Ethernet at 40: Its daddy reveals its turbulent youth
Bob Metcalfe: How Token Ring and 'IBM's arrogance' nearly sank Big Blue
Feature When Bob Metcalfe, the prime mover behind the invention of Ethernet, recently visited the site of that invention, Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), The Reg had the opportunity to sit down with him to discuss the history of Ethernet, its advantages over Token Ring, and IBM's perfidy.
Metcalfe was in town to promote a two-day Ethernet Innovation Summit that will commence on May 22 at Silicon Valley's Computer History Museum in celebration of Ethernet's 40th anniversary.
"As you know," Metcalfe told us, "something like Ethernet is not actually invented in a single day. But if there were a day, it would be May 22nd, [1973]."
The Reg asked what had happend on that day. "I wrote a memo," he said, "and in that memo named it and outlined its general operation." Ethernet, however, was not the original name of what has now become the world's networking standard.
Bob Metcalfe: How Token Ring and 'IBM's arrogance' nearly sank Big Blue
Feature When Bob Metcalfe, the prime mover behind the invention of Ethernet, recently visited the site of that invention, Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), The Reg had the opportunity to sit down with him to discuss the history of Ethernet, its advantages over Token Ring, and IBM's perfidy.
Metcalfe was in town to promote a two-day Ethernet Innovation Summit that will commence on May 22 at Silicon Valley's Computer History Museum in celebration of Ethernet's 40th anniversary.
"As you know," Metcalfe told us, "something like Ethernet is not actually invented in a single day. But if there were a day, it would be May 22nd, [1973]."
The Reg asked what had happend on that day. "I wrote a memo," he said, "and in that memo named it and outlined its general operation." Ethernet, however, was not the original name of what has now become the world's networking standard.