Chapter Nine · Part 2: The Network
Servers and Where Software Lives
When you open a website, the page comes from a computer somewhere else. This chapter looks at that computer — the server — splits an app into the part you see and the part hidden behind it, and follows example.com all the way from Enter to the page on your screen.
For the last few chapters you've been following one action — opening example.com in your browser — across the network: the address it needs, the route the data takes, the request and response that carry the page. Every one of those steps ends at the same place: a computer, far away, that holds the website and answers when you ask for it. This chapter is about that computer.
It turns out the answer to "where does software live?" has a few layers. There's the machine that stays on and answers requests — a server. There's the split between the part of an app you see in your browser and the part that runs hidden on the server. There's the organized store of data the server reaches for — a database. And then, with all the pieces named, the whole journey of opening a website laid out end to end, as the keystone of Part 2.