[ih] 13 the unlucky number

[Louis Mamakos]

The timing here lines up with Dave Mills' fuzzball code we had
running at University of Maryland (where Dave was a visiting
professor for a "special topics" networking class.)  I do
fondly recall Fuzzball PING and it was certainly a well-used
tool for the initial debugging of the UNIVAC TCP/IP stack that
Mike Petry and I started implementing at that time - fall 1980.

It was also around that time that we added the initial Ethernet
support in the Fuzzball code, adding ARP and a QBus InterLAN
interface.  Once again, PING was the universal debugging tool.

I do recall seeing "Packet InterNet Groper" in the Fuzzball
source code.

louie

On 11 Aug 2020, at 16:21, Jack Haverty via Internet-history wrote:

> Ping may have been released in 1983 but it was in use long before
> that.    When I was in charge of keeping the "core gateways" 
> running,
> Dave Mills was famous for doing lots of experiments that often gave us
> heartburn.   I clearly recall him telling us at some Internet 
> meeting
> about his experiments and the tool he used - he called it "Ping", and
> explained it was an acronym for "Packet InterNet Groper".  This was
> probably 1979/80 or thereabouts.  I don't know that Dave invented
> "ping", but I believe that's where I first heard about it.
>
> /Jack
>
>
> On 8/11/20 1:06 PM, Alejandro Acosta via Internet-history wrote:
>> uh, good question.
>>
>> Based on the days of the firsts networks and the release of ping the
>> answer is none, afaik, ping was released in 1983
>>
>> On 8/11/20 2:43 PM, Jack Haverty via Internet-history wrote:
>>> A related question, if you're exploring Internet History, might be
>>> "Which of the early networks were ever actually operational nets on 
>>> The
>>> Internet, i.e., nets that you could ping and get a response?"
>>>
>>> I was involved in the 77-80s timeframe, and as I recall, many of 
>>> those
>>> low numbered networks were assigned numbers, but didn't actually 
>>> ever
>>> get connected to the operational Internet.
>>>
>>> /Jack Haverty
>>>
>>> On 8/11/20 10:53 AM, Alejandro Acosta via Internet-history wrote:
>>>> Hello All,
>>>>
>>>>    First, really thanks for your comments.
>>>>
>>>>    I read a little bit more about the network 13. I supposed I 
>>>> should
>>>> have done this before sending the email.
>>>>
>>>>    As I said, it does not appear in RFC 790 (Sep 81), and it does 
>>>> not
>>>> appear until RFC 990 (Nov 1986 assigned to XEROX)
>>>>
>>>>    However, I just realized that actually network 13 was first 
>>>> seen in
>>>> RFC 739 assigned to National Physical Laboratory and last seen in 
>>>> RFC
>>>> 776.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Thanks again & sorry for the noise.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Alejandro,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 8/11/20 12:45 PM, Alex McKenzie via Internet-history wrote:
>>>>>    Alejandro,
>>>>> I don't think any of us can speak for Jon Postel, who assigned the
>>>>> numbers, and sadly he is no longer with us to speak for himself.  
>>>>> I
>>>>> knew Jon pretty well and he showed no evidence of being a
>>>>> superstitious person.  I think Steve Crocker's explanation that 
>>>>> the
>>>>> number was assigned to an entity that could not yet be made public 
>>>>> on
>>>>> the date RFC 790 was released is the most likely answer.
>>>>> For what its worth,Alex McKenzie
>>>>>
>>>>>       On Tuesday, August 11, 2020, 9:08:58 AM EDT, Alejandro 
>>>>> Acosta
>>>>> via Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
>>>>>      Hello list,
>>>>>
>>>>>      I have a question and one more time I believe this a good 
>>>>> place
>>>>> to ask.
>>>>>
>>>>>      During the weekend I read the old RFC 790 (ASSIGNED 
>>>>> NUMBERS).
>>>>> When
>>>>> reading it I noticed the following:
>>>>>
>>>>> {...}
>>>>>
>>>>>          009.rrr.rrr.rrr   BRAGG-PR      Ft. Bragg 
>>>>> Packet Radio Net
>>>>> [JEM]
>>>>>          010.rrr.rrr.rrr   ARPANET       ARPANET 
>>>>> [17,1,VGC]
>>>>>          011.rrr.rrr.rrr   UCLNET        
>>>>> University College London
>>>>> [PK]
>>>>>          012.rrr.rrr.rrr   CYCLADES      CYCLADES 
>>>>> [VGC]
>>>>>          013.rrr.rrr.rrr                 
>>>>> Unassigned [JBP]
>>>>>          014.rrr.rrr.rrr   TELENET       TELENET 
>>>>> [VGC]
>>>>>          015.rrr.rrr.rrr   EPSS          British 
>>>>> Post Office EPSS
>>>>> [PK]
>>>>>          016.rrr.rrr.rrr   DATAPAC       DATAPAC 
>>>>> [VGC]
>>>>>          017.rrr.rrr.rrr   TRANSPAC      TRANSPAC 
>>>>> [VGC]
>>>>>          018.rrr.rrr.rrr   LCSNET        MIT LCS 
>>>>> Network [43,10,DDC2]
>>>>>
>>>>> {...}
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>      As you can see the 013.rrr.rrr.rrr was unassigned but some
>>>>> subsequent
>>>>> prefix were (014, 015 ..... ). Is there any reason for it?. I know 
>>>>> 013
>>>>> was later assigned to XEROX-NET.
>>>>>
>>>>>      I wonder if 013 was skipped because some sort of 
>>>>> superstitions?.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Alejandro,
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>
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