Inter-Network

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Internet working is the practice of connecting a computer network with other networks through the use of gateways that provide a common method of routing information packets between the networks. The resulting system of interconnected networks is called an inter network, or simply an internet. Internet working is a combination of the words inter ("between") and networking; not internet-working or international-network.

The most notable example of inter networking is the Internet, a network of networks based on many underlying hardware technologies, but unified by an inter networking protocol standard, the Internet Protocol Suite, often also referred to asTCP/IP.

The smallest amount of effort to create an internet (an inter network, not the Internet), is to have two LAN's of computers connected to each other via a router. Simply using either a switch or a hub to connect two local area networks together doesn't imply inter networking, it just expands the original LAN.