IP Basics
Alright, I’m actually going to start doing this more regularly now. I know I’ve said this in the past, but here it really is … I swear 
Lets start from the beginning, most of the more advanced users are going to find this really boring.
Each and every computer on the Internet needs to have an Internet protocol address to communicate with all the other computers on the Internet. Each IP address consists of four decimal dotted octets. This means that there are four numbers separated by periods that can range from 0 to 255. A typical IpAddress would be 208.109.220.203 which is the IP address that run this web site.
Along with an IP address you also need a netmask and a default gateway to correctly direct traffic. A netmask basically lets the computer know how many other IP addresses are in the range close to it and the default gateway is the IP address of a computer or router that knows how to direct traffic to the rest of the Internet. A typical netmask will look like 255.255.255.0 or 255.255.255.128 or 255.255.255.252. Each of these three netmasks state that the range of IP addresses on the current network is 254 long, 128 long or 2 long.
The default gateway will be an IP address that falls within the range of the netmaks and it will be able to route traffic to the next default gateway on the Internet. As you request or send data between computers or servers on the Internet it travels over a series of networks that each know a little bit more about where the destination is. Once the data request gets to where it is going then it follows the same path back to deliver your information.
