[ih] Internet-history Digest, Vol 69, Issue 11

[Steve Crocker]

Multics lives on as well, in a truncated form, as Unix :)

On Sun, Aug 17, 2025 at 11:36 AM Bob Purvy via Internet-history <
internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:

> X.500 at least lives on, in a truncated form, as LDAP.
>
> On Sun, Aug 17, 2025 at 8:18 AM John Day via Internet-history <
> internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
>
> > Agreed and the plea to construct it in a modular fashion so that not
> > everyone needed to do the whole thing fell on deaf ears.
> >
> > The same could be said for X.500.
> >
> > Both were seen by their proponents as services to be provided by PTTs.
> >
> > It didn’t help that the groups doing them believed that specifying the
> > format of a message was a ‘formal description of the protocol.’
> >
> > Or that all protocol exchanges were request/response.
> >
> > etc. etc.
> >
> > > On Aug 17, 2025, at 10:35, Craig Partridge via Internet-history <
> > internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > Trying here, with some difficulty, to inject a historian's style of
> > > perspective.
> > >
> > > I sometimes view X.400 as caught between "second system syndrome"
> > (because
> > > an effective worldwide email system based on RFC 733 formatting and
> > > multiple transports existed [ARPANET+UUCP+CSNET+BITNET]) as X.400 was
> > > starting c. 1981/2 and "plan to throw one away" because X.400 decided
> to
> > > jump into the multimedia mail space, at a time that people were only
> just
> > > beginning to develop solutions (e.g. Bob Thomas' group at BBN which
> > > produced something called Slate and the CMU campus program [their
> version
> > > of MIT's Project Athena] -- and more, I just don't remember them all).
> > >
> > > So the project was almost inevitably doomed by a combination of trying
> to
> > > fix all that was wrong with the first generation and, thanks to the
> first
> > > generation, being able to see that multimedia was the future, but
> having
> > > nowhere near enough experience to know how to do it.  Add the usual
> > > international standards/telecomm standards pressures and...
> > >
> > > Craig
> > >
> > > On Sun, Aug 17, 2025 at 10:11 AM Bob Purvy via Internet-history <
> > > internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> > >
> > >>> I would have used "unreliable", "unpredictable" and "flimsy"
> > >> as adjectives for X.400.
> > >>
> > >> Amen. 3Com had a contract with a French company to do it for us, which
> > >> earned me a trip to Paris. It never worked right and we finally
> > abandoned
> > >> it.
> > >>
> > >> a poster child for "the perfect is the enemy of the good."
> > >>
> > >> On Sat, Aug 16, 2025 at 11:48 PM Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond via
> > >> Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> > >>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>> On 17/08/2025 04:13, vinton cerf via Internet-history wrote:
> > >>>>    *X.400* for its message handling services. This protocol
> provides a
> > >>>>    robust "store-and-forward" system for transmitting messages and
> is
> > >>> known
> > >>>>    for its advanced addressing and security capabilities.
> > >>>
> > >>> For the anedcote, my recollection of X.400 was that it was far from
> > >>> "robust". I would have used "unreliable", "unpredictable" and
> "flimsy"
> > >>> as adjectives for X.400. In theory, it sounded great, but in
> practice,
> > >>> its setting up and use was so complex that one small discrepancy and
> it
> > >>> it wouldn't work properly. IMHO a classic example of wanting to do
> too
> > >>> much.
> > >>>
> > >>> O.
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> > >
> > >
> > > --
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> > > Craig Partridge's email account for professional society activities and
> > > mailing lists.
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