CODEWITHSUNDEEP
httpdnssubdomain
badroit
badroit

Reputation: 1336

Name for an independent domain/hostname

Anyone know what the correct term is for a minimal (IP) domain name which intuitively indicates a domain registered through "typical" channels?

E.g., the term would indicate - google.com - bbc.co.uk

But not: - www.google.com - code.google.com - co.uk

(The term second-level domain doesn't quite work beacuse of the latter counter-example, where co. is the second-level domain name hosted within the .uk country code top-level domain. Maybe such a term does not exist?)

EDIT Hmm... can't self-answer for another 6 hours. Boo.

AFAICS, there's no concrete/authoritative term.

In The Art of SEO By Eric Enge, Stephan Spencer, Rand Fishkin, Jessie C. Stricchiola, they use terms like complete root domain/host domain/pay-level domain/second-level domain. As far as I can see, none of these terms is standard, and the latter term is actually strictly incorrect/ambiguous. Similar discussion is available on this page.

nist.gov use the term enterprise-level domain, but again it's equated with second-level domain and used conflictingly in this report for third/fourth/etc. level domains.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 153

Answers (3)

drf
drf

Reputation: 8699

The Mozilla Foundation uses the term Public Suffix to describe domains that can be registered through typical channels, which it defines to include .com, .co.uk, and pvt.k12.wy.us. The usage of this terminology may not be standard, however.

Edit: The Wikipedia entry on the Public Suffix list uses the term "effective top level domain", which appears to describe this concept, although it doesn't appear to be in widespread use.

Upvotes: 1

joet3ch
joet3ch

Reputation: 2512

The term 'second-level' is correct for google.com and 'third-level' for bbc.co.uk.

The country specific TLD is ccTLD.

The 'co' in 'co.uk' is termed 'generic-category 2nd level'.

Full details on Wikipedia

Upvotes: 1

Jared Ng
Jared Ng

Reputation: 5071

I'm not sure what you mean by "typical" channels, but I'll explain in general a few terms you might find handy:

Top Level Domains (TLDs) are domains that end in .com, .net, .org, or other "major" suffixes. This includes major country endings such as .uk and .us The full list is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Internet_top-level_domains

Subdomains are best explained by example. code.google.com is a subdomain of google.com, mail.yahoo.com is a subdomain of yahoo.com.

Edit:

.co.uk is a second level domain. While it's a popular choice, it is really just a subdomain of .uk

Upvotes: -1

Related Questions