History of the Internet

1996-- Microsoft enters

12.8 Million hosts, 0.5 Million WWW sites. WWW browser war begins, fought between Netscape and Microsoft. Various ISPs suffer extended service outages.?

1971--People communicate over a network

15 nodes on ARPANET. Email invented- sending messages across a distributed network. Main inter-person communication on the internet today.

1997-- what's next?

19.5 Million hosts, 1 Million WWW sites, 71,618 newsgroups. Human error at Network Solutions causes DNS for .com and .net to become corrupted, making systems unreachable.

1986-- Power of Internet realised

5,000 hosts, 241 News groups. NSFNET created. Establishes 5 super-computing centers to provide high-computing power for all- allowed explosion of connections. Network news transfer protocol designed to enhance Usenet news performance over TCP/IP.

1995-- Commercialization continues

6.5 Million hosts, main US backbone traffic now routed through interconnected network providers. WWW surpasses ftp-data. Traditional online dial-up systems begin to provide Internet access.

1969--birth of Internet

ARPANET commissioned by DoD for research networking. First node at UCLA followed by nodes at Standard Research Institute, UCSB and U of Utah.

1876-- Telephone

Alexander Graham Bell Exhibits. Provide backbone of Internet connections today. Modems provide digital and audio conversions to allow computers to connect over the telephone network.

1858-1866-- Transatlantic cable

Allowed direct instantaneous communication across the Atlantic. Today, cables connect all continents and are stills main hub of telecommunications.

1981-- Things start to come together

BITNET "Because It's the NETwork". CSNET established to provide networking services to university scientists with no access to ARPANET.

1991-- Modernization begins

Commercial Internet eXchange Association, Inc. formed after NSF lifts restrictions on the commercial use of the Net. Pretty Good Privacy released by Phillip Zimmerman. Wide Area Information Servers provide a mechanism for indexing and accessing information on the Internet.

1979-- News groups born

Computer science department research network established in USA. USENET established using UUCP. A collection of discussions groups. Multiuser dungeon- interactive multiuser sites. ARPANET establishes the Internet configuration control board.

1982-- TCP/IP defines future communication

DCA and ARPA establishes the Transmission Control Protocol and Internet Protocol as the protocol suite, commonly known as TCP/IP, for ARPANET. One of the first definitions of an Internet as a connected set of networks.

1990-Expansion of Internet continues

Electronic Frontier Foundation founded by Mitch Kapor. 300,000 hosts, 1,000 news groups. ARPANET ceases to exist. Files can be searched and retrieved by name.

1999

First Internet Bank of Indiana, first full-service bank available only on the Net. IBM becomes the first corporate partner to be approved for Internet2 access.

1957-- USSR launches Sputnik

First artificial earth satellite. Start of global telecommunications. Satellites transmit all sorts of data today. US forms Advanced Research Projects Agency to establish US lead in science and technology applicable to the military.

1973-- Global networking becomes a reality

First intentional connections to the ARPANET: university college of London and Royal radar establishment. Ethernet-how local networks are connected. Internet ideas started. File transferred protocol specified.

1972-- Computers can connect more freely and easily

First public demonstration of ARPANET between 40 machines. Internetworking Working Group created to address need for establishing agreed upon protocols. Telnet still relevant means of inter-machine connection today.

1991-- Friendly user interface WWW established

Gopher released by Paul Linder and Mark P. McCahill from the U of Minnesota. Text-based, menu-driven interface to access internet resources. No need to remember complex computer command.

1988

Internet worm burrows through the net, affecting 6,000 of the 6,000 hosts on the Internet Computer Emergency Response Team formed by DARPA in response to the needs exhibited during the Morris worm incident. W

1962-1968--Packet-switching networks developed

Military origin; utmost security in transferring information of networks. Data splits into tiny packets may take different routes. Hard to eavesdrop on messages. Networks withstand large scale destruction.

1983-- Internet get better

Name server developed. Large number of nodes. Hard to remember exact paths. Use meaningful names instead. Desktop workstations come into being. Internet activities board established.

1994-- Commercialization begins

Number of 3 Million, 10,000 news groups. Local communities begin to use the Internet. Shopping malls and banks arrive on the Internet.

1987-- Commercialization of Internet born

Number of hosts 28,000. UUNET is founded with Usenix funds to provide commercial UUCP and Usenet access.

1992-- Multimedia changes the face of the Internet

Number of hosts break 1 million. News groups 4,000. Internet Society is chartered. First MBONE audio multicast and video multicast. "surfing the Internet" was coined.

1989-- Large growth of the Internet

Number of hosts breaks 100,000. First relays between a commercial electronic mail carrier mail carrier and the Internet. Internet Engineering Task Force and Internet Research Task Force comes into existence under the IAB.

1977-- Email takes off, Internet becomes a reality

Number of hosts breaks 100. THEORYNET provides electronic mail to over 100 researchers in computer science. Mail specification. First demonstration of ARPANET/packet radio net/SATNET operation of Internet protocols over gateways.

1984-- Growth of Internet continues

Number of hosts breaks, 1,000. Domain name server introduced. Joint Academic Network established the UK. Moderated newsgroups introduced on USENET.

1993-- WWW Revolution truly begins

Number of hosts is 2 Million. 600 WWW sites. InterNIC created by NSF to provide specific Internet services. Businesses and media notice the Internet. White House and United Nations come online.

1836- Telegraph

Revolutionized human telecommunications. Morse Code, series of dots and dashes.

1974-- Packets become mode of transfer

Transmission Control Program specified. Packet network Intercommunication-basis of Internet communication. Telnet opened, first public packet data service.

1998

US Department of Commerce releases the Green Paper outlining its plan to privatize DNS followed by White Paper. Networks Solutions registers 2millionth domain. Open source software comes of age.

2000

US timekeeper and a few other time services around the world report the new year. Massive denial of service attack is launched against major websites, including Yahoo, Amazon, and eBay. Web size estimates by NEC-RI and Inktomi surpass 1 billion indexable pages.

1976-- Networking comes to many

UUCP UNIX-UNIX CoPy. Developed at AT&T Bell Labs and distributed with UNIX. Main operating system used by universities and research establishments. Networking exposed to many users worldwide.

1991-- Most important development to date

World Wide Web released by CERN. Developed to provide a distributed hypermedia system. Access to any form of information. Initially non-graphic.