Was talking to one of the IT guys at work today and he mentioned that he had to work on something called a subnet. I tried Googling it but found myself even more confused on its definition.
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Computer networks as we commonly encounter them are governed by a system called the TCP/IP standard.
TCP/IP networks are hierarchical, just like governmental districts in real life. You live on Earth, just like everyone else, but you also live in a very specific continent, in some specific country, in some specific state/province, in some specific county/parish, possibly in some specific city, in some specific precinct, in some specific neighborhood, on a specific street, at a specific street address, and maybe at a specific apartment number.
Internet networks are like this, too. You could be connected to the Internet, the global network, but you are also a part of a specific ISP’s subnetwork, maybe in one of their subnetworks set up for a specific city, further subdivided down to a neighborhood, and then down to your home or business network. If you’re connected to a very large business campus network, their own network may be further subdivided.
Each of these subnets can be controlled as an entire block. That is, if you want to keep a bunch of computers logically separated from others on your big network, and want them governed by a special set of rules (who they can see, talk to, what kinds of network requests are allowed in and out of the network, etc), you can take a chunk of your network and define it as its own standalone subnetwork.
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