referring to fig1 , a computer network that may be operated according to an embodiment of the present invention is shown . in this system , a first computer system 11 seeks to communicate with a second computer system 19 . in doing so , it seeks to send some sort of information which will be referred to herein as “ data ” to a first site name which may be associated with computer system 19 . in this example , the first site name is similar to a plurality of other site names and is prone for searching using a regular expression for comparison purposes as described in further detail below . for the purposes of this embodiment , the site name is as follows : 4085551234 . abrainc . com ( e . g ., a u . s . telephone number with an “ abrainc ” sub - domain and a “. com ” domain ). the first site name is communicated , for example , by the first computer system 11 to an internet service provider ( isp ) 13 . the isp 13 then transfers the site name to a network server 15 ( e . g ., over internet 14 ). as known in the art , this network server may be a root domain name server which is responsible for knowing valid site names in the “. com ” realm . once network server 15 identifies a valid “. com ” site name ( i . e ., the “ abrainc . com ” portion of the site name ), the site name is eventually forwarded to the internet and preferably is forwarded to domain name server 17 to determine if 4085551234 . abrainc . com is a valid site name ( e . g ., via a network node 18 ). referring to fig2 , a method of the present invention is shown in flow diagram form . in block 21 , a normal name lookup is performed where the first site name is compared to the site names that are stored at the dns 17 . at decision block 23 it is determined whether a match has been found . if one has , control passes to block 24 where an appropriate response is sent by the dns 17 to first computer system 11 . if no match is found , control passes to decision block 25 where it is determined whether regular expression comparisons are enabled at the dns 17 . if they are not , then control passes to block 26 where an “ unfound ” message or the like is sent back to first computer system 11 ( fig1 ). if regular expression comparisons are enabled , control passes to block 27 where a first regular expression is retrieved ( e . g ., from memory at dns 17 ). according to an embodiment of the present invention , the first regular expression can have a form such as ^\ d { 10 }$. x . y where ^\ d { 10 }$ represents a string of ten numbers , x represents a sub - level domain (“ abrainc ” in this example ), and y represents a top - level domain (“ com ” in this example ). an alternative regular expression could be ^[ 0 - 9 ]+$. x . y where ^[ 0 - 9 ]+$ represents a string of numbers ( each between 0 and 9 ). in block 29 a comparison is made between the first site name and the regular expression . such a comparison can be done , for example using a comparison procedure such as that which is used in the unix operating system . in this embodiment , the regular expressions set forth above are in a unix format . one skilled in the art based on the above teaching will appreciate that other formats may be used to represent a regular expression . in decision block 31 , it is determined whether there is a match . if there is , then control passes to block 33 where a good response is sent to first computer system 11 with an appropriate internet protocol ( ip ) address . if there is not a match , then control passes to decision block 35 to determine whether other regular expressions exist . if there are no additional regular expressions present at dns 17 , then control passes to block 26 where an “ unfound ” message or the like is sent to computer system 11 . if there are additional regular expressions , then control passes to block 37 to retrieve the next regular expression and pass control to block 29 to perform the next comparison . although several embodiments are specifically illustrated and described herein , it will be appreciated that modifications and variations of the present invention are covered by the above teachings and within the purview of the appended claims without departing from the spirit and intended scope of the invention . for example , network server 15 as a domain name server may be modified to include a regular expression comparison as described above with reference to fig1 . in addition , other domain name servers may be modified to include the regular expression method described above . for example , the root domain name server for a particular country may be used to perform the regular expression comparison . accordingly , assuming that z is a valid country code ( i . e ., a geographically - oriented top - level domain ), all site names including that root are directed to the domain name server for that country . thus , modifying the regular expression above to ^\ d { 10 }$. z would result in the data being sent to the root domain name server and that server determining that the site name is valid at that location . one skilled in the art will appreciate that other regular expressions may be used . for example regular expressions may be used which recognizes a string of alpha - numeric characters in the first site name .