[ih] Yet another subject change: Testing (Was Re: Gateway Issue: Certification (was Re: booting linux on a 4004))

[Jack Haverty]

Yes, I heard the same story.  There was a significant advantage in 
having a computer at each end of some telecommunications circuit, 
watching every hiccup of that line and raising an alarm if things 
weren't normal.

IIRC, there was a similar experience with Satnet, which spanned the 
Atlantic using a channel that ARPA leased from Intelsat on the Intelsat 
IV-A "bird".  Satnet had SIMPs attached to the satellite channel.   
SIMPs were "Satellite IMPs", using the same hardware and much of the 
software as in the Arpanet.

At the time, most of the satellite channels were used for things like 
television feeds and telephone calls.  So impending circuit problems 
would likely impact users as just some static in the audio or video, 
easily ignored at least at first.

Computers were much more critical of circuit problems, and the 
Arpanet/Satnet NOC would be informed.  Similarly, it took a while for 
Intelsat to believe that some little company in Massachusetts could be 
telling them about an actual imminent failure of their bird's system.

Jack

On 10/3/24 18:28, Dave Crocker wrote:
> On 10/3/2024 6:21 PM, Jack Haverty via Internet-history wrote:
>> But an Operator, or IMP programmer, could look back at the paper logs 
>> and often discover an imminent problem, or see the events which led 
>> up to a reported problem to be fixed. 
>
> I heard a story that in the early days, NOC folk would see an 
> increasing rate of errors on a link, contact the relevant phone 
> company -- not all were AT&T -- and tell them that that line was about 
> to fail.  The phone folk reportedly had no experience with a 
> customer's offering such predictions and were initially dismissive.  I 
> was told that that attitude changed quickly...
>
> d/
>

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