The goal of this textbook is to provide enough background into the inner workings of the Internet to allow a novice to understand how the various protocols on the Internet work together to accomplish simple tasks, such as a search. By building an Internet with all the various services a person uses every day, one will gain an appreciation not only of the work that goes on unseen, but also of the choices made by designers to make life easier for the user. Each chapter consists of background information on a specific topic or Internet service, and where appropriate a final section on how to configure a Raspberry Pi to provide that service. While mainly meant as an undergraduate textbook for a course on networking or Internet protocols and services, it can also be used by anyone interested in the Internet as a step–by–step guide to building one's own Intranet, or as a reference guide as to how things work on the global Internet.

这本教科书的目标是为互联网的内部运作提供足够的背景，使新手能够理解互联网上的各种协议如何共同完成简单的任务，如搜索。通过建立一个具有一个人每天使用的所有各种服务的互联网，人们不仅会对那些不为人知的工作有所了解，而且还会对设计者为使用户的生活更容易而做出的选择有所了解。每一章都由一个特定主题或互联网服务的背景信息组成，并在适当的地方有一个关于如何配置Raspberry Pi以提供该服务的最后章节。虽然主要是作为网络或互联网协议和服务课程的本科生教材，但它也可以被任何对互联网感兴趣的人用作逐步建立自己的内联网的指南，或者作为全球互联网上的工作方式的参考指南。