[ih] Internet-history Digest, Vol 62, Issue 9

[Jack Haverty]

On 1/24/25 18:10, Dave Crocker via Internet-history wrote:
> On 1/24/2025 6:05 PM, vinton cerf via Internet-history wrote:
>> that's a good question - I am not sure it was ever documented with 
>> minutes.
>> It was pretty informal. Pouzin, Crocker, Cerf, Metcalfe (?) and many 
>> others
>> were there because of ICCC and the demonstration of the Arpanet.
>
> Whoever was there an is available should record their recollections 
> from then.  Don't worry about the burden of writing.  Get the snapshots.
>
>
> d/
>

OK....

At ICCC'72, I was one of the crew setting up the exhibition in the 
ballroom of the Washington Hilton and getting it to work.   The ARPANET 
was only a few years old, and Lick had tasked his "chief of staff", Al 
Vezza, to help make ICCC'72 a success as the "coming out party" for the 
ARPANET.   Lick was my thesis advisor and I had stayed on after 
graduation in his group as a Member of the Research Staff.  Metcalfe had 
also been in Lick's group, with the job of building our PDP-10's IMP 
interface while simultaneously doing his thesis at Harvard and then 
joining Xerox PARC.

A bunch of us from MIT went down to DC to help set things up for the 
ICCC exhibit.  That involved stuff we knew how to do -- setting up a 
raised floor, running cables, unpacking and assembling equipment, etc.   
It also included things we didn't know how to do -- such as getting all 
sorts of different terminals connected to, and successfully talking to, 
the TIP in the middle of the room.  In retrospect, I suspect many of 
those terminals, loaned to the Exhibit by all sorts of vendors, had 
never been connected to a TIP before. We tweaked hardware, software, 
rewired connectors, and even rewired a backplane or two to get 
everything (more or less?) working.

There were some interesting experiences...   The Ballroom was in the 
basement of the hotel, and we all had rooms somewhere up on the guests' 
floors.  We were working, so of course we were dressed in boots, jeans, 
T-shirts, etc.  I remember at one point several of us getting in the 
elevator in the basement to go up to our rooms.  I was probably still 
wearing my tool belt and carrying my Craftsman toolbox from MIT brought 
in the plane as carryon.  The door opened on some intermediate floor and 
a whole bunch of people in ball gowns and tuxedos got in, obviously 
displeased to be riding with members of the working class.  A hotel 
manager shortly accosted us to advise that we had to use the freight 
elevators, since the primary elevators were only for use by registered 
guests.   I wish I had a camera to take his picture when we showed him 
our room keys, proving we actually were registered guests!

It is important to remember that the world of computing was quite 
different 50+ years ago.  Computers were expensive and required large 
spaces.  Humans used terminals on a network to access a remote computer 
in much the same way they used a terminal in their office to access a 
computer elsewhere in the building.  Most "network usage" was terminals 
interacting with some distant computer, with occasional data transfers 
between two computers, to move files as needed.  No web, no PCs, no 
smartphones, no speeds faster than about 100 kilobits per second, no 
Terabyte disk drives or SD cards. Dozens of computers, not millions.  To 
access a remote computer you used a telephone to "dial up" to that 
computer, and you were charged by the minute.

I didn't have time to see any of the presentations.   We were busy at 
first getting everything to work, then we served as docents for the 
Conference attendees as they came to view the Exhibit.  Bob Metcalfe had 
collected a bunch of "scenarios" for the various ARPANET sites, and the 
idea was that the attendees would get a hands-on experience by actually 
using the ARPANET themselves.   A scan of my copy of that "scenarios" 
handout is here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1F6OJOu8K7Mcfwdh_oTpZAO1J0U71VyBP/view?usp=sharing

The main controversy at the time seemed to be the difference between 
existing networking techniques and the new-fangled technique called 
"packet switching".  I recall the ATT attendees were quite pleased when 
the TIP crashed as they were watching a demo. Circuit-switching wins!

Most of the attendees, at least the ones that I helped, didn't care much 
about the technical aspects.   They were more focused on what they could 
do by using the ARPANET, and how they could access some useful program 
or data at some other distant site.  And of course the fact that it 
worked.  They had used it themselves and not just watched a demo by 
Marketing.

I don't recall hearing any discussions about "internetworking", distinct 
from discussions of "networking".   Established networking practice used 
circuit switching, and interconnecting networks was accomplished by 
"plugging" virtual circuits from one network to another.   That was 
basically how the telephony world had worked for quite a while.

Inside the ARPANET IMPs, algorithms implemented a virtual circuit 
service between any two computers attached to the net.   Packet 
switching was used between the IMPs, but the users' computers saw a 
virtual circuit service.  What you sent came out the other end, intact 
and in order.   There were lots of mechanisms and algorithms inside the 
IMP code to accomplish that.  So it would have been straightforward to 
interconnect the ARPANET with a clone of itself, patching together 
virtual circuits at the interface.

Again in retrospect, it's not surprising that the CCITT evolved to adopt 
X.25 and X.75 as internetworking techniques for data communications.  
That was the obvious extension of the mechanisms that had been used to 
interconnect PTTs' networks to carry voice calls across country borders.

The TCP approach was an unproven competitor.   Hence the "Internet 
Experiment".

Alex's recollections and the old INWG notes probably contain a lot more 
detail about those meeting discussions.

Sadly I suspect there are no Youtube videos available.....

Jack Haverty

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: OpenPGP_signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 665 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
URL: <http://elists.isoc.org/pipermail/internet-history/attachments/20250124/1e4a82d4/attachment-0001.asc>