[ih] Origin of "best effort"

[John Day]

I first heard it from Pouzin or Zimmermann. CYCLADES was the original “best effort” network.  Pouzin’s argument for a datagram network was that the hosts would check to ensure that all of the data was received, so the network didn’t have to be perfect. It only had to make a "best effort” so that it wasn’t too expensive to recover the errors.

Take care,
John

> On Jan 18, 2017, at 14:34, Brian E Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I learnt very early on that the Internet offered a "best effort" service
> for the delivery of datagrams.
> 
> Where did that meme come from, and when?
> 
> The earliest trace I found in a quick trawl was 1986 (RFC992). But RFC791
> doesn't mention it, and defined TOS, such that all packets were *not* assumed
> to be created equal. The 1984 Saltzer et al paper doesn't mention it either.
> 
> (RFC768 does say that UDP delivery is "not guaranteed" but that is not
> the same thing as "best effort".)
> 
> The question is of interest because some analyses of network neutrality,
> including a student dissertation I was reviewing yesterday, conflate the
> end-to-end principle with best-effort packet delivery.
> 
> Regards
>     Brian
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