WEBVTT - Happy Fathers of the Internet Day 0:00:00.280 --> 0:00:02.960 Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:08.880 It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With 0:00:08.960 --> 0:00:17.680 tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone, 0:00:17.720 --> 0:00:20.439 and welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulette 0:00:20.440 --> 0:00:22.480 and I'm an editor at how stuff works dot com. 0:00:22.520 --> 0:00:25.400 Sitting across from me as he always does during the 0:00:25.440 --> 0:00:29.320 recording of podcasts, as senior writer Jonathan Strickland, Hey there, 0:00:30.680 --> 0:00:33.400 and uh, do you remember that TV show? It was 0:00:33.440 --> 0:00:36.760 on many years ago? My two dads. I thought you 0:00:36.800 --> 0:00:39.479 were gonna say Punky Brewster, not that one. Yes, I 0:00:39.520 --> 0:00:42.120 do remember my two dads when they asked us if 0:00:42.159 --> 0:00:45.239 we wanted to do a Father's Day episode. We were 0:00:45.240 --> 0:00:47.680 trying to figure out how we could do something that 0:00:47.720 --> 0:00:50.199 related to tech stuff, and so Jonathan and I decided 0:00:50.600 --> 0:00:53.320 we wanted to talk about the fathers of the Internet. 0:00:53.800 --> 0:00:57.640 And as it turns out, there were two to some 0:00:58.240 --> 0:01:01.440 massive exponential power. We're going to be talking about a 0:01:01.520 --> 0:01:05.920 whole lot of fathers of the Internet because well, there 0:01:05.920 --> 0:01:10.080 were no two or one, or or seven people that 0:01:10.160 --> 0:01:12.840 were responsible for the Internet as we know it today. 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:15.200 There are tons and tons of people who worked on 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:19.840 different aspects of the Internet, right, Yes, this is uh, 0:01:19.880 --> 0:01:22.399 the Internet is a thing that grew out of the 0:01:22.440 --> 0:01:27.560 contributions of dozens and dozens of people. But really, in 0:01:27.640 --> 0:01:30.479 order to kind of narrow our our scope a bit, 0:01:31.080 --> 0:01:34.119 we thought we would really concentrate on our Pannet, which 0:01:34.120 --> 0:01:37.560 in itself is sometimes considered a father of the Internet 0:01:37.600 --> 0:01:40.959 because it's a predecessor of the Internet. It itself was 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:45.040 not the Internet. It was a It was, however, a 0:01:45.120 --> 0:01:50.680 network of computers, of of heterogeneous computers, so in other words, 0:01:50.680 --> 0:01:52.680 they were not all the same type of computer, which 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:56.480 was a big deal because, uh, prior to the Arpanet, 0:01:57.080 --> 0:02:01.080 there really there was really no way of of networking 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:05.520 together various different models of computers because they all had 0:02:05.560 --> 0:02:09.880 their own proprietary languages that they worked on, and one 0:02:09.960 --> 0:02:14.440 computer's systems was not necessarily compatible with any other computer 0:02:14.520 --> 0:02:19.800 system to the Internet. From arponnet, I am your father. 0:02:20.400 --> 0:02:25.040 End of line. Um, yeah, that's true, it's not possible. 0:02:25.720 --> 0:02:30.800 Well anyway, that and whole that end. Uh, the quote 0:02:30.800 --> 0:02:35.320 I know is not exactly accurate, but because someone will 0:02:35.360 --> 0:02:39.000 write in um, yeah, that that was the big thing, 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:44.040 And there is a myth, if you will, that the 0:02:44.160 --> 0:02:48.400 Arpanet was designed by the United States government to create 0:02:48.440 --> 0:02:52.680 a defense network or a network to share information between 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:58.359 different parts of the defense network real life meat space 0:02:58.440 --> 0:03:02.200 network UM sharing for nation in the event of a 0:03:02.240 --> 0:03:06.480 catastrophic attack of some sort two ferry information from one 0:03:06.919 --> 0:03:10.520 group to another. And that's not exactly true, although hey, 0:03:10.560 --> 0:03:14.320 it is a nice reason. UM the government. Different parts 0:03:14.320 --> 0:03:16.840 of the government were at that time looking for ways 0:03:16.880 --> 0:03:21.760 to share information between computers, and so were UM different 0:03:21.880 --> 0:03:26.360 parts of UH university networks. And those were really that 0:03:26.480 --> 0:03:30.120 the two UH types of organizations that were really interested 0:03:30.160 --> 0:03:32.520 in networking computers back in those days. But they all 0:03:32.600 --> 0:03:35.600 had UM. If you are a regular tech stuff listener, 0:03:35.840 --> 0:03:39.040 you know that all these different kinds of machines back 0:03:39.080 --> 0:03:44.080 then were really very proprietary. You didn't have UM. You know, 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:48.840 you didn't have a system UH where you made computers, 0:03:48.880 --> 0:03:50.800 and they would all run the same operating system like 0:03:50.840 --> 0:03:55.720 you do now with Windows or for example, or Linux. UM. 0:03:55.760 --> 0:03:58.680 Even IBM systems. I'm sure you know the system three 0:03:58.800 --> 0:04:01.920 sixty would run in a different operating system than a 0:04:01.960 --> 0:04:05.320 different kind of IBM computer because it was designed to 0:04:05.400 --> 0:04:10.080 run on on that specific machine. And of course you 0:04:10.160 --> 0:04:13.320 had dozens and dozens of different computer manufacturers on making 0:04:13.360 --> 0:04:17.039 these machines. So you know, you had the problem of 0:04:17.040 --> 0:04:21.640 trying to communicate between UH one and another, so you 0:04:21.720 --> 0:04:24.559 needed a protocol that would bridge the gap. Yea. So 0:04:24.839 --> 0:04:26.919 let's take some steps back before we get into the 0:04:26.920 --> 0:04:29.400 development of that actual protocol, because I think the journey 0:04:29.440 --> 0:04:31.560 there is pretty interesting. Oh yeah, I just wanted to 0:04:31.600 --> 0:04:34.000 say that if you were going to network these machines, 0:04:34.200 --> 0:04:36.279 which was the goal, that would that would be one 0:04:36.320 --> 0:04:38.159 of the things you have to do. So in fact, 0:04:38.279 --> 0:04:41.320 the one of the first people to sort of envision 0:04:43.120 --> 0:04:47.600 something that that kind of encapsulates what the Internet is, 0:04:47.680 --> 0:04:52.000 but in a in a smaller way. Is h Venever Bush? 0:04:52.480 --> 0:04:56.480 I s. Yes. He was a very important fellow in 0:04:56.520 --> 0:05:00.800 the United States history. He worked on the Manhattan probably ject, yes, 0:05:01.200 --> 0:05:03.880 which we've talked about before. That was the project where 0:05:04.480 --> 0:05:06.200 for a few beads we were able to build an 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:10.000 entire city. Wait, no, I'm thinking of something else. Yes, 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:14.120 yes you are that was that was actually Manhattan. Yeah. Uh. 0:05:14.640 --> 0:05:19.719 Bush was very involved with the Defense Department in during 0:05:19.880 --> 0:05:23.640 during World War Two. UM a very very smart guy 0:05:24.200 --> 0:05:27.400 and uh he helped with a Manhattan project as well 0:05:27.440 --> 0:05:30.360 as as other projects. UM and one of the things 0:05:30.360 --> 0:05:32.040 he really wanted to do, and you can read about 0:05:32.080 --> 0:05:34.120 this in an article in the Atlantic. It's still up 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:37.880 on the website called as We May Think. Yep, he um. 0:05:37.920 --> 0:05:40.600 He came up with well, he was a founder of Raytheon, 0:05:41.360 --> 0:05:43.920 and he came up with this idea he called microwaves, 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:47.479 he called memes and memeics. In his mind, it was 0:05:47.520 --> 0:05:50.760 going to be a micro film based machine, because that 0:05:50.880 --> 0:05:53.960 was sort of the epitome of the technology at the time, 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:56.520 and the idea being that he would have a database 0:05:56.600 --> 0:06:00.520 of all the information that he would ever need, an 0:06:00.680 --> 0:06:03.720 entire library of information, and also that he could create 0:06:03.800 --> 0:06:06.360 information on this system, and that he would be able 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:10.040 to access this information in a very natural way because 0:06:10.080 --> 0:06:14.760 the system itself would mimic the way people think. So 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:17.840 this was kind of a or not maybe not even 0:06:17.920 --> 0:06:20.920 mimic compliment, perhaps will say, complement the way humans think. 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:24.559 So that way, when you search for something, it would 0:06:24.560 --> 0:06:28.040 be able to bring back the relevant information to you 0:06:28.160 --> 0:06:30.520 and not just any information that just happened to have 0:06:31.200 --> 0:06:33.280 that term in it. We you know, we talked about 0:06:33.279 --> 0:06:38.560 this in our our episodes about semantic web and artificial intelligence. 0:06:38.640 --> 0:06:42.080 Is this whole idea of contextual information that a machine 0:06:42.160 --> 0:06:44.320 might be able to recognize. Now, this was something that 0:06:44.360 --> 0:06:46.760 he was just sort of theorizing about, but it was 0:06:46.800 --> 0:06:50.800 a very important element of what would go into our 0:06:50.880 --> 0:06:54.200 bonnet and the Internet. Now, the next person I would 0:06:54.200 --> 0:06:59.279 talk about besides Bush is Joseph Carl Robnett Lick Lighter 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:04.880 or j c. R or Lick to his friends. Um, 0:07:04.880 --> 0:07:09.600 it's it's funny because I've read a paper that Lick wrote. Um, 0:07:10.080 --> 0:07:14.160 and uh that why. I don't want to get too 0:07:14.200 --> 0:07:17.920 far ahead of where Jonathan's going with this, but um 0:07:18.080 --> 0:07:21.120 he if you think, well that this this machine, this 0:07:21.360 --> 0:07:25.520 memics um would be able to call up any basically 0:07:25.520 --> 0:07:28.520 you would you would take a document and take a 0:07:28.520 --> 0:07:30.720 photo of it and create a microfilm from that and 0:07:30.760 --> 0:07:34.440 store it. Because you know, computers back then we're huge. 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:38.920 They weren't um reliable like they are now. They were giant. Um, 0:07:38.960 --> 0:07:41.120 so that was kind of impractical, and so are a 0:07:41.200 --> 0:07:44.040 large cabinets full of paper. So that was kind of 0:07:44.040 --> 0:07:46.320 the idea was, Hey, I'll shrink this down into his 0:07:46.360 --> 0:07:48.000 size where I could just keep it in a desk 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:52.240 and find stuff. Um. Well, and you say, wow, that 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:55.640 that's remarkably like the Internet. Well, in a way, yes 0:07:55.720 --> 0:07:58.640 it is, but it's also not that remarkable because Lick 0:07:58.760 --> 0:08:01.800 has said or um, of course I read this a 0:08:01.840 --> 0:08:04.120 long time ago, but I remember him saying in this, 0:08:04.400 --> 0:08:09.320 uh this article that it's not an accident that the 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:15.160 Internet sort of mimics the memics. It's the idea was 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:17.600 so compelling to the early founders of the Internet, and 0:08:17.600 --> 0:08:21.320 they said, we like this, Let's try to make this 0:08:21.400 --> 0:08:24.240 happen with the technology. We have to change it from 0:08:24.280 --> 0:08:27.880 theory to reality. Yeah. Yeah, So it's it's not completely 0:08:27.920 --> 0:08:32.560 an accident that what the memics. Um, the concept of 0:08:32.559 --> 0:08:35.360 the memetics is very much like a computer attached to 0:08:35.440 --> 0:08:38.480 the Internet and being able to pull up information. And 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:43.840 so lit he was working in back in nineteen sixty two. 0:08:44.559 --> 0:08:48.480 He was working at Bolt Baroneck Newman Newman, which is 0:08:48.640 --> 0:08:51.720 also better known as BBN. That's going to come up 0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:53.720 again in a little bit, yes it will. He worked 0:08:53.720 --> 0:08:56.120 for bb IN and then came up with an idea 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:01.080 called he was calling the Intergalactic Computer Network because why 0:09:01.280 --> 0:09:04.840 think small, And this was the idea of being able 0:09:04.880 --> 0:09:07.600 to network computers together so that you are able to 0:09:07.640 --> 0:09:11.720 share information between machines in a very efficient way because 0:09:12.120 --> 0:09:16.200 you know, the the challenge was that you had all 0:09:16.240 --> 0:09:19.760 these really smart people working on at the time, very 0:09:19.760 --> 0:09:24.600 sophisticated machinery, but all of their work was siloed. All 0:09:24.640 --> 0:09:29.320 of that work was contained within the physical building that 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:31.720 that machine was in. Yeah, if you want to share that, 0:09:31.800 --> 0:09:34.280 that means you have to box that up and send 0:09:34.280 --> 0:09:37.120 it or or you had to go and use it. 0:09:37.200 --> 0:09:39.440 You had to you had to yourself plan a trip 0:09:39.520 --> 0:09:43.160 out to wherever that machine was and share information that way. 0:09:43.200 --> 0:09:46.680 There was no way of sending it electronically at all, 0:09:47.320 --> 0:09:50.679 and so you could call somebody and read it to them, 0:09:50.679 --> 0:09:55.520 but that's still that's electronic still. But the Intergalactic Computer 0:09:55.559 --> 0:09:57.640 Network was this idea that you would be able to 0:09:57.679 --> 0:10:01.959 actually have computers communicate with one an they're in share information. Well, 0:10:02.000 --> 0:10:05.880 he became the head of Computer Research Program at the 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:11.160 Advanced Research Projects Agency which is ARPA, and he became 0:10:11.200 --> 0:10:12.920 the head of that in nineteen sixty three and he 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:17.800 began he renamed the Computer Research Program the Information Processing 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:22.360 Techniques Office or i p t o IP two and 0:10:22.520 --> 0:10:26.880 um UH. The Advanced Research Projects Agency is now known 0:10:26.920 --> 0:10:30.840 as DARPA. We added a d on that UM and 0:10:30.920 --> 0:10:34.200 it's part of the Department of Defense, which is where 0:10:34.240 --> 0:10:38.720 that whole concept of they wanted to create a network 0:10:38.800 --> 0:10:43.600 that could withstand a catastrophic failure UM sort of came from. 0:10:43.640 --> 0:10:47.040 And it came from because there were there were movements 0:10:47.040 --> 0:10:49.360 within the United States government to try and create something 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:51.400 like that, but that was not the purpose of ARPA 0:10:51.480 --> 0:10:57.160 net Um, which would grow out of link Lighters projects 0:10:57.520 --> 0:11:00.800 now link later to Liqui liquid It or rather taught 0:11:00.840 --> 0:11:04.720 to several other people and kind of talked about his 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:08.240 his concept of this interglad to computer network and got 0:11:08.240 --> 0:11:10.560 them really excited and they sort of jumped on board 0:11:10.880 --> 0:11:14.920 and also helped champion the cause and get UH funding 0:11:14.960 --> 0:11:19.720 money and partnerships with various research institutions to agree to 0:11:19.800 --> 0:11:22.640 try and make this become a reality. A couple of 0:11:22.640 --> 0:11:28.880 those people include Ivan Sutherland, who was another is another 0:11:28.960 --> 0:11:33.080 really remarkable guy in computer science history because not only 0:11:33.200 --> 0:11:37.600 was he part of trying to get this network off 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:42.400 the ground, he also invented sketch Pad, which was an 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:46.480 early graphical user interface sort of the predecessor to things 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:49.040 like Windows and the Mac operating system and really any 0:11:49.080 --> 0:11:52.600 operating system on any touch device kind of has. You know, 0:11:52.679 --> 0:11:54.120 you have to go all the way back to Sutherland 0:11:54.160 --> 0:11:56.680 to thank him for his work. He also was a 0:11:56.679 --> 0:11:59.920 pioneer in computer graphics. He was a pioneer in augment 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:05.319 a reality, in virtual reality, so he was It's interesting 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:10.560 because his his focuses were on its folk. I we're 0:12:10.640 --> 0:12:15.760 on a different area of computer science than network technology, 0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:17.800 but he was still very much interested in this. He 0:12:17.840 --> 0:12:20.120 became the director of I p t O in nineteen 0:12:20.160 --> 0:12:23.760 sixty four after lick Lighter left the program, so lick 0:12:23.840 --> 0:12:28.640 Lighter leaves before Arpanette begins. Another person that lick Lighter 0:12:28.679 --> 0:12:32.200 taught to and got interested in this idea was Bob Taylor, 0:12:32.880 --> 0:12:35.520 and Bob Taylor became the director of I P t 0:12:35.679 --> 0:12:39.560 O from nineteen sixty five to nineteen sixty nine, and 0:12:39.760 --> 0:12:42.600 he was the one who actually sent out the request 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:47.360 for quotation the r f Q for building out our 0:12:47.400 --> 0:12:49.800 Pinett And this was the project where they wanted to 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:54.280 connect multiple computers together through a network and create the 0:12:54.360 --> 0:12:57.920 infrastructure that would make that possible. Now, this infrastructure would 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:02.199 have to be able to work of various different kinds 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:05.160 of computers and send information between them so that the 0:13:05.160 --> 0:13:08.320 different computers could understand what they were. Each one was 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:11.319 saying because, like we had said before, these computers were 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:15.480 working on proprietary operating systems that were not compatible. So 0:13:16.080 --> 0:13:19.440 they send out this request for quotation to one hundred 0:13:19.520 --> 0:13:25.000 and forty bidders. Now, most of the companies and research 0:13:25.040 --> 0:13:30.160 institutions that received these h r f q s thought 0:13:30.200 --> 0:13:35.640 that the whole idea was just too difficult, outlandish, impossible, 0:13:36.160 --> 0:13:39.480 just not practical at all. There were quite a few 0:13:39.520 --> 0:13:42.920 of them probably said why, Yeah, so they want to 0:13:42.960 --> 0:13:46.120 do exactly there were some that did say why. They 0:13:46.160 --> 0:13:51.120 received responses from twelve of the one and forty bids 0:13:51.120 --> 0:13:54.320 they sent out requests for bids uh and out of 0:13:54.320 --> 0:13:59.520 the twelve, four of them were considered viable by our PA, 0:13:59.760 --> 0:14:03.800 And it ultimately went down to a couple of different candidates, 0:14:03.880 --> 0:14:06.200 and the one that stepped down in the end was 0:14:07.040 --> 0:14:11.520 bb N, which was awarded the bid on April seventh, 0:14:11.720 --> 0:14:15.480 nineteen sixty nine. Yeah, they're they're a very interesting company 0:14:15.520 --> 0:14:18.000 to don't want to get into too much depth, but 0:14:18.040 --> 0:14:20.600 they're sort of I think there's sort of raytheon like 0:14:20.800 --> 0:14:24.800 in that they have done all kinds of different engineering 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:29.120 projects over the years, and I always associated them with 0:14:29.400 --> 0:14:31.960 computing in the Internet, but they their history goes back 0:14:32.080 --> 0:14:35.240 quite a ways. UM, and they did they they have 0:14:35.360 --> 0:14:39.400 done much much more than just participate in this pro project. 0:14:40.000 --> 0:14:42.240 But they were certainly well suited because they were were 0:14:42.680 --> 0:14:49.400 UM electrical engineering experts. Certainly and UH Taylor left I 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:54.240 p t O because of the Vietnam War actually, and 0:14:55.240 --> 0:15:00.360 Lawrence Larry G. Roberts stepped in and he was program 0:15:00.400 --> 0:15:02.800 manager and office director at Areva before he became the 0:15:02.800 --> 0:15:06.440 director of I p t O. And UH he was 0:15:06.760 --> 0:15:11.960 someone who had who was leading a team within this, UH, 0:15:12.080 --> 0:15:15.680 this department within I p t O that was working 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:19.840 on packet switching. Now, packet switching is something that was 0:15:19.920 --> 0:15:25.240 being worked on by various individuals throughout the entire world independently. 0:15:25.560 --> 0:15:27.880 So this was not necessarily When when I say that 0:15:28.000 --> 0:15:32.200 Larry Roberts and his team worked on packet switching, this 0:15:32.280 --> 0:15:35.480 is not where packet switching necessarily just comes from. There 0:15:35.560 --> 0:15:39.240 was a a pioneer in packet switching called Paul Baron 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:42.280 who was very much working on this, as well as 0:15:42.320 --> 0:15:46.080 another person in the UK named Donald Davies Yes. UM 0:15:46.160 --> 0:15:50.240 also Leonard Kleinrock Yes who ended up working with our 0:15:50.320 --> 0:15:53.440 pannette through u c l A because u c l 0:15:53.480 --> 0:15:56.280 A was the University of California at Los Angeles was 0:15:56.440 --> 0:16:00.440 one of the research facilities one of the universities that 0:16:00.600 --> 0:16:04.440 became part of the initial Arpanet project, and so klein 0:16:04.560 --> 0:16:08.200 Rock began to work through our pa net, not directly 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:11.400 from ARPA itself, but through u c l A. Yeah, 0:16:11.480 --> 0:16:14.440 the three those three guys are are known really for 0:16:14.760 --> 0:16:18.960 creating the packet switching part of the Internet, the concept 0:16:19.040 --> 0:16:21.840 behind packet switching on the Internet, the way it's done. 0:16:22.440 --> 0:16:25.280 Um and uh actually have a quick overview of packet 0:16:25.320 --> 0:16:27.880 switching again. UM, well, I was going to get to 0:16:27.880 --> 0:16:31.240 that in just a second. Um. Actually is a very uh, 0:16:31.600 --> 0:16:37.040 very diverse team. Baron actually came from from Poland. Um 0:16:37.480 --> 0:16:39.800 and Uh it's actually now in Belarus, but at the 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:43.120 time it was in Poland. And Um, he he had 0:16:43.120 --> 0:16:47.360 an idea of a network. Now there there's several different 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:52.080 kinds of networks. Um. Obviously, you can have one computer 0:16:52.360 --> 0:16:55.720 in the center to which other machines connect, which is 0:16:55.800 --> 0:16:58.200 known as a centralized network. And then you can have 0:16:58.320 --> 0:17:02.400 a decentralized network. Um. If you think about I think 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:06.520 Napster kind of used that concept. We have multiple servers, 0:17:06.640 --> 0:17:10.240 but the machines connect to those main computers, which are 0:17:10.280 --> 0:17:14.200 in turn connected to a main main computer. UM. Or 0:17:14.240 --> 0:17:17.720 you know, there are many important computers and lesser computers 0:17:17.720 --> 0:17:22.159 connect to those, but those that's a decentralized network. UM. 0:17:22.200 --> 0:17:25.920 But uh, but Paul decided that what he should do 0:17:26.200 --> 0:17:28.600 is create a or what what you should use for 0:17:28.640 --> 0:17:33.800 this particular project is a distributed model. UM. And that's 0:17:33.840 --> 0:17:36.639 the way the the internet works. Uh. It's it's a 0:17:36.680 --> 0:17:42.320 network of networks and each computer has redundancies. UM. So 0:17:42.400 --> 0:17:44.760 what does that mean? So if we were using a 0:17:44.800 --> 0:17:49.320 decentralized network, um, and you sent an email to the 0:17:49.400 --> 0:17:51.960 net to the main computer that your computer was hooked 0:17:52.040 --> 0:17:56.280 up to, but that computer was down, your email wouldn't 0:17:56.280 --> 0:18:00.359 get where it's going. Um. In a distributed network, there 0:18:00.400 --> 0:18:03.800 are multiple routes that that email can go. So the 0:18:03.800 --> 0:18:05.880 computer that you were supposed to send it to is down, 0:18:06.680 --> 0:18:09.399 but there's another way to go. So it goes through 0:18:09.440 --> 0:18:12.399 that computer and then from there to another computer and 0:18:12.400 --> 0:18:16.800 it basically follows that path. Now. UM, what they realized, 0:18:17.080 --> 0:18:21.880 these guys were that this redundancy is good, but they 0:18:22.359 --> 0:18:26.080 they're actually using redundancy of redundancies on the Internet, the 0:18:26.160 --> 0:18:29.680 network of networks and said, okay, well, uh, it would 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:32.119 be kind of cumbersome to send this all as one file. 0:18:32.520 --> 0:18:34.080 And if we send it all is one file and 0:18:34.400 --> 0:18:36.679 it gets bogged down in the direction it was supposed 0:18:36.720 --> 0:18:39.159 to go, it's not going to get there. So they 0:18:39.200 --> 0:18:43.440 broke it into pieces called which they decided to call packets. 0:18:43.480 --> 0:18:47.879 And um, each packet is represented more than once. So 0:18:47.960 --> 0:18:50.600 let's say, just for the sake of convenience, that you 0:18:50.640 --> 0:18:53.680 send an email and that's broken down into ten packets. Um. 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:59.359 Those ten packets are sent to multiple locations or through 0:18:59.480 --> 0:19:03.880 multiple locations to get to the end point. And one 0:19:03.880 --> 0:19:06.480 way or another, those ten packets are supposed to reach 0:19:06.520 --> 0:19:08.760 there and be reassembled on the other end in the 0:19:08.800 --> 0:19:14.680 correct order to complete the transmission. So the packets, uh, 0:19:14.840 --> 0:19:16.680 you know, if if one of those computers is down, 0:19:16.720 --> 0:19:20.200 let's say, and packets three and seven are lost, they 0:19:20.200 --> 0:19:24.280 have also been sent to other computers in the path, 0:19:24.760 --> 0:19:28.320 and they will be reassembled in the correct order. Um. 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:32.600 And using using that method, Uh, packet switching has become 0:19:32.640 --> 0:19:35.520 the way we send information over the Internet, and that 0:19:35.560 --> 0:19:39.600 goes for tiny little files to great big chunks. So 0:19:39.960 --> 0:19:44.840 Larry Roberts had decided that this packet switching technology, which 0:19:44.920 --> 0:19:49.240 had was in its infancy at this point, was probably 0:19:49.240 --> 0:19:51.680 the best way to go when you're talking about having 0:19:51.720 --> 0:19:55.400 a networked series of computers and you want to get 0:19:55.400 --> 0:19:59.520 this information from one to another. UM and so that's 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:02.480 kind of the direction that the team went in. And 0:20:02.920 --> 0:20:07.439 also the folks at the various institutions where the computers 0:20:07.440 --> 0:20:10.040 that were going to be connected together, uh, they also 0:20:10.160 --> 0:20:13.239 were working on this along with the folks over at 0:20:13.240 --> 0:20:16.120 our path. So let's, uh, let's let's talk a little 0:20:16.160 --> 0:20:19.640 bit more about where these computers were. There. There were 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:24.040 four initial host computers for our pannett. All right, these 0:20:24.080 --> 0:20:27.040 four hosts were the four computers that were going to 0:20:27.119 --> 0:20:30.399 be connected together. One was at u C l A 0:20:31.080 --> 0:20:33.600 and it was the University of California at Los Angeles. 0:20:34.320 --> 0:20:38.439 It was an s D S Sigma seven computer running 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:43.439 the Sigma Experimental operating System. Uh. Then you had the 0:20:43.560 --> 0:20:50.359 University of California's color Fried Interactive Mathematics Center, which had 0:20:50.400 --> 0:20:53.879 an IBM three sixty slash seventy five running on the 0:20:54.040 --> 0:20:58.000 O S slash m VT operating system. You had the 0:20:58.119 --> 0:21:01.440 University of Utah, which had the d e C p 0:21:01.640 --> 0:21:06.359 DP ten computer with the with the ten X operating system, 0:21:06.640 --> 0:21:10.560 the old Deck machines. And then you had Stanford Research 0:21:10.600 --> 0:21:14.040 Institute and they had an SDS nine D computer which 0:21:14.119 --> 0:21:16.560 ran on the Genie operating system. So all four of 0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:19.239 these machines are different machines running different o s s. 0:21:19.480 --> 0:21:22.000 I'm sorry, did you mention that two of those machines 0:21:22.040 --> 0:21:24.040 were made by the same company yet they use completely 0:21:24.040 --> 0:21:28.200 different operating systems? No? I did not, and so then yes, 0:21:28.280 --> 0:21:30.400 but that is true. There are two two of them 0:21:30.400 --> 0:21:34.040 were made, Um, we're sts computers, but both of them 0:21:34.080 --> 0:21:37.680 were running different operating systems. So yeah, even the same 0:21:37.720 --> 0:21:40.359 company's machines wouldn't necessarily talk to each other in the 0:21:40.400 --> 0:21:43.040 same way. That's true. And so those were the those 0:21:43.080 --> 0:21:45.040 are the four institutes as well. So you've got u 0:21:45.040 --> 0:21:49.200 c l A, Stanford, University of California, and um, you've 0:21:49.200 --> 0:21:54.120 got the University of Utah. Uh. Now, the team over 0:21:54.320 --> 0:21:58.159 at our PA that was in charge of putting this together. Um, 0:21:58.200 --> 0:22:00.560 actually what happened was not really the team at Arbo, 0:22:00.680 --> 0:22:03.040 the team at BBN, because that was the company that 0:22:03.119 --> 0:22:07.040 won out the bid. The team at BBN consisted of 0:22:07.280 --> 0:22:11.320 Frank Hart who was the leader of the team, Dave Walden, 0:22:11.880 --> 0:22:16.040 who was a programmer and real time systems expert. You 0:22:16.119 --> 0:22:21.280 had Will Crowther who was another programmer. You had Bernie Cosell, 0:22:21.560 --> 0:22:24.000 who was a d bugger, so he was someone who 0:22:24.040 --> 0:22:26.640 would find all the stuff that's wrong with the programs 0:22:26.640 --> 0:22:31.960 that everyone else is making. You had, Yeah, you had 0:22:32.000 --> 0:22:35.560 Bob Cohn, was a computer theory expert and an error 0:22:35.560 --> 0:22:39.399 control specialist and also was the guy they went to 0:22:39.600 --> 0:22:42.280 when it came to how do we send data across 0:22:42.320 --> 0:22:46.119 telephone lines? That was kind of his master network protocols. 0:22:46.880 --> 0:22:52.040 You had several Orne Stein who was a hardware specialist UM, 0:22:52.119 --> 0:22:54.000 and you had another hardware engineer by the name of 0:22:54.040 --> 0:22:56.840 Ben Barker who joined the team a little bit after 0:22:56.880 --> 0:23:02.040 the initial UH team got together, and Uh, I think 0:23:02.080 --> 0:23:04.399 that's everybody. I think I got everyone who was on 0:23:04.440 --> 0:23:10.439 the that initial team. Now, the approach they made was 0:23:10.520 --> 0:23:12.800 kind of interesting. You know, how do you create this 0:23:12.880 --> 0:23:16.919 network where these four computers that do not speak a 0:23:16.960 --> 0:23:19.720 common language, how can you get them to communicate with 0:23:19.760 --> 0:23:23.960 each other? And they came up with a hardware and 0:23:24.080 --> 0:23:28.679 software solution. So really it's a hardware and protocol solution. 0:23:29.240 --> 0:23:34.200 The hardware approach they took was to create interface message 0:23:34.520 --> 0:23:40.600 processors imps. YEP. A guy named Mike wing Wingfield actually 0:23:40.640 --> 0:23:42.840 came up with the the interface that would connect a 0:23:42.880 --> 0:23:47.080 computer to the IMP. Yeah. So these are these themselves 0:23:47.119 --> 0:23:50.200 are computers. These are but these were unlike now the 0:23:50.240 --> 0:23:53.520 computers that we're talking about at these these colleges were 0:23:53.560 --> 0:23:56.280 those enormous computers that you think of in the old 0:23:56.600 --> 0:23:59.520 you know, pictures from the sixties room full of computer. Now, 0:23:59.560 --> 0:24:05.320 the were comparatively speaking, much more simple than those. Yeah. 0:24:05.359 --> 0:24:08.720 I actually have a photo um from u c l 0:24:08.800 --> 0:24:11.560 A that shows uh Klein rock and a picture of 0:24:11.600 --> 0:24:15.919 an IMP, which I'm gonna show Jonathan. Um. It's it 0:24:16.000 --> 0:24:19.359 kind of looks like a stereo amplifier actually built into 0:24:19.359 --> 0:24:22.080 a wall. It's it's not it's not very exciting to 0:24:22.119 --> 0:24:25.560 look at, but very necessary. At these lights are blinking 0:24:25.560 --> 0:24:28.680 out of sequence. Will give them the blink in sequence. Yeah, 0:24:28.680 --> 0:24:31.560 it's it's definitely a Star Trek computer. Yeah, or stuff 0:24:31.600 --> 0:24:37.080 blink stuff what blinks? And Yeah. So the the imps 0:24:37.160 --> 0:24:40.479 were designed to be the go between. They're actually kind 0:24:40.480 --> 0:24:43.879 of like routers. There were gateways is what they were. Yeah, 0:24:43.920 --> 0:24:48.879 and you connected these physically to the host machines with 0:24:48.960 --> 0:24:53.960