What does the "Public" checkbox mean exactly?

[Drumming Pete]

I still do not understand the firewall persé. Yes I understand it intermediates to blocking or allowing traffic left or right (incoming, outgoing). But the function "public"is still a it unclear. As you see in the picture, Firefox only has home/private network ticked. But still functions fully to browse the internet. FreshPaint however has public checkbox checked while I cannot figue out why it would need to call out or receive any incoming signal. What does "Public" mean exactly?

 

[samuria]

Private is on your local network ie all your home pc etc public is anything not at home and on the internet ie google. What can be a bit confusing is dns can be said to be local as you can set the router to be dns so it goes out but you only use local as you ask the router not the internet