database Design Fundamentals for Software Engineers"​, the URL becomes https://www.educative.io/courses/database-design-fundamentals.

Broken down, the anatomy of this URL looks like this:

1. Protocol: The protocol is https://www..
2. Hostname: The domain/hostname is educative.io.

This can also be explained through DNS.

3. Resource location: The location of the resource that the user desires to view is /courses/database-design-fundamentals.