[Info-vax] An alternative history of computing

[chris]

On 07/28/21 02:50, David Jones wrote:
> On Monday, July 26, 2021 at 6:27:22 AM UTC-4, chris wrote:
>> Originally, all that was loosely based on an ISO model,
>> the sort of standards that DEC were great supporters
>> and contributors to at all levels, but really backed
>> themselves into a corner over decnet. An obscure set
>> of protocols and command set reminiscent of the sort of
>> serisl line and telco ideas dating back to the 1970's.
>> TCP/IP was faster, easier to visualise in design, to
>> program and above all, a completely open source and fixed
>> set of standards that anyone could use, improve and generally
>> contribute to.
>
> The TCP/IP standards were developed over decades, RFC superceding RFC.
> The RFC specifications often had gaps which results in conflicting implementations
> by different parties, usually resolved by adopting the interpretation of the one
> which has bigger presence in the rather limited ARPANET ecosystem.
>
>   Eventually it got reliable enough that  V.P. Gore proposed dropping the commerce
> restrictions.

That's a rather biased, one sided view. I was using tcp/ip in the late
1980's and by then, most if not all of the unix community had a common
set of networking standards that just worked out of the box and was 
reliable. Billion $ companies were created and thrived on it as well.
Even DEC had mips cpu based unix workstations and Ultrix ran on VAX,
mips and even pdpd11 hardware.

The RFC idea is still alive, as new standards emerge,but the core
networking standards were established very early and have changed
little over time.

As for Al Gore, yet another brain dead politician, though I understand
that he invented the internet over breakfast one morning?...