The Server Can’t Be Found

Say What?

For some the concept of a network is very confusing.  They are told their internet connection has a problem because of their network, they are told the problem with a website they are using is a problem on the server’s network, or they get a message from the web browser that the server is not responding.  They get confused because the internet is a network of networks, thus the original name “The World Wide Web”.  The term “Client-Server Network” is even more confusing, where is the server, on their computer or on the web, or in the basement?

The other day I was planning a small get together for some friends, and I realized how similar the analogy was to a client server network. 

You see you have a dozen people over for dinner, you decide what to make for dinner, and you give it to them.  You don’t make them go into the kitchen, because that would be rude.  And if you don’t know all of them real well, you don’t know if you could trust them in there anyway.

A client server network is very similar, each of your guests are the clients.  You are the server.  You decide what they will get from you, you decide where they can and can’t go, and you provide them with everything they need for a pleasant experience. 

In the same way the server on a network provides the programs and data that the clients need, the server prevents the clients from accessing areas that need to be protected.

Now let’s carry that a bit farther.  When you planned the meal you went to the grocery store and purchased your food and maybe some napkins.  The grocery store called a supplier to restock when they ran low on something.  The supplier gathered the products from the farmers, or manufacturers. 

Each of these entities, the grocery store, the supplier, and the farmers, and the manufacturers were networks of their own.  The grocery store made you their client, the supplier made the grocery store a client, and the supplier is a client of the farmer and so on.

So we have a web of clients and servers that spread across the planet.  A world wide web!

So when your browser tells you the server can’t be found, don’t go looking in your basement for a machine that doesn’t exist, imagine you are at the table and asked for pumpkin pie, but all your server had was strawberry pie.  In other words: The pumpkin pie couldn’t be found.