Landweber’s
proposal has many enthusiastic reviewers. At an NSF-sponsored
workshop, the idea is revised in a way that both wins approval and
opens up a new epoch for NSF itself. The revised proposal includes
many more universities. It proposes a three-tiered structure
involving ARPANET, a TELENET-based system, and an e-mail only
service called PhoneNet. Gateways connect the tiers into a seamless
whole. This brings the cost of a site within the reach of the
smallest universities. Moreover, NSF agrees to manage CSNET for two
years, after which it will turn it over to the University
Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR), which is made up of
more than 50 academic institutions.

The
National Science Board approves the new plan and funds it for five
years at a cost of $5 million. Since the protocols for
interconnecting the subnets of CSNET include TCP/IP, NSF becomes an
early supporter of the Internet.

NASA has
ARPANET nodes, as do many Department of Energy (DOE) sites. Now
several Federal agencies support the Internet, and the number is
growing.

Research
by David Patterson at Berkeley and John Hennessy at Stanford
promotes ‘reduced instruction set’ computing. IBM selects the disk
operating system DOS, developed by Microsoft, to operate its planned
PC.

Osborne

IBM
PC

By the beginning
of the year, more than 200 computers in dozens of institutions have
been connected in CSNET. BITNET, another startup network, is based
on protocols that include file transfer via e-mail rather than by
the FTP procedure of the ARPA protocols.

The
Internet Working Group of DARPA publishes a plan for the transition
of the entire network from the Network Control Protocol to the
TCP/IP protocols developed since 1974 and already in wide use (RFC
801).

At
Berkeley, Bill Joy incorporates the new TCP/IP suite into the next
release of the Unix operating system. The first ‘portable’ computer
is launched in the form of the Osborne, a 24-pound suitcase-sized
device.

The IBM
PC is launched in August 1981.

Meanwhile, Japan
mounts a successful challenge to US chip makers by producing 64-kbit
chips so inexpensively that U.S. competitors charge the chips are
being ‘dumped’ on the U.S.
market.

Cover from
the manual for Snipes

Time magazine
names ‘the computer’ its ‘Man of the Year.’ Cray Research announces
plans to market the Cray X-MP system in place of the Cray-1. At the
other end of the scale, the IBM PC ‘clones’ begin appearing.

An NSF
panel chaired by the Courant Institute’s Peter Lax reports that U.S.
scientists lack access to supercomputers. It contains the testimony
of University of Illinois astrophysicist Larry Smarr that members of
his discipline have been forced to travel to Germany to use
American-made supercomputers.

The
period during which ad hoc networking systems have flourished has
left TCP/IP as only one contender for the title of ‘standard.’
Indeed, the International Organization for Standards (ISO) has
written and is pushing ahead with a ‘reference’ model of an
interconnection standard called Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) —
already adopted in preliminary form for interconnecting DEC
equipment. But while OSI is a standard existing for the most part on
paper, the combination of TCP/IP and the local area networks created
with Ethernet technology are driving the expansion of the living
Internet.

Drew
Major and Kyle Powell write Snipes, an action game to be played on
PC’s over the network. They package the game as a ‘demo’ for a PC
software product from SuperSet Software, Inc. This is the beginning
of Novell.

Digital
Communications Associates introduces the first coaxial cable
interface for micro-to-mainframe
communications.

Internet
Topographic Map, 1983

Apollo
Workstation

In January, the
ARPANET standardizes on the TCP/IP protocols adopted by the
Department of Defense (DOD). The Defense Communications Agency
decides to split the network into a public ‘ARPANET’ and a
classified ‘MILNET, ‘ with only 45 hosts remaining on the ARPANET.
Jon Postel issues an RFC assigning numbers to the various
interconnected nets. Barry Leiner takes Vint Cerf’s place at DARPA,
managing the Internet.

Numbering
the Internet hosts and keeping tabs on the host names simply fails
to scale with the growth of the Internet. In November, Jon Postel
and Paul Mockapetris of USC/ISI and Craig Partridge of BBN develop
the Domain Name System (DNS) and recommend the use of the now
familiar [email-masked] addressing system.

The
number of computers connected via these hosts is much larger, and
the growth is accelerating with the commercialization of
Ethernet.

Having
incorporated TCP/IP into Berkeley Unix, Bill Joy is key to the
formation of Sun Microsystems. Sun develops workstations that ship
with Berkeley Unix and feature built-in networking. At the same
time, the Apollo workstations ship with a special version of a token
ring network.

In July
1983, an NSF working group, chaired by Kent Curtis, issues a plan
for ‘A National Computing Environment for Academic Research’ to
remedy the problems noted in the Lax report. Congressional hearings
result in advice to NSF to undertake an even more ambitious plan to
make supercomputers available to US
scientists.

In January, Apple
announces the Macintosh. Its user-friendly interface swells the
ranks of new computer users.

Novelist
William Gibson coins the term cyberspace in Neuromancer, a book that
adds a new genre to science fiction and fantasy.

The newly
developed DNS is introduced across the Internet, with the now
familiar domains of .gov, .mil, .edu, .org, .net, and .com. A domain
called .int, for international entities, is not much used. Instead,
hosts in other countries take a two-letter domain indicating the
country. The British JANET explicitly announces its intention to
serve the nation’s higher education community, regardless of
discipline.

Most
important for the Internet, NSF issues a request for proposals to
establish supercomputer centers that will provide access to the
entire U.S. research community, regardless of discipline and
location. A new division of Advanced Scientific Computing is created
with a budget of $200 million over five years.

Datapoint, the
first company to offer networked computers, continues in the
marketplace, but fails to achieve critical
mass.

Computers
& Communications, by Dr. Koji Koyabashi

NSF announces the
award of five supercomputing center contracts:

Cornell Theory
Center (CTC), directed by Nobel laureate Ken Wilson;

The
John Von Neumann Center (JVNC) at Princeton, directed by
computational fluid dynamicist Steven Orszag;

The
National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), directed
at the University of Illinois by astrophysicist Larry Smarr;

The
Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center (PSC), sharing locations at
Westinghouse, the University of Pittsburgh, and Carnegie Mellon
University, directed by Michael Levine and Ralph Roskies;

The
San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC), on the campus of the
University of California, San Diego, and administered by the
General Atomics Company under the direction of nuclear engineer
Sid Karin.

By the
end of 1985, the number of hosts on the Internet (all TCP/IP
interconnected networks) has reached 2,000.

MIT
translates and publishes Computers and Communication by Dr. Koji
Koyabashi, the Chairman of NEC. Dr. Koyabashi, who joined NEC in
1929, articulates his clear vision of ‘C & C’, the integration
of computing and
communication.

Map of the
NSFNet Backbone

The 56Kbps
backbone between the NSF centers leads to the creation of a number
of regional feeder networks - JVNCNET, NYSERNET, SURANET, SDSCNET
and BARRNET - among others. With the backbone, these regionals start
to build a hub and spoke infrastructure. This growth in the number
of interconnected networks drives a major expansion in the community
including the DOE, DOD and NASA.

Between
the beginning of 1986 and the end of 1987 the number of networks
grows from 2,000 to nearly 30,000.

TCP/IP is
available on workstations and PCs such as the newly introduced
Compaq portable computer. Ethernet is becoming accepted for wiring
inside buildings and across campuses. Each of these developments
drives the introduction of terms such as bridging and routing and
the need for readily available information on TCP/IP in workshops
and manuals. Companies such as Proteon, Synoptics, Banyan,
Cabletron, Wellfleet, and Cisco emerge with products to feed this
explosion.

At the
same time, other parts of the U.S. Government and many of the
traditional computer vendors mount an attempt to validate their
products being built to the OSI theoretical specifications, in the
form of the Corporation for Open Systems.

USENET
starts a major shakeup which becomes known as the ‘Great Renaming’.
A driving force is that, as many messages are traveling over
ARPANET, desirable new news groups such as ‘alt.sex’ and ‘alt.drugs’
are not allowed.

Internet
Map, 1987

NSFNet
Map, 1987

The NSF, realizing
the rate and commercial significance of the growth of the Internet,
signs a cooperative agreement with Merit Networks which is assisted
by IBM and MCI. Rick Adams co-founds UUNET to provide commercial
access to UUCP and the USENET newsgroups, which are now available
for the PC. BITNET and CSNET also merge to form CREN.

The NSF
starts to implement its T1 backbone between the supercomputing
centers with 24 RT-PCs in parallel implemented by IBM as ‘parallel
routers’. The T1 idea is so successful that proposals for T3 speeds
in the backbone begin.

In early
1987 the number of hosts passes 10,000 and by year-end there have
been over 1,000 RFCs issued.

Network
management starts to become a major issue and it becomes clear that
a protocol is needed between routers to allow remote management.
SNMP is chosen as a simple, quick, near term solution.

NSFNet T-1
Backbone Map, 1988

NCAR
Network Map, 1987

The upgrade of the
NSFNET backbone to T1 completes and the Internet starts to become
more international with the connection of Canada, Denmark, Finland,
France, Iceland, Norway and Sweden.

In the US
more regionals spring up - Los Nettos and CERFnet both in
California. In addition, Fidonet, a popular traditional bulletin
board system (BBS) joins the net.

Dan Lynch
organizes the first Interop commercial conference in San Jose for
vendors whose TCP/IP products interoperate reliably. 50 companies
make the cut and 5,000 networkers come to see it all running, to see
what works, and to learn what doesn’t work.

The US
Government pronounces its OSI Profile (GOSIP) is to be supported in
all products purchased for government use, and states that TCP/IP is
an interim solution!

The
Morris WORM burrows on the Internet into 6,000 of the 60,000 hosts
now on the network. This is the first worm experience and DARPA
forms the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) to deal with
future such incidents.

Tim
Berners-Lee

Berners-Lee's diagram describing 'hypertext'

The number of
hosts increases from 80,000 in January to 130,000 in July to over
160,000 in November!

Australia,
Germany, Israel, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand and
the United Kingdom join the Internet.

Commercial e-mail
relays start between MCIMail through CNRI and Compuserve through
Ohio State. The Internet Architecture Board reorganizes again
reforming the IETF and the IRTF.

Networks
speed up. NSFNET T3 (45Mbps) nodes operate. At Interop 100Mbps LAN
technology, known as FDDI, interoperates among several vendors. The
telephone companies start to work on their own wide area packet
switching service at higher speeds - calling it SMDS.

Bob Kahn
and Vint Cerf at CNRI hold the first Gigabit (1000Mbps) Testbed
workshops with funding from ARPA and NSF. Over 600 people from a
wide range of industry, government and academia attend to discuss
the formation of 6 gigabit testbeds across the country.

The Cray
3, a direct descendant of the Cray line, starting from the CDC 6600,
is produced.

In
Switzerland at CERN Tim Berners-Lee addresses the issue of the
constant change in the currency of information and the turn-over of
people on projects. Instead of an hierarchical or keyword
organization, Berners-Lee proposes ‘Hypertext’, that will run across
distributed systems on different operating systems. Thus is born
what eventually becomes the World Wide
Web!

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