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Vol 10 Number 2
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  SPOTLIGHT: Cerf on the Net
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I: When you picture the world in 2010, what changes do you see — specifically in our use of the Internet?
Cerf: I expect to see a high degree of penetration of Internet services everywhere — not the least of which will be in Internet-enabled appliances. Telephony, television, radios and all forms of “print” material will be distributed through Internet. Mobile access to Internet will be provided through advanced cellular radios. Homes will be fully “wired” and appliances managed and controlled through this medium. For example, a washing-machine user may browse a website to find out how a very bad stain on a piece of clothing can be removed. He may then have the appropriate instructions conveyed to this washing machine through the Internet. Cars will also be fully enabled, delivering performance details for maintenance purposes through the Internet. The Internet will have grown to exceed the size of the telephone network and will likely have become the telephone network, in effect. Information will have become a first class “object” in Internet space. The business world will be richly interconnected and the exchange of information will have enabled mass customisation, such as improvements in time inventory management, 24-hour-per-day operations and financial transactions. There may be a time when intelligent agents will roam the Web automatically performing tasks: an auto insurance policy being automatically executed when a car is purchased over the Internet. Or a program could be written to monitor the financial wire to watch interest rates and tell a bank customer when it might be a good idea to refinance his home. What I am working on right now is also a great source of enthusiasm. The project is with the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory developing Interplanetary Internet. It will be an extension of the Internet as we know it today, bringing the connection to Mars and even beyond. It is hoped that a manned mission to Mars will use this technology by 2030.

I: What impact will the Internet have on teaching and learning in particular?
Cerf: Internet will almost surely offer new avenues for teaching and learning. The notion of lifelong learning will take on new meaning, as Internet becomes more and more available, accessible and affordable around the world. The most striking aspect of Internet evolution will be the housing of the world’s knowledge within its framework. Any information that is required will be culled from the Internet. Unlike the print media of the past, digital information can be searched, sorted, analysed and composed with the help of software and computers. By linking millions, if not billions of information resources together, the Internet becomes a treasure house in which the addition of a single datum adds more than a linear amount of value, as it interacts with all the other data contained in the system.

I: There is much discussion about security on the Internet, especially in the area of e-commerce. What do you think are the possible solutions?
Cerf: The best technological approach seems to be based on public key technology (see Signpost) and the development of a public key infrastructure to support authentication and confidentiality. We have some distance to go before such an infrastructure can be widely realised. Apart from technology, there are open questions regarding the liability of certificate issuing authorities, uniformity of personal identification used to obtain certificates and a variety of other non-technical issues. It seems likely that national and international agreements might be needed to provide a framework for such an infrastructure to flourish.

The History of Vinton Cerf and His Net
1967-72
Graduate student at University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Worked at the legendary Professor Len Kleinrock’s laboratory, helping to develop host level protocols of the ARPANET (a government-supported data network that would use the technology which by then had come to be known as packet switching)
1972
Moved to Stanford as part of electrical engineering and computer science faculties
1973
With Bob Kahn, developed the concepts underlying the Internet and presented a preliminary paper in September of that year to the International Network Working Group
1974
In October, led group in a seminar focusing on the detailed development of protocol concepts; late in the year, first full draft of Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) achieved
1975
Continued to lead efforts into developing test implementations into TCP at Stanford, London’s University College, and Bolt Beranek and Newman
1976
Managed packet technology and internetting research programs at the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA)
1977-78
Took first steps to deploy Internet on a wider scale, together with colleagues at ARPA
1979—mid-80s

Led intense development, including:

  • Basic TCP design leading to three-way handshake for establishment of initial sequence numbering at each end of the TCP connection
  • Separation of Internet Protocol (IP) from TCP to permit applications that did not need the reliability and sequencing of the latter. Resulted in the TCP/IP protocol suite. By year-end, all hosts on the ARPA- sponsored networks were running TCP/IP
Late 1982
Joined MCI WorldCom to lead engineering of MCI Mail
The Gateway to Mars and Beyond
MARSATSInterplanetary Internet is conceived by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as an extension of the Internet that will serve as a communications conduit for future missions to Mars and beyond.

The architecture under examination for enabling these capabilities consists of a constellation of microsatellites (Microsats) and one or more relatively large Mars Aerostationary Relay Satellites (MARSats).

The Microsats would serve both as communication relays between Mars exploration elements (landers, rovers, balloons, airplanes and others) and the Earth, and as navigational aids for the exploration elements.

MARSats, on the other hand, would be much like the very high-bandwidth geostationary communications satellites in Earth’s orbit. These satellites orbit the Earth, along its equatorial plane at the same rate as the Earth rotates. In so doing, they are always positioned over the same region on the Earth. In the case of MARSat, however, the satellite would orbit Mars in this fashion, not the Earth.

In both the case of the Microsats and the MARSats, communication with the Mars exploration elements would occur using an Internet protocol similar to what enables communications via Earth’s Internet.

Deployment of a prototype Microsat, tentatively scheduled for 2003, would be the first step in creating this Mars “Internet”. A series of probes will gradually envelope the planet between now and 2040.

Mars will probably be the first of many gateways on the Interplanetary Internet — an Internet that would enable virtual presence throughout the solar system.

According to NASA, the study material in the Mars Network website described above is one possible approach to increasing data rates, connectivity and navigation capability on Mars. As NASA’s plan for Mars exploration progresses, its associated approach to communication and navigation may evolve as well.

Source - Jet Propulsion Laboratory, National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
For further information, please see: http://marsnet.jpl.nasa.gov

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INNOVATION magazine is a joint publication of Nanyang Technological University,
National University of Singapore and World Scientific Publishing Co.