LIS 525 - History of the Internet

Origins

1794-1855	Chappe optical telegraph
1830	First practical electrical signal demonstrated
1844-	Morse's electric telegraph in use
1876-	Telephone
1891-	Mechanical switching
1927-	Transmission of television and color photographs by wire
1931-	Typewriter Exchange (TWX) service
1940-	Broadband services	More than one conversation can be carried on a single wire
1963-	All-electronic switching systems in use
1976-	Digital switches in use
1978-	U.S. telephone users may connect with any industry standard devices
1996-	Cable modems

Farley, T. 2006. Privateline.com Telephone History Page One http://www.privateline.com/TelephoneHistory/History1.htm. (First of a series, all on the same site.)
Holzmann, G.J.; Pehrson, B. 2003. The Early History of Data Networks. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley. DBW stack TK5115.H67 2003. (A detailed treatment of the history of the optical telegraph. An earlier version was formerly available on the Web.)

1642	Pascaline	Numerical wheel calculator
1694	Leibnitz's calculator	Could do multiplication
1822	Babbage's proposal for a Difference Engine	Stored programs and automatic printing of results
1874	QWERTY keyboard	Keyboard arrangement of the first commercial typewriter
1889	Hollerith cards	Storing census data on punch cards; the origin of IBM
1941	Z3	First computer.
1945-1956	First generation	Vacuum tube computers
1956-1963	Second generation	Transistorized computers
1964-1971	Third generation	Integrated circuits, operating systems
1971-	Fourth generation	Large-scale integration
1975	Altair 8800	Personal computer in kit form
1977	CP/M	First operating system for personal computers
1977	Apple II, Commodore PET, TRS-80	First affordable usable pre-assembled personal computers
1981	Xerox Star	First PC with a mouse and GUI
1981-	IBM PCs	Widely used personal workstations

Bush, V. 1945. "As We May Think". Atlantic Monthly. 176 (1): 101-108. http://www.press.umich.edu/jep/works/vbush/vbush.shtml (A classic paper often cited as a precursor of hypertext and other concepts.)
Lee, J.A.N. 2002. The History of Computing. http://ei.cs.vt.edu/~history/index.html. (Links to a variety of interesting sites.)
Maxfield & Montrose Interactive. 1999. Frame page for History of Computers. http://www.maxmon.com/history.htm. (Notes from the book Bebop BYTES Back; stronger on origins and early history of computers.)
Rehr, D. 2004. The QWERTY connection. http://home.earthlink.net/~dcrehr/. (Early history of the typewriter and the QWERTY keyboard.)

1969-1989/1990	ARPANet	Researchers can share data. E-mail
1972-	telnet	Remote login to other computers
1973-	FTP (File Transfer Protocol)	Standarized file transfer
1979-	USENET	Electronic news distribution system
1983-	TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol)	Packet creation, routing, and reception.
1984-	DNS (Domain Name System or Server)	Translates mnemonic node names to identifiers.
1991-	Gopher	Hierarchical menu navigation.
1993-	WWW (World Wide Web) and HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol)
1993-	InterNIC (Network Information Centers)	First formal registration of Internet sites.
1993/1994-	Mosaic and Netscape Navigator	Graphical Web browsers

BBC. 2006. BBC NEWS | Technology | Fifteen years of the web. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/5243862.stm. (Brief list of major events starting in 1991.)
Beck, S.E. 1998. "LSC 311-02, Spring 1998, Class Notes, Day 4/ A Brief History of the Internet". Information Literacy. New Mexico State University. http://lib.nmsu.edu/staff/susabeck/lsc311/04notes.html.
Internet Society. 2007. Internet Society (ISOC) All About The Internet: History of the Internet. http://www.isoc.org/internet/history/. (Pointers to many other items.)
Simonelis, A. 2005. "A Concise Guide to the Major Internet Bodies". ACM Ubiquity. 6 (5). http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/views/v6i5_simoneli.html. (Briefly describes the role of various bodies. Points out that some actual roles and relationships are considered controversial.)
Stewart, W. 2007. Internet History, How The Internet Was Invented. http://www.livinginternet.com/tindex_i.htm. (Emphasizes early history, but includes some more recent developments.)
Zakon, R.H. 2006. Hobbes' Internet Timeline - the definitive ARPANet & Internet history. http://www.zakon.org/robert/internet/timeline/. (Many events enumerated, with various links, some to parodies of standards, plus some graphs.)

Last updated October 4, 2007.
This page maintained by Prof. Tim Craven
E-mail (text/plain only): craven@uwo.ca
Faculty of Information and Media Studies
University of Western Ontario,
London, Ontario
Canada, N6A 5B7