We all ???know??? what an IP address is and what it’s significance in the age of the internet is. What remains a mystery to a large number of people however (surprisingly even those in the technology industry) is exactly what an IP address is, in detail, and what the component parts represent and the significance of each. Today, we are going to define those components and talk a bit about each in an effort to make things a bit clearer as well as prepare you for the eventual (and inevitable) move to IPv6 (the subject of a series of later articles). Let’s get started???