The Internet: A worldwide network of computers connected by telephone, radio, and satellite systems; where a message is cut into many pieces (packets) and sent along numerous pathways, to be subsequently reassembled at the destination.
Imagine ten taxi cab drivers gathered at one side of town. Each is given a piece of a letter to be delivered at the airport. Each chooses their own pathway, and once they all arrive at the airport, they assemble all the pieces of the letter into the complete original message.
The history of the Internet,
rightfully, begins in the early 19th Century.

The Telegraph, with its simple binary code, was the forerunner of our modern digital communications. The Morse Code consisted of "dots" and "dashes," much like the "zeroes" and "ones" of our computers, today.

Electromagnetism Discovered
Danish Physicist, Hans Christian Oersted, discovered magnetic fields generated by electricity. He noticed the effect of electric current on moving a nearby compass needle.
Telegraph Invented
Carl F. Gauss and Wilhelm E. Weber developed the first electromagnetic telegraph in Germany. It consisted of two copper wires strung 1.4 miles.
Mathematical Calculator Developed
The first mechanical adding machine was built in 1642 by a 19 year old youth in France. Blaise Pascal demonstrated that the young would often lead the innovation of computational mechanisms.

Two centuries later, the use of mechanical calculators was finally becoming popular. Charles Babbage, an English mathematician, designed a machine for calculating astronomical tables. The "Difference Engine" used punch cards for its programming. This idea of programming came from the textile industry. At that time, the Jacquard Loom used punch cards for the repetitive reproduction of intricate woven patterns (e.g., flowers). Punched holes were also used in player pianos and music boxes. After 10 years of development, the Difference Engine" was abandoned for a better Idea.

In 1833, Babbage began the design of the more powerful "Analytical Engine" which was expected to perform any mathematical calculation. The machine, is considered today, to be the first digital computer, especially since it was able to store information. But more importantly, it incorporated the "If...Then" conditional statement; thus distinguishing it from simple calculators. Like its predecessor, the "Analytical Engine" was never completed. The government terminated funding in 1842. Babbage was so far ahead of his time that he was often considered a lunatic. His design, however, has garnered a great deal of respect in modern times.

American Telegraph Developed
Samuel Morse, who was well known for his artistic talents, developed an electric telegraph that was superior to that of the German's. It was faster, simpler and required only one wire to transmit data. He conceived the idea in 1832. By 1838 he devised his code for constructing messages, later known as the Morse Code. After a vigorous legal battle, the Supreme Court awarded him patent rights in 1854.
First Telegraph Message
Samuel Morse solicited Congress to provide funding for a 37 mile long telegraph line between Baltimore, MD and Washington D.C. He sent the first message on May 24th., "What hath God wrought?"
First Transatlantic Cable
There were three, unsuccessful, attempts to span the Atlantic Ocean with a telegraph cable in 1857, 1858, and 1865. With the fourth attempt in 1866, the engineers were finally successful. They laid a cable that stretched 2500 miles between Ireland and New Foundland. It had a core constructed from 27 insulated copper wires. The outside was protected by a sheath of woven iron.

The first underwater telegraph "line" was laid 24 years earlier by Samuel Morse, in the New York Harbor. It was short lived. Early cables were notorious for breaking.

Telephone Invented
Alexander Graham Bell, a teacher of the deaf, and Thomas Watson, a mechanic, devised the first telephone. He received his patent in March 7, 1876, but for many years afterward Bell was involved in patent infringement litigation with notable companies, such as, Western Union Telegraph Co.
First Tabulating Machine
Herman Hollerith, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, designed the Hollerith Tabulating System for the U.S. Census Bureau. The 1880 census took more than seven years to count by hand. Fearing that the 1890 census would take 10 years to record, the Bureau was open to new ideas.

Hollerith designed a system where the data (age, sex, ethnicity, etc.) of each citizen would be stored on a punch card and then tabulated by his machine. He got the idea from observing the use of designated holes being punched in railroad tickets.

The census cards were tabulated by retractable pins passing through the representative hole and, thereby, connecting an electrical circuit that would advance the counting mechanism. The census was completed in three years. The Tabulating System was so successful that other countries began to order machines. Austria, Italy, and Canada were among the first.

In 1896 Hollerith formed the Tabulating Machine Co. which sold and/or leased numerous tabulating machines to governments and industry, worldwide. Considerable income was also derived from selling the punch cards used for tabulating the data. In 1911 he sold the company to a holding company that became Computer-Tabulating-Recording Corporation, CTR. This company was renamed International Business Machines, IBM in 1924. The concept of leasing equipment remained with IBM right up to modern day. Card sales lasted until technological advancements made them obsolete.
IBM Punch Card

Transatlantic Radio Message
In 1896, Guglielmo Marconi devised a method of sending Morse Code message by radio waves. He experimented with different types of aerials to amplify the signal. At that time, the scientific community was skeptical about the usefulness of his work. In 1901 he sent the first transatlantic radio message from England to New Foundland. This event changed the understanding of radio waves, particularly in reference to their propagation through the atmosphere and around the curvature of the earth. In 1909 he received a Noble Prize in physics for his work.
The Great Brass Brain
Rollins Harris and E. G. Fisher, working for the U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey devised a mechanical device for predicting tides. It weighed 2,500 pounds and measured eleven feet long and seven feet high. It had 37 dials, one for each programmable variable. It was so accurate that it continued to be used for 56 years.
The Differential Analyzer
Vannevar Bush designed and built a 100 ton calculator to perform differential equations. It took five years to construct.

With its completion, the United States Army collaborated with the Moore School at the University of Pennsylvania and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to complete two more Differential Analyzers for the purpose of conducting ballistic research. These machines were completed in 1935. Their purpose was to prepare artillery firing tables with would be used in the field for variable adjustments of wind, temperature, humidity, and other important variables.

During World War II firing tables were also prepared by women "computers," as they were called. The Army recruited female math majors from all over the country to work on these calculations. The demands of war eventually exceeded the resources of the "computers" and the Differential Analyzers. In 1943 the Army in collaboration with the Moore School decided to build the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC) computer. This would be the world's first "universal purpose" computer, but the war was over by the time it was completed.

Electromechanical Computing Device
Konrad Zuse, of Germany, built an electromechanical binary computing devise. Electromechanics is the field where mechanical devices are controlled by the use of electrical current.

In 1939 Zuse and Helmut Shreyer proposed a computer to the German government. They believed the device could be built in one year and would be able to decipher enemy codes. Adolph Hitler expected the war to be over in six months, so the proposal was rejected.

First Electronic Computer
John Atanasoff built a binary calculating device that used vacuum tubes (the term electronics refers to the emission, behavior and effects of electrons in devices which use vacuum tubes, and in later years, transistors and integrated circuits). This could be considered the first electronic computer; but since it was very specialized in its function and prone to errors, historians disagree on the validity of this claim. Some consider the ENIAC (1946) to be the first electronic computer since its functioning was considered to be of general purpose. Others consider the Colossus (1943) to be the first electronic computer because it functioned before ENIAC and performed calculations without errors, although it, too, was a single purpose machine.

In 1973 patent litigation was decided in Atanasoff's favor, being represented by Honeywell. The court decision was probably aimed at breaking the monopolistic power that IBM and Sperry Rand Corp. held over the industry. IBM had a secret licensing agreement with Sperry Rand Corp., which owned the ENIAC computer. Between the two companies they controlled 90% of the industry.

Electronic Military Computer
The British Foreign Office constructed a binary electronic computer, "Colossus," that was fully operational in deciphering enemy military codes during World War II. The German's used an elaborate code produced by an electromechanical machine called Enigma to communicate between strategic military installations, especially between U-boats (submarines) in the Atlantic Ocean.

The "Colossus" machine was constructed from 1,500 large vacuum tubes which threw off a great deal of heat. The Foreign Office continued to build ten more machines, each improved over the last, but their use was only practical for code breaking. With the end of the war, their use was quite limited. They were shut down in the late forties. The operation was so Top Secret that it took thirty years after the war to finally release details about the project.

IBM Presented Electromechanical Computer
Howard Aiken, with the collaboration of IBM and Harvard University presented the "Mark I" electromechanical calculator. It measured over fifty feet long.
EDVAC*******
***** to be continued *****
ENIAC Electronic Computer
John Mauchly and Presper Eckert of the University of Pennsylvania, in collaboration with the U. S. Army, unveiled the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC). The design began in 1943. Its purpose was to calculate ballistic tables for United States Army artillery. Many variables needed to be taken into account for continuing accuracy of the guns in the field. Skepticism was high, many believed that a machine of this nature could not be constructed.

ENIAC was completed from more than 17,000 vacuum tubes and filled 650 square feet. It could conduct 5,000 operations per second, which was 1,000 times faster than the Mark I electromechanical calculator produced by IBM. The computer was completed by the end of the war (World War II), so its original purpose was no longer necessary. The computer was then put to use on other military projects, such as the Manhattan Project (development of the hydrogen bomb).

Bell Telephone Developed Transistor
***** to be continued *****
First Computer Bug
bugGrace Murray Hopper discovered a moth in the relays of the Mark II, the second of Howard Aiken's monstrous electromechanical calculators built in collaboration with IBM. This was the beginning of the terms "bug" and "debugging" for describing a malfunctioning computer.

In later years she worked with Mauchly and Eckert, the founders of ENIAC, in their commercial endeavor, the UNIVAC computer. She was also considered the founder of the COBOL programming language, although she didn't write it.

"Bit" as Fundamental Unit of Data
Claude Shannon of Bell Telephone coined the term "bit" as the most fundamental unit of data.
Transistors Used In Computer
***** to be continued ****Typical Transistor
Bell Telephone Developed Modem
Bell Telephone Laboratories developed a method of converting analog (continuous wave) signals into digital (discrete unit) signals. This enabled the connection of computers (digital) to telephone systems (analog). The term "modem" is a contraction of modulate-demodulate.
ARPA Initiated for Scientific Research
The United States Government was put on a serious defensive by the Soviet launching of the first satellite, Sputnik. President Dwight D. Eisenhower initiated the Advanced Research Projects Agency, ARPA to conduct general scientific research. ARPA's area of research, eventually, evolved into communications and computer networks, thus laying the groundwork for the Internet, as we know it today.
Integrated Circuit Developed
The integrated circuit enabled a number of transistors to be placed on one piece of silicon wafer (semiconductor). Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments filed for patent rights on February 6, 1959, while Robert Noyce of Fairchild Semiconductor filed on July 30, 1959. The patent rights were given to Fairchild Semiconductor.
Packet Switching Introduced
Paul Baran introduced the concept of packet switching. This would entail a communications network that would supply multiple pathways for a message to follow. The message would be cut into pieces, sent along different pathways and re-assembled at the destination. The idea was initially rejected by the technical community. Donald Davies, an English physicist, independently working on the same idea, coined the term "packet switching."
ASCII Code Established
American National Standards Institute (ANSI) established the ASCII Code (American Standard Codes for Information Interchange) which standardized a binary code for every symbol on a typewriter/computer keyboard. This gave computers the ability to speak and understand the same language.
ARPA Connected Two Computers
Larry Roberts supervised the connection of two computers for the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), one in California and the other in Massachusetts. This was the first step towards a computer network for ARPA, which eventually became the Internet.
Hypertext and Hyperlinks Introduced
The concept of hypertext and hyperlinks is introduced by Ted Nelson. This gave the user the ability to "choose" data as opposed to the traditional method of accessing data in a sequential order.
ARPAnet Planned
The Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) announced its plans for a computer network that will use packet switching technology. The intention was to connect numerous research facilities for the United States Department of Defense.
ARPAnet Operational
Four sites were connected to each other to form ARPAnet. The University of California at Los Angeles, the University of California at Santa Barbara, the University of Utah and the Stanford Research Institute were connected to each other by specially designed computers. These machines, Interface Message Processors (IMP's) were installed at each location to control the process of communication which utilized the new packet switching technology.
UNIX Operating System Developed
Bell Telephone Laboratories developed the UNIX Computer Operating System. It was specifically designed to run on smaller computers. Dennis Ritchie invented the "C" Programming Language which allowed the UNIX Operating System to run on any computer system. Thirty years later, many Internet Service Providers (ISP's) still use the UNIX Operating System.
E-Mail Introduced
Ray Tomlinson developed the first E-mail programs to be used with ARPAnet. He designated the @ symbol as a separator between the user's name and the user's service provider.
ARPAnet Expanded
Nineteen other sites were connected to the ARPAnet.
ARPAnet Showcased To Scientists
The International Conference on Computer Communications convened in Washington D.C., showcasing the ARPAnet to the scientific community.
Protocol For Local Area Networks
Bob Metcalfe, working for Xerox, developed the "Ethernet" networking protocol for Local Area Networks (LAN). The term "ether" refers to the ancient definition of air, atmosphere, space, heavens, etc. His design was modeled after the functioning of ALOHAnet which was a radio network in Hawaii using packet switching technology. Ethernet networking, rapidly, became the standard for connecting computers into networks that were used in office and school environments.

In 1979, Metcalfe founded his own company, 3Com, to market this design. By 1982, one year after IBM marketed their first personal desk top computer (PC), Ethernet networking cards were selling for $1,000 each. The following year, Novell launched their Netware product for managing network traffic over the Ethernet system. In 1984 Sandy Lehner and Len Bosack, co-founders of Cisco Systems, developed the "router" which was, basically, an updated Interface Message Processor (IMP). IMP's were used in 1969 for establishing the first connections of the ARPAnet.

Civilian TELEnet Launched
The first public packet switching network service was put in place. TELEnet was the civilian twin of the ARPAnet.
TCP United Networks
Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn introduced the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP). This system utilized special computers, called gateways, to unite a number of networks with different transmission protocols. Using one standard protocol between these different networks facilitated the creation of one large network, where radio, satellite, and wire communications could communicate with digital packets. This, soon to be, emerging worldwide network was referred to as the "internet" (spelled with a lower case "i"; later, when the name became popularized it was spelled with a capital "I").
First Personal Computer (PC) Marketed
The Altair 8800 was marketed by Model Instrumentation Telemetry Systems (MITS). It was produced in the form of a kit that electronic hobby enthusiasts could assemble. It had 256 bytes of memory, no monitor, no keyboard, and no disk drive. By today's standards, it was useless; but hobbyists loved it.
Bill Gates Started Microsoft
Bill Gates, a Harvard law student, and Paul Allen, a systems programmer for Honeywell, collaborated on writing a programming system (an interpreter) for the Altair 8800 Computer. They used the Beginner's All-Purpose Symbolic Instruction Code (BASIC) computer language which was first developed in 1964 at Dartmouth College. There was such a large demand for writing BASIC interpreters, for other small computers, that they started their own company, Microsoft.
First Internet Message
The first message using the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) was sent through a series of networks. Transversing 94,000 miles through radio, satellite, and wire networks, the message was delivered without error.
PC Market Widened
The Personal Computer (PC) market widened with the introductions of Apple, Commodore, and Tandy computers.
TCP/IP Standardized Networks
Engineers at Xerox developed the Internet Protocol (IP) to improve TCP transmission. TCP/IP, swiftly, became the new standard for large network transmission.
Electronic Bulletin Board Debut
The first computer bulletin board, a place to post electronic messages, went on line.
USEnet Developed
USEnet was developed by university students in North Carolina connecting two campuses through telephone lines. The University of North Carolina and Duke University were connected by a UNIX operating system and Unix-to-Unix Copy Protocol (UUCP). This network was established for the purpose of discussion "newsgroups" because many colleges were not included in the ARPAnet. In a few years, USEnet developed into an international phenomenon. Also by this time, the ARPAnet was connected to more than 100 university computer science departments, with it's purpose still being defense related work.
IBM Introduced Personal Computer
IBM introduced the personal computer (PC), which became the industry standard.

What is often called the biggest blunder of corporate history, IBM was not interested in the concept of networking these small computers together. In an effort to protect their mainframe business (very large computers used by governments, universities and large corporations), they allowed other companies to develop networking technology which could have been their monopoly.

IBM Supported BITnet
BITnet was another computer network built by university students that were excluded from ARPAnet. It connected City University of New York and Yale in Connecticut. The students used a different type of format than other networks. The message was stored at each location until the new location received it intact. This was referred to as Store-and-Forward architecture. The project was funded by IBM.
External Gateway Protocol Introduced
The ARPAnet began to use the External Gateway Protocol (EGP) to insure that messages are not lost from the incompatibility of different network protocols.
ARPAnet Adopted TCP/IP
ARPAnet, and any network connected to it, adopted the TCP/IP protocol. All of these networks were, collectively, called the Internet (with a capital "I").

The evolution of network protocol was, as follows:

In 1969, an early version of Network Control Protocol (NCP) was used on the ARPAnet.

In 1977, Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) was used for cross network connections, but was slowly adopted for the replacement of the general NCP, even though it was considered faster, easier, and less expensive.

In 1978, Internet Protocol (IP) was added to the TCP. IP controlled message routing, where TCPcontrolledd the construction of a message.

In 1983, all networks that were connected to the ARPAnet were forced to adopt TCP/IP or be dropped from the network.

Name Server Initiated
Stanford Research Institute initiated the first name server, allowing a "name" to be used for an address on the ARPAnet, instead of a sequence of numbers.
Apple Introduced Macintosh Computer
Apple Computer introduced the "Macintosh." It featured a Graphical User Interface (GUI), which we now refer to as point-and-click with a mouse. Microsoft quickly followed suit with the Windows Operating System. It also featured a GUI and revolutionized the desktop computer industry.
Domain Name System Installed
Outlined by Paul Mockapetris, the Domain Name System (DNS) consisted of software that facilitated communication between computers (servers) that store IP addresses. These name servers were accessed in a systematic fashion to provide the correct address location. This design enabled the Internet to experience explosive growth.
All Universities Connected to Internet
The United States Government finally recognized the importance of "all" universities being connected to the Internet (ARPAnet). To accomplish this task, the National Science Foundation (NSF) established the NSFnet which gave all universities access. Previously, only universities with defense related research were allowed access to the network. With so many "non defense" universities creating their own networks, it became imperative to connect them all. The NSFnet was constructed with five supercomputer centers operating at 56K (bits/second). This move fostered explosive growth in the Internet, from 10,000 hosts in 1987 to more than 100,000 in 1989.
Internet Worm Released
Robert T. Morris, a computer science graduate student, released a worm into the Internet that disabled 6,000 host computers, about 10% of the network. A worm is a self replicating program that can run alone and multiply without assistance, whereas, a virus is a program that runs only when the infected program is running. The first anti-virus software was marketed in 1981.
Computer Hacker
Kevin Mitnick was convicted of computer fraud and sentenced to a year in prison. He was arrested again in 1995 for a similar crime.
America Online (AOL)
Quantum Computer Service changed its name to America Online (AOL). Originally, it started as a Bulletin Board System (BBS) for Commodore 64 computer users, competing against CompuServe and Prodigy (Prodigy was a joint venture between Sears and IBM, with a million subscribers at the time). By 1994 AOL had 4 million subscribers and by 1998, 14 million. CompuServe, with 2.6 million subscribers, was bought by AOL in 1997. In 1998, AOL bought Netscape Communications, which produced the leading web browser.
ARPAnet Disbanded
ARPAnet is shut down, transferring all of its traffic to the NSFnet.
World Wide Web Proposed
The "World Wide Web" was proposed and named by Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau of Geneva, Switzerland. Working at the Centre Europeen Pour La Recherche Nucleaire (CERN), they were determined to design an efficient system of information management for the research facility. Using the conceptional foundations of hypertext and hyperlinks established by Ted Nelson in 1965, they devised a hypertext retrieval system that would change the world.
Linux Operating System
Linus Torvalds began writing code for the Linux Operating System which was intended for PC's. It was designed as an open architecture system; that is, no copyright protection was put in place. Anyone could modify or improve it, as long as they shared the changes with the computer science community. Within a year, many others added improvements to the system, making it a very reliable operating system. It has become popular with Internet Service Providers (ISP's) for use as a server platform. Other businesses also use the platform.

There has been ongoing controversy for decades about the virtue of open architecture versus closed architecture (The Microsoft Windows Operating System has a closed architecture; that is, the source code is secret and the system has copyright protection). It has been said that open architecture fosters the more efficient development of an individual product. Whereas, closed architecture may develop more competition between companies which eventually yield the most efficient product. The IBM PC is, basically, an open architecture. IBM "clones" have dominated the market for many years. The proliferation of the PC may have been seriously hindered if IBM had a monopoly on PC's and was able to charge exorbitant royalty fees for every PC manufactured by other companies.

Internet Gopher
The University of Minnesota developed Gopher, a transfer protocol and browser that was designed for searching and viewing information on large databases and libraries. It became very popular with university students.
WWW Protocol Completed
Tim Berners-Lee, of CERN, completed the basic components of the World Wide Web Protocol. This included the URL: Uniform Resource Locator (a system of Internet addresses), HTTP: Hypertext Transfer Protocol (an Internet transfer protocol), and HTML: Hypertext Markup Language (codes used for document construction).

Also at this time, Sun Microsystems started to develop the Java Programming Language. This would be the first universal language, able to run on any operating system. It was released in 1995 and quickly dominated the development of web page applications that employ interactive design.

Mosaic Browser Introduced
Marc Andreessen developed the Mosaic browser, software for viewing documents on the World Wide Web. It employed a Graphical User Interface (GUI); that is, point and click with a mouse. The software is given out for free. In 1994 he partnered with Jim Clark, the founder of Silicon Graphics, to from Mosaic Communications. Later the name was changed to Netscape Communications.
InterNIC Formed
The National Science Foundation (NSF) established an agreement with Network Solutions, Inc. to form an organization for registering domain names and offering other directory services.
Yahoo!
David Filoo and Jerry Yang, Stanford graduate students working on their doctorates, started exchanging bookmarks of interesting web sites. As their lists grew, they developed a way to categorize and search for information. Leaving their doctoral studies behind, they built the Yahoo search engine. A year later, other companies also launched search engines, e.g., Lycos, AltaVista and Excite.
Microsoft Antitrust Case
Netscape Communications accused Microsoft of an antitrust violation with their including a Internet browser in their Windows Operating System. In 1998 the United States Department of Justice filed a suit against Microsoft for anti-competitive practices.
AOL Buys Netscape Communications
America Online bought Netscape for 4.2 billion dollars.
Internet Mania
The stock market experienced unprecedented growth as a result of the dot com craze. Every week new companies were going public to cash in on the gold mine of investors hungry for any kind of Internet company. Employees of these companies were becoming millionaires, literally overnight, from these Initial Public Offerings (IPO's)
The Great Bear Emerges
The stock market suffered vicious declines from investors pulling money out of the high flying Internet stocks. Over the next year of the bear market, more than 500 technology companies lost more than 90% of their market value.
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