Why a same url opens different web pages?

Question

Hi,

I am facing a strange thing when i open some URL. The URL is (www.jobserve.com)

When i open this URL from my home, it opens some web page. Same url if i open from my office network, i get a entirely differnt URL, which is what i want.

Both, my home and office are in same city in India(3 Km. apart!) but somehow from my home network, i get served a entirely different page which is not what i am trying to open.(The page opening up in the office one is desired one. Office network has proxy/firewall which could be shielding the IP address for opening to outside world!).

My question is why is it happening so, because both accesses are happening from same country/city(but different ISPs though!), so there cannot be a country/IP specific host/content served differently than the global content of the same server.

So what could be happening here?

This raised another question in my mind(when i tried to find ip of the server using nslookup and domain name which returned error - "can't find www.jobserve.com/: Non-existent domain"):- How can i find IP address of the web server using the domain name other than nslookup which is not working for this particular domain/url?

I recall there were some sites which find geographical location of server and show that pictorially, but i am not able to recall the url for that? Does anyone know?

Thanks,

-AD.

Answer 1

Some sites look at the incoming IP address, lookup where it's coming from and then take various actions they think relevant to you - usually, redirecting you to a more-local site.

Of course, lots of sites react if they think they've "seen you before." For example, there may be cookies that tell them something about you. Or, they may be reacting to your browser.

Sometimes, organizations look at the source IP address and if it's coming from a business they may respond differently than if it's from a non-business ("home") IP.

And, sometimes companies intercept IP traffic and edit it in various ways. This is not normally done to web pages, but if your employer isn't happy with your watching porn at work ( -smile- ), they may do something about it! ...China is well known for doing this type of interception...

Answer 2

I work for an UK based company and all my regional settings are UK based. Moreover the internet is itself from UK so all websites act as if I am from UK.

Google.com goes to google.co.uk virgin, T mobile ads every where

Does this give any idea about why you are getting a different website in office?

Answer 3

For finding the IP address: don't use a slash. Just

nslookup www.jobserve.com

Alternatively, you can use a website like http://www.domaintools.com/ (there are many others, that's just the first one that comes to my mind).