Date: Sat, 25 Jun 2005 03:47:33 -0400 To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org> From: "Mike B." <omni at omniphile.com> Subject: [WSFA] Re: Not Re: [WSFA] Re: Computer problems at work At 01:44 AM 6/25/05 -0400, Ted White wrote: >From: "Elspeth Kovar" <ekovar at worldnet.att.net> >> At 12:06 AM 6/21/2005, Keith F. Lynch wrote: >> >Mike Bartman wrote (but was actually quoting Ted) >> >> > > As I told you, you inherited Mary Catherine Gallagher's computer -- >> > > and she'd been having problems with it. It's probably haunted by >> > > her malingering ghost.... >> > >> >If a computer (or house, or person) must be haunted by a ghost, the >> >malingering kind is best. "I'm not going to bother haunting today; >> >my ectoplasm has been aching all week." >> >> That's lovely; not only am I going to have to remember it but with your >> permission would like to pass it along. Ted, I'd like to.htm. That one traces the origins of the internet back to the early 1960s...when the first work that led to NCP was started: ------ In fact, the concept of a decentralized network dates to the early 1960s, when the RAND Corporation, a think tank which studies national security and public welfare issues for the U. S. government, was asked by the U. S. Air Force to design a communications network that would be able to survive and function during and after a nuclear attack. The idea of a centralized network was unacceptable, since any central network computer or network control center would likely be the first target in an attack. Paul Baran of RAND published a paper in 1964 entitled On Distributed Communications, which provided the theoretical design for data transfer on an unreliable network, a network which was designed from the beginning to operate while in tatters. Baran's design proposed many of the features which were eventually incorporated into the network we have today, including decentralized data storage, digital packets and different routes for packets in the same data transfer. ------ It goes on to say: ----- The early 1970s were spent developing basic standards called protocols for data transfer (see How the Internet Works for more information on protocols). The first protocol developed was known as the Network Control Protocol or NCP. This protocol supported computers running on the same network. ----- and: ----- During 1973-1978 a team of researchers led by Vinton Cerf at Stanford Research Institute and Robert Kahn of ARPA developed a suite of protocols called TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol and Internet Protocol) which supported the interconnection of a number of different computer networks. In 1983 TCP/IP replaced NCP as the core Internet protocol. ----- http://www.walthowe.com/navnet/history.html says: ----- The telnet protocol, enabling logging on to a remote computer, was published as a Request for Comments (RFC) in 1972 ----- That doesn't mean that's when the protocol was invented, just when it was standardized on the internet. Various comments on a number of web pages suggest that it originated to use TCP/IP though, so it can't predate the RFC by too much. http://www.postel.org/pipermail/internet-history/2002-December/000174.html says: ----- > -Ad-hoc Telnet: The First Attempts at Demonstrating Remote > Login on the ARPANET (Late 1969) > > -The Old Telnet Protocol (1971 - 1973) ----- http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/chris/think/Project_Management/ARPANET/Timeli ne/ seems to have the best timeline for internet creation. This shows that the first computers on the Arpanet were not Unix machines. The first machine was added in September of 1968: a Sigma 7 computer at UCLA. October of 1968: The second node of the ARPANET is installed at Stanford Research Institute (SRI). The IMP is connected to an SDS 940 Computer. The first message is sent across the network and received. http://www.faqs.org/docs/artu/ch02s01.html talks about the origin of Unix, and includes this: ----- Unix was born in 1969 out of the mind of a computer scientist at Bell Laboratories, Ken Thompson. ----- http://www.livinginternet.com/i/iw_unix_dev.htm talks about the origin of Unix too, and says in part: ----- In 1975, the sixth version of Unix was released, for the first time made available outside AT&T to educational and research institutions. ----- Other info on that page indicates that initial development was on a PDP-7, and later a PDP-11 computer. This would seem to imply that Unix was not involved in the origins of the Internet...which were well underway by the time Unix left Bell Labs for places like Berkeley, and that telnet was developed at the same time, or a bit later than Unix, but not on Unix, and Unix went out to the world 3 years after Telnet's spec was published in an RFC, though Unix probably existed prior to the invention of Telnet. Both Kieth and I appear to be correct about telnet vs Unix, depending on how you want to define things (running? released internally? released to the world?). It's still arguable whether his "far older" claim is valid even if you use "released to the world" as the definition of origin, since we are talking about at most 3 years in public release dates, but that's a minor quibble. There's no argument that I was seriously confused about the sockets/BSD stuff. That all came much later. http://www.scnc.k12.mi.us/websites/bsdtree.html has a family tree and timeline for Unix development from Multics to Unix to BSD Unix. Short form: Unix first running in 1969. Telnet RFC published in 1972, with earlier forms as early as 1969 maybe. Unix released outside of AT&T Bell Labs in 1975. When the "internet" was actually created is open to even more argument. Was it when the work started? When the first computer was connected to the first IMP? When the second computer was connected to the second IMP and the two exchanged data? Or when the first two dissimilar networks were connected and exchanged data using internet protocols through gateways? A case could be made for any of these points being the "origin of the internet". Thanks to both of you for making me look all this up. It's been educational. -- Mike B. -- ========================================================================== The Boulder Pledge: "Under no circumstances will I ever purchase anything offered to me as the result of an unsolicited email message. Nor will I forward chain letters, petitions, mass mailings, or virus warnings to large numbers of others. This is my contribution to the survival of the online community." ========================================================================== include your >> "Yeah, but sooner or later it remembers what it's there for." (Family >> members only and with attribution, but a lot of them use AOL accounts.) > >Without going back and looking for it, I'd almost swear that quote was from >Keith, not Mike. But sure, feel free to quote me. I can't confirm that Keith wrote that without going back and looking either, but I can confirm that it wasn't me. -- Mike B. -- A philosophy must be like a baby: If it stinks, change it.