History Channel - The Internet: Behind the Web

From: Fred N. van Kempen <Fred.van.Kempen_at_microwalt.nl>
Date: Thu Oct 10 11:48:00 2002

> Yeah, even my wife enjoyed it!
Sadly, we don't get it in Europe... *sigh* Anyone got a taped
copy?

> So, the IMPs they built would be the first network interface,
> right? The precurser to the present-day NIC.
Well, no.. IMP's connected a local(-ish) network to the remote
(-ish) network, usually over a slow(-ish ;-) WAN link like a
56K switched circuit. You could see them as the first series
of protocol-converting gateways, though.

Werent they built by BBN, and based on PDP-11(/23's) with the
Fuzzball software load image?

--f
Received on Thu Oct 10 2002 - 11:48:00 BST