[ih] IP/TCP to TCP/IP

[John Kristoff]

Alan, I hope you don't mind me following up to the list.

I noticed it today when I was reviewing an older paper:

Development of the Domain Name System
Paul Mockapetris, Kevin J. Dunlap, ACM SIGCOMM 1988

When I saw it, I was curious, because I know I've seen it before and
assumed that was how it was originally written.  Perhaps its not as
prevelant as I thought.  I did a quick search and although TCP/IP seems
to be at least as common if not more so even early on, it does turn up
in:

RFC 896, Congestion Control in IP/TCP Networks
J. Nagle, 1984

NSL Technical Note TN-2
Using screend to Implement IP/TCP Security Policies
J. Mogul, 1991

And most interestingly:

http://www-mice.cs.ucl.ac.uk/multimedia/misc/tcp_ip/8502.mm.www/0144.html

I wonder if it was a 'purist' thing not unlike the proper pronouniation
of router.

John


"Alan J. Maitland" wrote:
> I suppose the first time I even heard the term TCP/IP was around 1980, then
> represented as an up and coming replacement for ARPANet.  I don't believe
> that I ever heard it expressed as IP/TCP.  By the time I received any
> formal training on networking, it was 1984/1985 and TCP/IP was expressed in
> that way then.  Which docs are you referring to?
> 
> Perhaps it was just for emphasis of the Transport Control Protocol part in
> anticipation that other protocols might fall on the other side of the '/'.
> 
> I believe that I had read that some of the early developers of the DNS
> service bemoaned the decision to go x.y.com vs com.y.x as the standard for
> name hierarchy.  Of course, my company uses the hierarchy to attempt to
> logically order its portals, so I suppose that I am grateful for the
> current system - I don't think that Net.Clothing.Mens look as good as
> Mens.Clothing.Net ;-)
> 
> On the other hand, sometimes things just happen.  The decision to name the
> company Hewlett-Packard verses Packard-Hewlett was decided on the toss of a
> quarter by its founders!
> 
> Best,
> 
> Alan Maitland
> The Commerce Company - Connect Your Dot(sm)
> http://WWW.Commerco.Com/
> 
> At 12:59 PM 10/24/01 -0500, you wrote:
> >Everyone now knows the suite of Internet protocols as TCP/IP, but a few
> >of the early Internet documents I've seen have them documented as
> >IP/TCP.  Did they purposely get reversed?  If so, why?  Was it just a
> >matter of personal preference and TCP/IP won out?
> >
> >John