ip address

An Internet Protocol (IP) address is a numerical identification (logical address) that is assigned to devices participating in a computer network utilizing the Internet Protocol for communication between its nodes.^[1] Although IP addresses are stored as binary numbers, they are usually displayed in human-readable notations,such as 208.77.188.166 (for IPv4), and 2001:db8:0:1234:0:567:1:1 (for IPv6). The role of the IP address has been characterized as follows: "A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A route indicates how to get there." ^[2]

The original designers of TCP/IP defined an IP address as a 32-bit number^[1] and this system, now named Internet Protocol Version 4 (IPv4), is still in use today. However, due to the enormous growth of the Internet and the resulting depletion of the address space, a new addressing system (IPv6), using 128 bits for the address, was developed (RFC 1883).