eZ publish is capable of handling two types of URLs:

• System URLs
• Virtual URLs

System URLs
A system URL is a raw eZ publish URL that contains miscellaneous information about the content/functionality that is being accessed. A system URL may look something like this: http://www.example.com/content/view/full/44

Virtual URLs
A virtual URL is a simplified version of an arbitrary system URL. A virtual URL is nicer, easier to remember and sometimes shorter than its corresponding system URL. Virtual URLs are often referred to as "nice URLs" or "URL aliases". A virtual URL may look something like this: http://www.example.com/recent_news

Example
The links page of a site may be reached in two different ways:

• Using a system URL: http://www.example.com/content/view/full/46
• Using a virtual URL: http://www.example.com/links

The following subsections give further explanation of the two URL types.