[ih] capacity v bandwidth

[Brian E Carpenter]

Vint, I'm sure you're correct, but again quoting the same 1988 DDN document:

"3.8.2. cisco Systems Gateways -
PRODUCT-OR-PACKAGE-NAME: cisco Multi-Protocol Gateway Servers
DESCRIPTION:
The cisco family of gateways are multi-protocol routers linking networks of heterogeneous hosts and -
media. All Gateway Servers are fully compliant with RFC 1009, "Requirements for Internet Gateways"."

so clearly even Cisco was using both words.

RFC 1009 (June 1987) uses "gateway" 154 times and "router" 16 times.
It explicitly defines the terms about 180 degrees differently than Noel:

"     Router      A router is a switch that receives data transmission
                   units from input interfaces and, depending on the
                   addresses in those units, routes them to the
                   appropriate output interfaces.  There can be routers
                   at different levels of protocol.  For example,
                   Interface Message Processors (IMPs) are packet-level
                   routers.

       Gateway     In the Internet documentation generally, and in this
                   document specifically, a gateway is an IP-level
                   router.  In the Internet community the term has a long
                   history of this usage [32]."

Regards/Ngā mihi
    Brian
On 02-Jun-26 13:32, vinton cerf wrote:
> I had always thought that cisco introduced the term 'router" in 1984.
> 
> v
> 
> 
> On Mon, Jun 1, 2026 at 8:52 PM Brian E Carpenter via Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org <mailto:internet-history at elists.isoc.org>> wrote:
> 
>     This is slightly complicated by the IGP/EGP terminology. That persisted even when
>     "router" became commonplace. I think we can date it to between June 1988
>     and June 1989:
> 
>     RFC1058 (RIP, June 1988) uses "gateway" exclusively
> 
>     RFC1105 (the first version of BGP, June 1989) uses "router" exclusively,
>     except in the name of the protocol!
> 
>     Wikipedia says that the p4200 came out in 1986. I couldn't find a manual,
>     but its product name was in a May 1988 DoD report:
> 
>     "Proteon p4200 Gateway
>     ...
>     The p4200 gateway is a multiprotocol router, supporting (among other protocols) TCP/IP."
> 
>     [https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA192186.pdf <https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA192186.pdf>]
> 
>     Also see: RFC1208 "A Glossary of Networking Terms" (March 1991)
> 
>     Regards/Ngā mihi
>          Brian
> 
>     On 02-Jun-26 11:48, Noel Chiappa via Internet-history wrote:
>      >      > From: Jack Haverty
>      >
>      >      > In the early Internet, the boxes interconnecting networks were called
>      >      > "gateways". Today they're called "routers".  But why the change...?
>      >      >
>      >      > So we started callig them "routers". Other companies (cisco, proteon,
>      >      > ...) probably had similar experiences in their sales activities.
>      >
>      > If my memory isn't failing me (it well might be), I can take part of the
>      > blame.
>      >
>      > I do remember that I was pissed off because everyone and their brother
>      > (across the industry generally) called any box that did digital
>      > communications between two things a 'gateway'. E.g. a box that did email
>      > forwarding from BITNET to the Internet was called a 'gateway'. I.e. 'gateway'
>      > was useless as a technical term, because it covered an impossibly wide range
>      > of functionalities.
>      >
>      > (I am not sure if the p4200, the first Proteon router product,
>      > post-dated the 'gateway' -> 'router' change; I'd have to try and find an
>      > original manual. If it pre-dated, I may have taken Proteon experience into
>      > account too.)
>      >
>      > So I campaigned (I think it was me) in the IETF community to come up with a
>      > term limited to internetwork-level datagra packet switches, and 'router' was
>      > picked.
>      >
>      >
>      > I don't know if that change post-dated the creation of the IETF or not. I
>      > remember such large-scale questions (i.e. not within the purview of a WG,
>      > after Phill set up the WG structure) were often discussed on the main IETF
>      > mailing list, so if we still have the email archive from the start of that
>      > list, someone can dig into it.
>      >
>      > I remember that before the IETF existed, there was an email list (I think
>      > hosted at CNRI maybe, although CNRI didn't exist until 1986 - Jon's minutes
>      > of TCP/IP meetings stop at the end of 1980) where a lot of early TCP
>      > internetworking discussions ('TCP internetworking' since there must have been
>      > PUP internetworking discussions, too, inside Xerox) happened. Does anyone
>      > remember what it was called?
>      >
>      > Any technical history of the creation of TCP internetting would _really_
>      > benefit from having access to that email archive (if it still exists
>      > somewhere; if not, maybe it would be possible to re-create it by picking
>      > through preserved emailboxes; or perhaps someone who printed out all their
>      > email still has those printouts).
>      >
>      > I feel sadly wary that a lot of our earliest history has been lost (since we
>      > didn't use physical memos, which many technical histories depend on for 'nuts
>      > and bolts' primary sources) - except for the copy stored in 'meat' CPUs (who
>      > will soon start dying off - historians take note, and act now, while you can).
>      >
>      >       Noel
>     -- 
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