Ethernet History

HISTORY OF ETHERNET

In 1973, Robert (Bob) Metcalfe was a recent Harvard Ph.D. graduate working at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). In the course of his work training US military personnel to use the world’s first operational packet switching network – known as the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) – he often traveled to Washington D.C.

While staying at a friend’s apartment in the nation’s capitol, the young engineer came across a book of conference proceedings from the 1970 American Federation of Information Processing Societies (AFIPS) conference. In the proceedings was a hidden gem – a paper written by Norman Abramson entitled “The Aloha System – Another Alternative for Computer Communications.” It described the development of an innovative radio-based network of computers that came to be known as ALOHAnet. And although he disagreed with some aspects of the technology model, the paper quickly caught Metcalfe’s attention.

Inspired by the ALOHAnet paper, upon his return to PARC and with the help of David R. Boggs, he began putting his thoughts to paper. Using an IBM Selectric Typewriter with an Orator ball, Metcalfe typed a memo and sketched a quick schematic that would forever change both networking and the world at large. And so on May 22, 1973 Ethernet was born. After months of effort built on Metcalfe’s ideas and Boggs’ help in designing and debugging the necessary network hardware, the first working Ethernet prototype, a 2.94 Mbps CSMA/CD system connecting more than 100 workstations on a 1 Km cable, went live on November 11, 1973. Based on its demonstrated success, Xerox would go on to patent Ethernet in 1975.

In 1979, Metcalfe left PARC to found a new company called 3Com, and successfully convinced Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), Intel, and Xerox to cooperatively promote Ethernet as a standard. The following year, the IEEE Standards Association (IEEE-SA) formed a committee to develop local area networking standards: the IEEE 802 LAN/MAN Standard Committee. Led by Maris Graube, the committee began defining and specifying the physical and lower software layers for wired Ethernet, and on June 23, 1983 IEEE 802.3 was approved as a standard. Through the work of IEEE-SA working groups and committees, Ethernet continued to evolve, eventually growing to encompass higher bandwidth speeds, a diverse array of physical media, and new variants like 10GBASE-T.

In August 2012, IEEE joined other leading global organizations, including the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), Internet Society and World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), to announce its support of OpenStand,  a jointly developed set of principles establishing a modern paradigm for global, open standards. Under OpenStand, the economics of global markets in conjunction with technology innovation help facilitate continued worldwide open standards development and deployment, including standards for the next generation of Ethernet speeds of 100G, 400G, and beyond.

Advantages: 

1) Information on almost every subject imaginable. 
2) Powerful search engines 
3) Ability to do research from your home versus research libraries. 
4) Information at various levels of study. Everything from scholarly articles to ones directed at children. 
5) Message boards where people can discuss ideas on any topic. Ability to get wide range of opinions. People can find others that have a similar interest in whatever they are interested in. 
6) The internet provides the ability of emails. Free mail service to anyone in the country. 
7) Platform for products like SKYPE, which allow for holding a video conference with anyone in the world who also has access. 
8) Friendships and love connections have been made over the internet by people involved in love/passion over similar interests. 
9) Things such as Yahoo Answers and other sites where kids can have readily available help for homework. 
10) News, of all kinds is available almost instantaneously. Commentary, on that news, from every conceivable viewpoint is also available. 

Disadvantages: 

1) There is a lot of wrong information on the internet. Anyone can post anything, and much of it is garbage. 
2) There are predators that hang out on the internet waiting to get unsuspecting people in dangerous situations. 
3) Some people are getting addicted to the internet and thus causing problems with their interactions of friends and loved ones. 
4) Pornography that can get in the hands of young children too easily. 
5) Easy to waste a lot of time on the internet. You can start surfing, and then realize far more time has passed than you realized. Internet and television together of added to the more sedentary lifestyles of people which further exacerbates the obesity problem. 
6) Internet has a lot of "cheater" sites. People can buy essays and pass them off as their own far more easily than they used to be able to do. 
7) There are a lot of unscrupulous businesses that have sprung up on the internet to take advantage of people. 
8) Hackers can create viruses that can get into your personal computer and ruin valuable data. 
9) Hackers can use the internet for identity theft. 
10) It can be quite depressing to be on the internet and realize just how uneducated so many people have become in today's society.

Getting to Know the Ethernet Protocol, Present and Future

Antony

26 Feb 2014 14:33:14

How many different “Nets” are there? Although there are many different ways in which business networks connect to the Internet and with each other, the most popular for this day and age remains the Ethernet. An Ethernet protocol offers high-speed access at varying rates and is excellent for high-data transmissions through a network. Let’s examine the different types of Ethernet connections a provider typically offers as well as what the future holds.

What is the Ethernet Protocol?

The Ethernet protocol has existed in one form or another since the 1970s, although it was more recently that it became the common method that businesses and home customers alike used to connect to one another. When the term “Ethernet” is used, it can refer to one of several different protocols, each with their own different speed. The standard Ethernet, which is most commonly requested by home users and owners of very small businesses, transfers data at 10 Mbps (millions of bits per second). Most businesses use the fast Ethernet, which transfers data at 100 Mbps and can thus handle more file transfers and larger data storage. Very large businesses might look into the gigabit Ethernet, which transfers at 1,000 Mbps. These speeds represent a maximum limit – at times, transfers might be slower than that.

Ethernet and the OSI Model

Most network connections are defined using the OSI model, which stands for Open Systems Interconnection. There are seven layers in this model, but an Ethernet connection mainly interacts with only two: the data link layer and the physical layer. The physical aspect of the Ethernet revolves around a network card and a connecting cable, although it is also possible to set up a wireless network using some additional software. When it comes to the data link layer, the Ethernet splits the layer into two parts. The logical link control, or LLC, allows several network protocols to remain active at once. The media access control, or MAC, allows multiple terminals to connect to the network at the same time.

Which Ethernet is Right for You?

If you have a business of any sort, you should probably shoot for a gigabit Ethernet connection if at all possible. As the size of data continues to grow, this is the best option to make sure that you won’t have to constantly upgrade your network in order to handle large file transfers, remote gateways, and cloud computing protocols. If you’re looking to save some money and have a small business with only a handful of employees or network access points, you might be able to function using the vanilla fast Ethernet, although you may find yourself needing to upgrade sometime in the near future. For businesses, a standard 10 Mbps Ethernet is only appropriate if you have one or two full time employees.

A Look into the Future

As technology continues to develop, the Ethernet protocol looks to be here to stay. The technology is extremely flexible and eminently buildable, meaning that even as one type of Ethernet services starts to lose efficacy another faster variation can be brought on board. For example, as the gigabit model becomes more common, developers have already begun to institute even faster alternatives that can handle 10 Gbps or 40 Gbps at a time. The newest Ethernet protocol on the horizon is the 1,000 Gbps model, which will likely meet all the requirements of businesses both small and large for a long time to come. 

Keeping an Eye on Tomorrow

If you are planning to implement a new Ethernet connection in your office, the best bet would probably be to go for a gigabyte Ethernet model for now and to keep an eye on emerging technologies that can allow you to speed up your network even further. You will want to make sure you map out your structure and keep clear records of all hardware you need. If you have a good layout now, you will be in a better position to upgrade in the future. Most businesses benefit from at least one wireless router as well, since this can help people who bring their mobile devices into the office so they can function as work machines.

If you plan to use a network of any sort, odds are that you will need to be familiar with Ethernet protocols. Keep this in mind when looking into new technologies and when hiring members of your IT team. The more knowledge you have about the technology in the present, the better you will be able to adapt in the future.

Bibliography:

http://www.dcs.gla.ac.uk/~ross/Ethernet/history.html

http://standards.ieee.org/events/ethernet/history.html

https://www.informit.com/library/content.aspx?b=CCIE_Practical_Studies_I&seqNum=32