infoARPA

The Childhood of Internet

 
 

About

An abstract picture showing the working of four people working as one. An abstract picture showing the working of four people working as one.

This Site

This website has been designed for the purpose of competition in the IEEE Computer Society 60th Anniversary History Competition (CHC60) by a group of four people pursuing undergraduate degrees. The site attempts to provide a complete history of the early days of internet, focusing much on ARPAnet: the ancestor of today’s internet. We have tried our best to present the matter in clear, efficient navigational-view making use of multimedia applications.

Standards and Technologies

This site has been developed according to W3C standards (XHTML 1.1). We have fused together several different web technologies like PHP, CSS and Flash and the pages have been tested for compatibility in wide range of web browsers including Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Opera and even text browser Lynx.

Inspiration

The main motive of the JASS team in choosing this project amid vast possible alternatives is that we believe internet has become an indispensable factor of life in this digital world of today. Be it searching for the tutorials, reading the latest technologies, updating ourselves with the happening all over the globe, connecting to the friends distant apart, seeking help of lecturers round the world, and more, we always go for the internet. This very fact made us realize that if we are so dependent in this marvelous web, why not trace back its early history? That’s how we chose to unravel the different aspects of ARPAnet: the glorious past of Internet.

Work Division

After having chosen the topic we had to do a lot of homework before we could design the pages. Later, we simplified the project by splitting it into different modules and distributing these roles among ourselves based on our personal interests. The modules were:

  • W3C and web technologies
  • Interface, Animations & interactivity
  • Content research & web architecture.

First we stared working on the subdivisions individually, collecting as much information as we could. With more research, the complexity increased likewise. Soon it became necessary for us to sit together and discuss the problems faced by each to sort out the solutions. The information collected and the matter presented had to be edited a number of times before it came to the present form.

The outcome

We hope this site will give a moment to think how it all began, the brains behind its creation and the contributions of people around the world. We think this project will be useful and appealing to all, ranging from a student to a researcher.

As I reflect back to that first year, now so many years ago, I am also struck by the general competence of the effort and team certainty of successful completion.

- Dave Walden

When we read the article Looking back at the ARPANET effort, 34 years later we were really impressed by the lines that we have mentioned above. He has mentioned regarding his experience regarding ARPA and the same goes with our experience of making this page for the purpose of CHC60 competition. From the day we learnt about the competition and stared working for it we learnt a lot of things. It was a great fun working together, the experience to divide the work into small chunks and fuse them together, the moments of discussions and arguments etc are the moments which have sharpened the skills in us. Besides the experience of participating in the competition working as a team will be the fine moments to be cherished in the future.


The JASS Team,
CHC60 contestant number: 697937