Understanding Web Servers: Part 2

For the basic function of web servers, refer to Understanding Web Servers: Part 1

Consider the URL, http://clareciriaco.appspot.com/portfolio/about.html

Pink: Tells the server the communication protocol to be used. In this case, HTTP.
Red: The Server, which is mapped to an IP address.
Green: The resource path on the server where the resource can be found.
Blue: The resource requested by the client(Either a human being or a browser like Mozilla, IE).

Most resources being requested are HTML pages. The pages are then classified as Static and Dynamic.

A Static Page

A Dynamic Page

If you would notice, the static page's time will not change. It will always be 12:30 PM. However, if you look at the dynamic page, it will get the current server time. BUT! HTML alone does not have capabilities on getting the server time. Remember!  HTML deals only with "How to display the data". What we need, is a WEB SERVER APPLICATION.

A Web Server Application does not change/alter/do anything with the resource. Instead, it FINDS another application on the server to help with getting the server time.

Image Source: Headfirst JSP + Servlets