
Ethernet Turns 40 - eguizzo
http://theinstitute.ieee.org/technology-focus/technology-history/ethernet-turns-40#.UffhEKgcEeI.hackernews
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Decade
The introduction to the article is a bit overblown. We were connecting
computers, sharing printers and files and playing multiplayer games, long
before we used Ethernet.

Now we all use Ethernet, and Ethernet has been around so long that devices are
available at practically every price point. But for a long time, Ethernet was
not the only choice.

As a Mac user, I was using AppleTalk (later called LocalTalk) until the late
90's. The controllers were built into every Mac, and the PhoneNet transceivers
and wiring were extremely cheap. We just used plain, common, thin telephone
wiring, daisy-chained from computer to computer. No need for hubs or carefully
categorized cabling. The devices configured their own addresses, so we only
had to give them names that meant something to humans, and not memorize all
these 192.168 numbers.

LocalTalk was slow (230kbps), and the lack of DMA on most of the controllers
really sucked, but it was a nice and easy way to start a network.

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voltagex_
How were the name lookups done? It seems we still can't get this right in 2013
(mDNS & NMB)

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silvestrov
The Mac broadcasted a packet and collected all the response packets from other
Macs which responded to the broadcast packet. This gave AppleTalk a reputation
for being chatty as all lookups resulted in a broadcast.

Documentation:
[http://developer.apple.com/legacy/library/documentation/mac/...](http://developer.apple.com/legacy/library/documentation/mac/pdf/Networking/NBP.pdf)

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chebucto
FTFA:

"“In 1973, the Internet [which at that time was basically the ARPANET] on a
good day ran at 50 kb/s,” Metcalfe reflected in his oral history. “Ethernet
ran at 2.94 megabits per second.” Over the years, people urged Metcalfe to
round the number up to 3. He always resisted, as a matter of emphasis: If one
rounds 2.94 Mb to 3 Mb, the rounding error is more than 50 kb/s. “Ethernet’s
round-off error was bigger than Internet,” said Metcafe. “That’s how fast
Ethernet was running.”"

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rzendacott
Robert Metcalfe recently did a reddit AMA:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1erq51/youre_probably_...](http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1erq51/youre_probably_connecting_to_reddit_through_a/)

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derefr
What a wonderful thing to read just as I'm starting work for the day; put me
right into a productive mood (washing all of the sociopolitical-hogwash from
the rest of the front page right out of my head in the process.)

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greenlakejake
Ethernet arose from Aloha Net

[http://www.isa.org/InTechTemplate.cfm?Section=InTech&templat...](http://www.isa.org/InTechTemplate.cfm?Section=InTech&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=55888)

From the article: During the 1970s, a Harvard graduate student named Robert
Metcalfe read a paper about something called Aloha Net. It was a radio system
used in the Hawaiian Islands to send small messages, also called data packets,
between islands. ... The packet communications network he designed became the
worldwide standard we know today as Ethernet.

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drcube
"By using the word ether in its name, the PARC people alluded to the
possibility that Ethernet could be based on coaxial, twisted-pair or optical
fiber wiring and, eventually, on Wi-Fi."

Still waiting on that last one. ;) Hooray for 802.11.

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jotm
Ethernet is really great, I can't wait for affordable 10Gbps cards - right now
the most you can get is 2Gbps (which is still enough to write/read seamlessly
to even the fastest hard drives with the right setup).

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wmf
10G NICs have been around $400 for years; I've given up hope on them ever
getting cheaper.

~~~
jotm
I think it's because people didn't really need 10Gb until now. With widespread
use of NAS and SSDs in homes and offices, hopefully these adapters will become
cheaper.

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rdudekul
Interview with Bob Metcalfe, worth watching (11 mins.):

[http://standards.ieee.org/events/ethernet/index.html](http://standards.ieee.org/events/ethernet/index.html)

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ewest
I think we're a little late to the party - this story is from July 15 and the
facebook page for this dates back to May 15.

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jimktrains2
While this is only tangentially related: I wish there was an easy way to use
10base5 Ethernet from a microcontroller.

