[ih] The 20th anniversary of the Internet

[Bob Braden]

We ought not to let pass unnoticed the impending 20th anniversary of
the Internet.  The most logical date of origin of the Internet is
January 1, 1983, when the ARPANET officially switched from the NCP
protocol to TCP/IP.  Six months later, the ARPANET was split into the
two subnets ARPANET and MILNET, which were connected by Internet
gateways* (routers).

The planning for the January 1983 switchover was fully documented in
Jon Postel in RFC 801.  The week-by-week progress of the transition was
reported in a series of 15 RFCs, in the range RFC 842 - RFC 876, by
UCLA student David Smallberg.

There may still be a few remaining T shirts that read, "I Survived the
TCP/IP Transition".  People sometimes question that any geeks would
have been in machine rooms on January 1.  Believe it!!  Some geeks got
very little sleep for a few days (and that was before the work "geek"
was invented, I believe.)

So, on New Year's Eve, hoist one for the 20th anniversary of the
Internet.

Bob Braden

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* Routers brought to you by Bob Hinden of BBN.

** Prominent survivors included Dan Lynch of Interop fame.
   And of course Vint Cerf was working the Levers of Power at
   ARPA.