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ARPANET</title></head><body>
<div>And I think it is a very important distinction. I always
say the ARPANET was a success because it was done by OS guys not
telecom guys. Our early guide for applications was trying to
re-create the facilities of an OS on the Net.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Yes, do/don't/will/won't was inspired. But the go-ahead
solution is as well. It takes something that everyone else saw
as oil and water and found an elegant synthesis. Just the
fact that they saw the protocol as symmetrical while everyone else
looking at the problem saw it as asymmetrical.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>This kind of thinking seems to be beyond the ability of 99% of
those in the field today.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>(Not only did the textbook authors not get it, but they don't
cover Telnet any more, because "no one uses Telnet
anymore." Fools! The reason to cover Telnet is to
learn very good forms of solving problems. They don't teach
principles. They are training technicians. By now many of those
are professors teaching the same dumb stuff.)</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>We had just gotten our feet on the ground and had an idea of what
was next when ARPA shut down USING, which would have started
experimenting with a bunch of things.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>The real problem though was that we were already too far ahead of
the capabilities of the hardware at the time. We knew what we
should do, but the machines didn't have the umph to support it.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>John</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>At 9:42 -0500 2012/12/12, Vint Cerf wrote:</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>john,</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>ok that's fair. Of course, we used the
protocol to log in remotely, among other things.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>the network virtual terminal and the
Do/Don't/Will/Won't mechanisms were brilliant.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>v</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>On Wed, Dec 12, 2012 at 9:38 AM, John Day
<<a href="mailto:jeanjour@comcast.net">jeanjour@comcast.net</a>>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote>At 9:22 -0500 2012/12/12, Vint Cerf wrote:<br>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>john, what would you call TELNET if not
something facilitating remote login?<br>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote><br></blockquote>
<blockquote>The Telnet spec quite specifically says it is a terminal
device driver protocol.</blockquote>
<blockquote><br></blockquote>
<blockquote>One of the true brilliances of Telnet is that it is NOT a
remote login protocol but a byte-oriented IPC mechanism that could be
used for other applications that needed a byte-oriented IPC
mechanism. Remember we called this class of protocols:
Virtual Terminal Protocols, not remote login protocols.</blockquote>
<blockquote><br></blockquote>
<blockquote>Remote log in protocols by their nature are asymmetric and
unsuitable for anything else. To call Telnet a remote login
protocol is to grossly miss the point, not only about Telnet, but what
those guys thought they were doing.</blockquote>
<blockquote><br></blockquote>
<blockquote>The symmetric negotiation that Bernie came up with was
another brilliance, and the go-ahead was a third.</blockquote>
<blockquote><br></blockquote>
<blockquote>Those early ARPANET guys were pretty smart! It was a
great honor and a great piece of luck to be a grad student then and
getting the chance to learn from them!</blockquote>
<blockquote><br></blockquote>
<blockquote>Take care,</blockquote>
<blockquote>John</blockquote>
<blockquote><br>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
<blockquote>v<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote><br>
<br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote>On Wed, Dec 12, 2012 at 8:37 AM, John Day <<a
href="mailto:jeanjour@comcast.net">jeanjour@comcast.net</a>>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote>Given that it was very late 1969 when the first IMPs went
in, yes. The first file transfer would have been in 1970. The
second question would be when was the first file transfer using
FTP.<br>
<br>
There was no "initial focus" on remote login. There
WAS an initial focus on just getting bytes to move! ;-)<br>
<br>
I should point out that the ARPANET never did do a remote login
protocol. This is a fiction invented by sloppy textbook authors
who don't check the original sources and frankly, don't seem to be
that bright.<font color="#888888"><br>
<br>
John</font><br>
</blockquote>
<blockquote><br>
<br>
At 21:47 -0800 2012/12/11, Richard Bennett wrote:<br>
<blockquote>Dear Historians,<br>
<br>
I'm curious about when the first file transfer was done successfully
on ARPANET. Given that the initial focus was remote login, I'm
guessing that rudimentary file transfers wouldn't have been done until
sometime in 1970. Does anyone remember?<br>
<br>
Thanks,<br>
<br>
RB<br>
<br>
--<br>
Richard Bennett</blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
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