[ih] First file transfer on ARPANET

[John Day]

At 9:22 -0500 2012/12/12, Vint Cerf wrote:
>john, what would you call TELNET if not something facilitating remote login?

The Telnet spec quite specifically says it is a terminal device 
driver protocol.

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.

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.

The symmetric negotiation that Bernie came up with was another 
brilliance, and the go-ahead was a third.

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!

Take care,
John

>
>v
>
>
>On Wed, Dec 12, 2012 at 8:37 AM, John Day 
><<mailto:jeanjour at comcast.net>jeanjour at comcast.net> wrote:
>
>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.
>
>There was no "initial focus" on remote login.  There WAS an initial 
>focus on just getting bytes to move!  ;-)
>
>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.
>
>John
>
>
>At 21:47 -0800 2012/12/11, Richard Bennett wrote:
>
>Dear Historians,
>
>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?
>
>Thanks,
>
>RB
>
>--
>Richard Bennett
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