I would like to read about the initial proposals, email exchanges, discussions, about why any specific technology or protocol was built, who all were involved - designer, funders, contributors, etc.
History, timeline, discussions, proposals - accepted & rejected, ideas - accepted & rejected, philosophy, restrictions.
In general I would like to read about all the technologies, but want to start with the internet and the TCP stack (protocols).
Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
1–10 of 74 posts
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#2IETF might be a place to start, https://ietf.org/standards/
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#3Here is an overview from the people who created it:
https://www.internetsociety.org/internet/history-internet/br...
An internet timeline, 1957 -- 2017:
https://www.zakon.org/robert/internet/timeline/
The recent article linked here reviews some of the important early papers about the Internet and alternatives:
http://named-data.net/publications/main/
A History of the ARPANET: The First Decade, Report no. 4799, Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc.
http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a115440.pdf
The Wikipedia article on Arpanet has many many links to its technical and political history.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARPANET
The Arpanet was the immediate predecessor of the Internet, and was built and operated by many of the same people. Arpanet did not use the TCP protocol, but experience with Arpanet very much informed the design of TCP.
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#4Then if you really want to get into the details you could
begin working through the RFCs:
https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc-index.html
in contrast to this, a brief and lively history is the book Where Wizards Stay Up Late by Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon.
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#5Perhaps not exactly what you're looking for, but from a historical perspective The Cuckoo's Egg does a wonderful job of capturing what the state of networking was in the late 1980's
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#6Perhaps not exactly what you're looking for, but from a historical perspective The Cuckoo's Egg does a wonderful job of capturing what the state of networking was in the late 1980's
Definitely highly recommend! Also check out what Clifford (if I remember his name correctly) is up to these days! He sells Klein bottles and builds little robots to help him. Definitely someone I want to be when I grow up haha.
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#7Then if you really want to get into the details you could begin working through the RFCs: https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc-index.html in contrast to this, a brief and lively history is the book Where Wizards Stay Up Late by Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon.
https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1118.txt is one such historical record.
Implementing something like DNS, however, requires jumping between multiple documents and understanding what's deprecated and extended by each.
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#8Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet
By Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0684832674
--
I read the Audiobook version of this book. It presents a narrative of the development of the very early stages of the internet. I enjoyed it. I think it would also have been fine in print or ebook formats. It is not too long and seems to present the events in a mostly linear fashion.
You'll get a great overview of the names, organizations, and machines that were used in this period.
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#9I know you said read but I found the Internet History Podcast very enlightening and fun to listen to: https://pca.st/miqr
Re: Ask HN: Where can one learn about the history of the internet and the protocols?
#10Try Kurose's "Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach". The points you mention are not the focus of the book but get touched on the way, plus it's extremely accessible. I vividly remember reading it as a CS student and being happy that I finally reached a satisfactory level of understanding on the topic.