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The Internet's History and Development The Internet's History and Development From Wartime Tool to the Fish-Cam by Scott Ruthfield It was 1964, the height of the Cold War, and Americans spent theirfree time building bomb shelters and stockpiling canned food inpreparation for the impending nuclear attack. The government, however,had a more pervasive problem. If war did come, how would the militarybe able to communicate? A centralized systemmight easily be destroyed in wartime, and so traditional technologieswouldn't work. This fear impressed a need on the government to dosomething different -- to develop a whole new scheme for post-nuclearcommunication. Today, a descendant of that Cold War mechanism is used totrack seismological phenomena, transmit pressing news bulletins, andsend email to mom. Does this signal a complete shift in priorities?In part, yes; more appropriately though, it is an example of atechnology with more uses than anybody ever imagined. The Internet we use today is one of the few positive legaciesof Cold War paranoia, providing efficient and inexpensive communicationsbetween people around the world.As the Iraqis proved during the Gulf War, commerciallyavailable Internet technologies were indeed resistant to enemy fire.But as ``Information Superhighway'' becomes the most over-used phrase ofthe 1990s, mass numbers of people are signing up and trying to becomepart of the Internet community. By understanding the motives, methods,and technologies behind the Internet's development, we can get a senseof the power and importance of this project gone happily amok. Research BeginningsThe roots of today's Internet come from the Advanced Research ProjectsAgency (ARPA). Instead of performing its own research, ARPA (a branchof the Department of Defense), which became DARPA in 1972, regularlyfunded research projects related to technological development ormilitary problems. In the 1960s, ARPA became interested in developinga way for computers to communicate with each other and began to fundprograms at universities and corporations, including MIT and RAND. A network would both advance Americantechnological development and provide a secure command and controlover information during wartime. To this end, in the mid-1960s, ARPAbegan to support research into building an effective network. On January 2, 1969, designers began working on an experiment todetermine whether computers at different universities couldcommunicate with each other without a central system. The corporationBolt, Baranek and Newman had beenawarded the contract to develop the Interface Message Processor(IMP), the basis of the new communications system. IMPs were small machines which were part of each host and werededicated to forming the network between computers [1]. IMPswould use a technology called packet-switching, which split largesections of data into small parts called packets, each labeled with its destinationaddress. Packets could be sent in any order and through differentroutes which all led to the same destination [2]. Upon arrival at the destination computer, the packets could bereassembled. (While the term has died out, IMPs form the backbone ofpacket-switching networks today.)IMP's and Packet-SwitchingIn September of 1969, BBN shipped its first IMP to UCLA, which hadspent the previous few months furiously trying to develop a hardwareand software interface. With crossed fingers, they plugged in theprocessor and ran the program; it worked perfectly. Soon after,Stanford, UCLA, UC-Santa Barbara, and the University of Utah performedthe first packet-switching experiment, and a network was looking likemore of a reality [3]. The advantage of the packet-switching system was veryclear. Under a traditional central system, all information had to be chanelledthrough one source, processed, and sent off somewhereelse. Packet-switching, though, allowed for another method;information could first be sent to one place, and if that site was notworking or processing too slowly, could be routed, on-the-fly,somewhere else. This concept, called dynamic re-routing, would allowall hosts to be ``equal.'' With every computer having the same routingabilities, an enemy would have to destroy nearly all computers onthe network to be sure that communication lines were dead. While these developments were looking quite positive, thedesigners soon ran into trouble. The original systems only supportedclient-server applications like telnet and FTP, andcouldn't handle host-host relationships [1]. Thislimit would impair the functionality of the network. A new protocol totake care of this went into development soon afterwards; calledNetwork Control Protocol (NCP), it became the primary concept behindnetworking. Armed with these tools, researchers were ready to unveiltheir creation: ARPAnet.Bonjour, ARPANet! ARPAnet made its first public appearance flashily, as the star ofWashington D.C.'s International Conference on Computers andCommunications (now International Conference on ComputerCommunication) in 1972. Arranging for an ARPAnet IMP to beon-site, head researchers demonstrated the abilities of thenetwork. Terminals set up at over 40 locations were able to locate theIMP and other processors. More than 1000 people witnessed a newtechnological revolution, as remote access to files became possible [1]. What had once only been research was now being takenseriously by vendors and manufacturers. After the unveiling,technologies to help develop the network began to sprout. By 1973, asatellite link to Hawaii was running; by the end of the year, moredistant hosts were connected over telephone lines.While the technology was growing quickly, the number of terminalshooked up to ARPAnet was still moving slowly. Between 1969 and early1977, ARPAnet only added 107 hosts. (In contrast, more than onemillion hosts were added to the Internet between January and August1994) [4]. Even so, engineers at DARPA and RANDrecognized that this new communications network was going to grow into something far larger than they had everimagined, and needed to develop a design suitable for a largenetwork.TCP/IP DevelopmentKnowing that NCP was not ready for a mass influx of hosts, researchers atDARPA began working on a new protocol which would be able to handle largernumbers of users, and Transmission ControlProtocol/Internet Protocol(TCP/IP) was born in the mid-1970s. This more sophisticated technology wasaccepted by the U.S. government in 1978, and TCP/IP became the preferrednetworking tool. Many people view January 1, 1983, when allof ARPAnet was switched over fromNCP to TCP, as the ``official'' beginning of the Internet [3]. During 1983, to provide operational separation, the militarybroke off from ARPAnet and formed MILnet. The Department of Defensecontinued to run and fund both networks. Further, more networks werepopping up; educational and commercial organizations that didn't fallinto ARPA's original charter wanted to use the same packet-switchingtechnologies. In the early 1980s, two large networks sprang up: CSnet (ComputerScience Network), for members of the computer science academic andindustrial community, and BITNET (Because It's TimeNetwork), for the general academic community. Other small networks,like ones for space scientists and high-energy physicists grew forspecific needs [5]. (The latter also helpeddevelop the foundation of the World Wide Web in 1989.) While thesenetworks existed separately from ARPAnet, there was a need forinterconnection between all of them. In 1983, CSnet and ARPAnetnegotiated an agreement which allowed members of the two networks toexchange electronic mail. Further agreements followed, and thenetworks began building gateways between one another.NSFNet: More Power, More Speed For several years, the myriad networks were effective; organizationswere able to complete their work and communicate without trouble. However,by mid-1985, more resource-intensive programs became widespread, and even the most advanced networks could not keep up withthe demand. At the same time, the National Science Foundation's Office forAdvanced Scientific Computing became interested in high-speed computing. Acombination of technological advancements and the availability of funds led the NSF to encourage the use of supercomputers in networking, and begin fundingthe construction of its own network (NSFnet). The planners envisioned a three-tiered system. Instead of userorganizations (like universities and manufacturers) connectingdirectly to the backbone of five top supercomputers, they developed amid-level tier, where regional networks would connect the two levelstogether[2]. Starting in 1987, the NSF fundedresearch organizations at IBM, MCI, and the Merit Computer Network. Originally,the NSF wanted to incorporate its network into ARPAnet, but a numberof political and technical difficulties caused it to build its ownnetwork. The original supercomputer centers turned out to be unsuccessful; fewof them worked, and still fewer were cost-efficient enough tomaintain. The NSF kept up its network, though, adding more than adozen backbones and more large regional networks. By 1989, ARPAnet hadbeen co-opted; it folded, having provided the impetus for technologiesthat far exceeded its capabilities. Today's Internet Maintenance From 1989 until 1995, there were few changes in the structure,but a mass explosion of interest. The number of hosts more thandoubled in two years, and national magazines ran a number of coverstories about ``cyberspace.'' On April 30, 1995, thegovernment and the organizations that built this system from scratch,released it; NSFnet was turnedoff, and Internet traffic was handed over to commercialnetworks. While the NSF is still funding research and settingguidelines for network providers, new infrastructure will be built andmaintained by offsprings of telephone companies (like MCI and Sprint)and other organizations. Global Networking and Future IdeasWhile theUnited States still leads the world in Internet-based technologies,other nations have developed similar networks, which connectthrough gateways. The Coordinating Committee forIntercontinental Research Networks (CCIRN) has led the way inbringing the world into internetworking [5].New ideas continue to pop up. For example, when he was a TennesseeSenator, Vice President Albert Gore proposed the National Research and EducationNetwork, which (building off of NSFnet) would provide topcomputing facilities to research communities and schools. This programwent into development in 1991 and continues today. While many peopleare frightened by the prospect of the government having a larger rolein Internet policy (even as it divests itself from hardware), othersare pleased that the ``information-poor'' may be given a chance tobecome part of this expanding world [2],[3]. Scientists developing networking technology in the 1960's knewthat what they were building would be far bigger than themselves;nobody, however, could have predicted the explosion in Internet accessand interest in the past several years. The original designers didn'teven think email would be something people would want! Commercialnetworks, students, and even Internet cafes are scrambling to sign upand be part of a technological revolution. It is important for us toremember that the real revolution took place two decades ago -- today'stechnology just rides on the wave of yesteryear. References1.Lynch, Daniel C. Historical Evolution. In Internet SystemHandbook. Daniel C. Lynch and Marshall T. Rose, eds. Addison-Wesley Company, Reading, Massachusetts, 1993.2.Wiggins, Richard W. The Internet for Everyone: A Guidefor Users and Providers. McGraw-Hill, Inc., New York, 1994.3.Dern, Daniel P. The Internet Guide for New Users. McGraw-Hill, Inc., New York, 1994.4.Zakon, Robert. Hobbes InternetTimeline v1.3a. Published electronically: available at http://www.amdahl.com/internet/events/timeline.html.5.Leiner, Barry M. Globalization of the Internet. In InternetSystem Handbook. Daniel C. Lynch and Marshall T. Rose, eds.Addison-Wesley Company, Reading, Massachusetts, 1993.For Further Reading:Most mass-produced books about the Internet include a section onhistory and development. These are, of course, of varying quality (andinformation). Virtually any text will give you a basic understandingof the history, but several books stand out. The Internet SystemHandbook has an excellent technical description of productdevelopment and a lot of first-hand information. Both The InternetGuide for New Users and The Internet for Everyone haveshorter and better-organized discussions, though the former issomewhat simplistic.There are also a number of on-line documents that discuss history. Acolumn from Bruce Sterling, originally published in The Magazine ofFantasy and Science Fiction in 1993, and found at gopher://gopher.isoc.org:70/00/internet/history/short.history.of.internetprovided the impetus for this article; it is well-written,interesting, and suitably provocative. Ronda and Michael Hauben (atUniversity of Michigan and Columbia University respectively) havedeveloped an on-line manual (http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook) with some history and an excellent set of references.There are a number of first-hand accounts -- from the developers in the1960's and 1970's -- that can be found with a bit of searching. Still,the primary source for Internet history has to be the InternetRequest for Comments. Anything you need (or want) to know can befound here. Copyright 1995 by Scott Ruthfield Crossroads 2.1 September 1995Want more Crossroads articles about Networking? Go to theIndex orto the next one or theprevious one.Last Modified:Location: www.acm.org/crossroads/xrds2-1/inet-history.html |
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