Development of the Internet Research
Uploaded by tyson_626 on Dec 22, 2004
Development of the Internet Research
The Internet began as the ARPANET during the cold war in 1969. It was developed by the US Department of Defense's research people in conjunction with a number of military contractors and universities to explore the possibility of a communication network that could survive a nuclear attack. It continued simply because the DOD, it's contractors, and the universities found that it provided a very convenient way to communicate.
For the first decade that the Internet was in existence, it was primarily used to facilitate e-mail, support online discussion groups, allow access to distant databases, and support the transfer of files between government agencies, companies and universities.
During the early 1980s, all the interconnected research networks were converted to the TCP/IP protocol, and the ARPANET became the backbone of the new Internet, which comprised all TCP/IP-based networks connected to the ARPANET. This conversion to TCP/IP was completed by the end of 1983 - and the Internet was born.
In 1990, HTML, a hypertext Internet protocol that could communicate the graphic information on the Internet, was introduced. Each individual could create graphic pages, which then became part of a huge, virtual hypertext network called the World Wide Web. The enhanced Internet was informally renamed the Web and a huge additional audience was created.
At the moment, most people use the term "Internet" to refer to the physical structure of the Net, including client and server computers and the phone lines that connect everything. They use the term "Web" to refer to the collection of sites and the information that can be accessed when one is using the Internet.
A number of different services have developed over the years to facilitate the sharing of information between the many sites on the Internet. Because the Internet was originally research-oriented, many of these services were hard to use and poorly documented. Now that the Internet has been opened to commercial and private sites, new services are being developed that are easier to use, and new interfaces to the older services make them more friendly.
The Internet is the largest electronic network in the world. It is really a global network of networks. Some sources estimate the Internet currently interconnects over 40,000 different networks in over 100+ countries. It is believed that over 5 million computer hosts take part in the Internet and provide service for between 35 to 40 million users...