LibGuides: Physical sciences: Domain names

Domain names (url address) are one of the quickest and most effective ways of identifying a web page. Learning to read domain names will enable you to quickly identity a web page’s country of origin (e.g. .au, .uk, .jp), and the entity (e.g. .edu, .gov, .org.) that has produced the page.

When you run a search using a search engine, often the full web address will be displayed along with the results. Before opening the web page, you can often check the web address and get an idea of the type of organisation or group who has published the site. This allows you to begin evaluating the quality of the information before you even open it

Domain	What does it mean?	An example
edu	An educational institution, e.g.: a university, colleges or high schools. (Primary schools also use .edu)	yale.edu – Yale University, USA harvard.edu – Harvard University, USA uni-stuttgart.de – University of Stuttgart, Germany (Germany doesn’t use the edu domain)
edu.au	Australian educational institution	anu.edu.au – ANU cit.act.edu.au – Canberra Institute of Technology unsw.edu.au – University of New South Wales in Sydney kurnaicollege.vic.edu.au – Kurnai College (high school), Victoria
ac.uk	The .ac refers to “academic” and is used by United Kingdom, Indian and Japanese universities	ox.ac.uk – University of Oxford, England ed.ac.uk – University of Edinburgh, Scotland du.ac.in – University of Delhi u-tokyo.ac.jp – University of Tokyo
gov (or go)	Government departments	defence.gov.au – Department of Defence, Australia dfat.gov.au – Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Australia deplu.go.id – Department of Foreign Affairs, Republic of Indonesia
org	An organisation, usually non-profit and community groups	alia.org.au – Australian Library and Information Association satsonline.org – South African Theological Seminary
asn	An association	kooyongltc.asn.au – Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club Incorporated apesma.asn.au – Association of Professional Engineers, Scientists and Managers, Australia
com	Commercial or company	ebay.com.au – an online auction site webshots.com – lovely photographs!
Domain	What does it mean?	An example
co.uk	United Kingdom commercial	news.bbc.co.uk – British Broadcasting Commission bookshop.co.uk – WH Smith Internet Bookshop
net	A networked organisation	abc.net.au – Australian Broadcasting Corporation blackdog.net – a fun, children’s game site

Some country domains

au	Australia	in	India	pg	Papua New Guinea
ca	Canada	jp	Japan	uk	United Kingdom
cn	China	nz	New Zealand	vn	Vietnam
id	Indonesia	bw	Botswana	my	Malaysia