Random web page?

[Peter Hansen]

Anton Vredegoor wrote:
> 
> Roel Schroeven <j4nff5m02 at sneakemail.com> wrote:
> 
> >Because not all websites can be reached that way, due to virtual
> >hosting. Take my website for example (don't look at it, it's really not
> >interesting :) ). http://roelschroeven.net gives a normal webpage, while
> >http://64.191.37.195 (which is the ip-address for that domain) gives a
> >generic page (in this case something that shouldn't really be there IMHO).
> 
> This is quite perplexing. My view of the internet is that it is like
> a phonebook where it is possible to link each name to a number. I
> forgot that sometimes a lot of people are living on the same address!
> Also thanks to Terry for bringing this up, although it took another
> post to make me understand what was meant. I guess I am back to the
> drawing board now :-|

I believe it's since version 1.1 that HTTP has required clients to
supply the domain name in the HTTP request, to allow this kind of
virtual hosting.  Think of it as nothing more (to use your analogy) 
than putting a name on an envelope *along with* the address, to 
get it to the right person there.  Prior to 1.1 (?) HTTP allowed
specifying only the street address...

I believe we may be at the point where, technically, it is 
impossible to do what you originally asked, since host names
could even be generated dynamically (although domain names 
cannot, I would think).

-Peter