Before we create the repository let't take a look the URL I mentioned in the
previous para: `https://github.com/fastn-stack/fastn-template`. These things
are called URL, which is short of Uniform Resource Locator. Look at another
URL, URL of this book `https://fastn.com/book/`. You should start paying
attention to the URL, it's "structure", as we are going to be building web
applications and websites in this book, and they are all about creating such
URLs.
A URL has a "scheme", here the scheme is `https`. `https` stands for "secure
HTTP", and HTTP is the "internet protocol" that your web-browser uses to
communicate with the the "web-server" hosting the website. There is another
internet protocol, identified by the scheme `http` which is very common. `http`
and `https` are losly grouped into a single name, http, and very few people call
things https, e.g. typically a server would be called http server, and it
supports https, instead of calling it https server. HTTPS is secure, so you
should always be on a lookout for https URLs. But http is "simple", so when
doing local web development, you will often not use https and use http.
Sometimes you will come across URLs without scheme, eg `google.com`. This is
technically not a valid URL, but is common enough that a lot of applications,
like your webbrowser understands that you mean `https://google.com` when you
type `google.com`.
Since HTTPS, the secure version of http came out later, earlier when you saw
a URL without scheme, most applications assumed you meant `http://google.com`.
Now HTTPS is starting to gain widespread adoption, so more and more sites
and applications prefer https by default now.
You should be aware of the distinction though. And this may be your first
lesson, if you want to become programmer, you have to pay a lot of attention
to minute details. Programmers create "robust applications", means users of
programs are sheilded from such minute details, but this has trained users to
not pay too much attention to details. But these details matter.
Let's look at the URL of the template repository once again:
`https://github.com/fastn-stack/fastn-template`, the URL uses `https`, so it
is secure. The next part is the "domain", `github.com` in this case.
the `github.com` part tells you that this repo is on
Github. Then comes the `fastn-stack` part, which is our "account name". When you
created your account on Github, you must have picked a username, your username
would be your account name. And finally the `fastn-template` part, which is the
"name" of the repo.