The letter for the day in the Networking ABC's is the letter "V". Vary headers, verification, and VLAN's find a home with the letter V, but I opted for a word that enables scaling of websites by virtualizing the resources.  Todays word is the word "VIP"

"V" is for VIP

VIP

Pronounced: vip

VIP, not be confused with V.I.P. or Very Important Person, stands for Virtual IP.  A Virtual IP is a mechanism to allow for scalaing and maintenance no a physical resource by virtualizing the access to that device.  A server is accessed by it's network address.  By configuring a virtual address to an application (say www.f5.com), a company is able to install many physical servers behind the virtual address that provide access to the requested application while exposing it through a single network address.  Even with the advances in computing power, active websites cannot be supported by a single computer and rely on some form of virtualization, also known as load balancing.