What Happens When You Click a Link? - Computerphile

What happens when you click on a link? Dr Richard Mortier explains the mechanics of connecting you with your favourite website.

This video was filmed and edited by Sean Riley.

[Neueregel]

Good info. Please, consider asking Dr. Mortier about VPN in the future. He seems very knowledgeable. I have  a hard time understanding how VPN networks work.

[darkflamesquirrel]

Fascinating. I hope this is covered in a later video:
"What happens when you click on a Zelda?"

[Manabender]

I just noticed this...

In google chrome, the URL bar color-codes the URL. The schema is in green, the domain is in black, and the path is in grey.

[xanokothe]

The background it's even more complex when we talk about highly distribuited systems. At same time we could (programmers, engineers, scients) make it incredibly easy for end user and, of course, highly lucrative for a lot of sectors.

[Myx]

HTTP/1.1 solves the problem (among others) of having multiple websites sharing a single IP address... The domain name is passed to the server (along with the path), allowing the server to route the request to the correct website.

[SinthTeck]

When you click a Link, he gets mad and starts throwing swords at you

[MrGiovanniOSFP]

Just awesome...One of the finest channels. Thanks a lot for this content.

[underweightHater]

i love the graphics in these videos.  they're so unusual and handcrafted looking (in a computery way)

[pratiyushprakash]

This is so well explained. Great video.

[Zhab]

Hmmm, no mentions of ports anywhere. Kinda important... How does the computer knows that this webpage is meant for the 3rd tab of chrome rather than your 2nd tab of firefox ? Ports.

How does the computer knows that this url is meant to connect to a webpage server rather than a mail server or a video game server ? Ports.

By the way... ports is what TCP actually handle. The IP protocol is the one that handle IP address (I guess that is why they are called IP address), You can't get far with just one of these, which is why you usually hear about TCP/IP in pair like that.

[DogsBAwesome]

It does not happen much these days but waiting for some frigging advert to be downloaded used to hang or slow down the loading of the page, really annoying.

[TheKesmond]

Protocol stack. think this is what you mean as complex, lots of things happen.

[zenzylok]

The complexity behind one click is quite amusing.

[yijiang]

Very informative and helpful video, thanks for sharing!

[AliAlHabsiAA]

Really liking these kind of videos. Keep it up.

[Kantenkugel]

Wouldn't the very first thing be to check the protocol and associate the link with the correct program for a link of that protocol?

[maeon]

I don't like how he takes about 1.5 minutes just to rephrase the question in about 25 different and superfluous ways.  

[tabularasa]

An URI also has a port, the URI shown only works for the default port.

[limitless]

great
I always was curious about what happens behind a link

[outofthebox]

When I press a link, does the final product (some page) download to my computer, or do I see it on the other person's computer?
Sorry, I'm learning.