"Radium" <> wrote in message
news: s.com...
> On Jun 18, 10:28 am, Whiskers <catwhee...@operamail.com> wrote
> http://groups.google.com/group/24hou...7e42224?hl=en&
> :
>
>>Your laptop has a unique identifying code number by which it
>>is identified by any network to which it tries to connect.
>
> Is this "number" the MAC address? Or the locally administered network
> address? Or something totally different?
>
> What is this number called?
>
> No offense but please respond with reasonable answers & keep out the
> jokes, off-topic nonsense, taunts, insults, and trivializations. I am
> really interested in this.
Radium
Even though your quote is lacking sufficient detail to place it in context
the most likely 'number' your quote refers to is what is know as a TCP/IP
address. The TCP/IP networking protocol is the protocol used on the Internet
and nowdays the majority of Local Area Networks.
TCP/IP networking works by assigning a unique number to each computer or
device connected to the network.
This number can be permanently assigned (static address) or lent temporarly
from a pool of address's (dynamic) address. The numbers are made up of four
octets separated by a dot. The numbers range from 0.0.0.0 to
255.255.255.255, for example 64.233.187.99 is the Internet address for
Google.com.
Therefore for your Laptop to connect to a TCP/IP network you must either
assign a TCP/IP address to it or have one granted to it by some other
authority.
Depending on your method of connection to the Internet either your Laptop
(for dial up) or your Router (for broadband) will be assigned a TCP/IP
number from your ISP's pool of numbers that it has bought the rights to.
You could think of this TCP/IP address as akin to a house number/street
address for your regular snail mail.
There are many reference documents available on the Web that will give you
chapter and verse on the tiniest detail of TCP/IP. For example
http://www.google.co.nz/search?hl=en...G=Search&meta=
I can only encourage you to read them up.
Best
Paul.