Hong Kong: Snapshot of the Internet around 1990

[by NG Nam]

2012.6/7.11/10.27

Introduction

Not different from many other parts of the world, computer networking in Hong Kong was started in the 1980’s in the Universities, invariably in the computer science/engineering departments in conjunction with the computer centres that had a supporting role to departments other than computer science and the administrative offices that handled student registration, staff payroll and ledger applications. The most popular computer systems for supporting administrative applications in the Hong Kong universities in the mid-eighties were the IBM computer systems that supported the BSC (binary synchronous protocol) network protocol, while the most popular teaching/research systems were initially Digital’s PDP systems that supported the DECnet (Digital Computer Equipment network) protocol and later on the SUN Microsystems that adopted the UNIX operating system and the UUCP network protocol.

UPCC and HARNET

In Hong Kong, inter-computer-networking among campuses was started around 1985. The inter-campus networking in the computer centres was facilitated by an entity called the University and Polytechnic Computer Centre (UPCC), which consisted of 5 academic institutions at that time, the University of Hong Kong (HKU), the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), the Hong Kong Polytechnic (HKP), the City Polytechnic of Hong Kong (CPHK) and the Baptist College Hong Kong (HK Baptist). In late 1985, Dr Nam Ng led a network group of UPCC to connect the PDP computers in the computer centres. He also coordinated the work with Dr Kam-Pui Chow of HKU Computer Science department who had started a UUCP-connected network to form the Hong Kong Academic and Research NETwork (HARNET).

Connection of HARNET to CSNET

The initial HARNET mainly supported electronic mail and file-transfers and served to connect the Decnet-connected computers with the UUCP-connected computers in the universities and polytechnics. The HKU Computer Science department also up various gateways to provide dial-up international connectivity to other parts of the world, including connection to ARPANET, Usenet and CSnet in the USA, ASCNET in Australia, JANET in the United Kingdom, CDN in Canada and SDN in Korea, etc. Additional applications at that time included Usenet NEWS.

Connecting HARNET to BITNET

In June 1987, a proposal was raised to join BITNET (Because It’s Time Network), in order to provide network connectivity to the administrative systems that were supported by the BSC protocol. The connection was finally established in November 1989. The initial network link was a 2400 bps leased-circuit connecting HKU with Yale University of USA and made possible the connection of HARNET to BITNET. Protocol converters/emulators were used in the Decnet-connected and UUCP-connected computers for supporting the BSC protocol. Though not at a high speed, it was then considered to be a major investment in the universities. This nevertheless provided network connectivity in real-time among the various popular computer platforms in the universities in that timeframe.

An immediate issue was raised after the connection to BITNET as the domain name addressing was quite confusing in the various computer platforms. This was however not resolved until the Internet style of domain name addressing was adopted. In 1989, Dr Nam Ng registered the .hk domain for Hong Kong. This made possible the adoption of Internet style of domain names later in our effort of establishing connectivity to the Internet world.

Email and File-transfer in Chinese

As Chinese was one of the official languages of Hong Kong, there was a genuine need to support electronic mail and file transfers, especially in our correspondence with China. One interesting development to record was the effort taken to investigate the electronic communication in Chinese characters at that time. As the most popular communications code was the 7 bit ACSII code, it was necessary to cater for Chinese character communications using ESC code. In response to this urgent need, Dr JT Yu and Dr N Ng of the HKU Computer Centre and Professor Francis Chin and Dr KP Chow of HKU Computer Science Department had cooperated with Professor Xu Kung Shi, Dr Zhang Dawei and Dr MC Pong of Academic Sinica and secured a research grant from the Croucher Foundation in Hong Kong to undertake some research investigations into the issues of communication using Chinese characters in those early days over slow network links.

Connecting HARNET to Internet

The first adoption of the TCP/IP Internet protocol in Hong Kong was established by the Faculty of Engineering of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) in September 1991. With support from PACCOM, a 64 Kbps leased circuit was set up by CUHK to connect their network to the Internet in the US. CUHK was very generous to share the use of the link with the UPCC institutions, which also provided the initial connectivity of HARNET to the Internet. In July 1992, the CUHK Faculty of Engineering transferred the management of the Internet link to UPCC. With the support of the University and Polytechnic Grants Committee in financing the Internet link, UPCC decided to open up the use of HARNET to all students, including the undergraduates, of the academic institutions in Hong Kong for the value of exposing student to the new electronic environment for supporting learning over the Internet and the Information Highway.

Commercial Internet and Registration of .hk Domain Names

The opening-up of the Internet to student use in 1992 had met with instant success in the academic sector in Hong Kong. This had attracted the Internet Service Providers to join the bandwagon to provide commercial Internet service to the Hong Kong community. UPCC had then started to provide registration of .hk domain names. CUHK was also quick to set up the Hong Kong Internet Exchange (HKIX) to provide a local exchange point for supporting local and international connectivity to the Internet. At the same time, HARNET had started to provide international Internet connectivity for academic users in China (CERNET) and Macau.