Chapter 1. Evolution of the Internet

This chapter covers the following key topics:

• Origins and recent history of the Internet— A brief history of the early Internet, with emphasis on its implementers and users, as well as how it has evolved in the last decade. Includes an overview of several important NSF solicitations.

• Network Access Points— Internet service providers can connect, directly or indirectly, with Network Access Points (NAPs). You will need to know enough to evaluate how your ISP connects to the NAPs, as well as which NAPs are available in which regions of the world today.

• Direct interconnections— An alternative to NAPs, this connection model has gained popularity with large service providers in recent years, primarily because it overcomes some of the shortcomings of the public NAP connection model.

• Routing arbiter project— An overview of concepts central to the rest of this book: route servers and the Routing Arbiter Database. Route servers are architectural components of NAPs, Internet service providers, and other networks.

• Regional providers— Background on the current Internet layout with respect to regional connections.

• Information services— An overview of the information services and agencies that have evolved as a result of NSF solicitation and privatization of the Internet: the InterNIC, registration services, directory and database services, NIC support services, and the evolution of other Internet registries and the Internetworking Routing Registries.

• The once and future Internet— A survey of research efforts that point to the future of the Internet: The Next-Generation Initiative, Internet2, and Abilene.

The structure and makeup of the Internet has adapted as the needs of its community have changed. Today's Internet serves the largest and most diverse community of network users in the computing world. A brief chronology and summary of significant components are provided in this chapter to set the stage for understanding the challenges of interfacing the Internet and the steps involved in building scalable internetworks.