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- the “Logical Net” -

 

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Intro

• CSNET was founded by the US National Science Foundation in the early 1980’s with leadership by Larry Landweber and David Farber

• It was the first to link academic computer Science departments nationwide

• It was an alternative to ARPANET, to which many computer  Science departments didn’t have the privilege to access

• A “logical net” – a high level communication environment spanning several physical nets, including the ARPANET, Phonenet, and X.25 public packet-switched networks (e.g., Telenet)

 

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Development of CSNET

• Early 1980s
• Larry Landweber at the University of Wisconsin-Madison put together a proposal to build a network to connect non-ARPANET computer science departments using TCP/IP

• In a foreshadowing of  the NSFNET development, one of the conditions was requiring the network to become self sufficient within five years

• Dave Crocker suggested to establish a network with a simple telephone-based email relay

• The email relay network became known as Phonenet and got CSNET off the ground

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CSNET is Born

• March 1980
• David J. Farber (or Dave Farber) from National Science Foundation (NSF) reviewed the proposal, and returned comments to the proposers
• NSF thought it was an interesting idea but doubted the university’s lack of networking experience

• Vinton Cerf and DARPA supported the CSNET proposal

• NSF awarded $5 million to the CSNET project

• One of the immediate consequences of the award was the connection of three Universities (Wisconsin-Madison, Delaware and Purdue) to the ARPANET became the core of CSNET

 

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CSNET in Motion

• End of 1981
• University of Delaware, Princeton University, and Purdue University were connected to Phonenet – using Delaware and RAND (Research and Development) as relay sites to the ARPANET

• 1982
• 24 sites were connected

• 1984
• 84 sites were connected
• Providing email connectivity for university computer science and engineering departments around the country

• A host was established at Winconsin-Madison to provide dial-in and network access

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Providing Full Internetworking Functionality

• Vinton Cerf proposed establishment of a network gateway between CSNET and ARPANET

• TCP/IP was chosen as the common network protoco

• TCP/IP was made available for free to CSNET sites and became common standards across the network

• CSNET grew rapidly across US with email and Usenet inerfaces

• Feb 1984
• Israel became the first international node on CSNET
• Followed by Korea, Australia, Canada, France, Germany and Japan

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CSNET as a Central Role

• Played a central role in popularizing the Internet outside APRANET

• Connecting more than 180 institutions and thousands of new users that went on to further the awareness and spread the growing network

• CSNET’s important legacy was the introduction of the NSF to the Internet, which led to the development of NSFNET (National Science Foundation Network)

• 1988
• Managing boards of CSNET and BITNET (Because It’s Time Network) voted to merge, creating a larger network managed by the crew Corporation for Research and Educational Networking (CREN)
• CSNET stopped its service after the merge

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References

• http://www.livinginternet.com/i/ii_csnet.htm

• http://www.isoc.org/internet/history/documents/Comm83.pdf

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