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Who Invented Packet-Switching?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the battle-of-giants dept.

Saint Aardvark writes "It's how the Internet works, and now who invented packet-switching is under dispute. A posthumous paper by British scientist Dr. Donald Davies disputes the claim by Leonard Kleinrock to have invented the technique, saying Kleinrock never took it beyond the case of a single node. Kleinrock, whose lab was the first node on Arpanet, is willing to concede that Davies invented the term "packet-switching.""

10 of 161 comments (clear)

  1. This one is easy ... by BESTouff · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... it's Microsoft, of course !

    1. Re:This one is easy ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Sigh, another victim of Microsoft propoganda. The answer is clearly Al Gore.

      (yes I know he really never said he invented the Internet)

  2. Word on the street by gmkeegan · · Score: 4, Funny

    I could have sworn that it was Al Gore. He put all of the packets into a lockbox, then switched it for another lockbox.

  3. Let me get something straight by Mignon · · Score: 5, Funny
    A posthumous paper...

    I thought it was "publish or perish." Now you're telling me it's "publish and perish"?

    I'm glad I got out of academia.

    1. Re:Let me get something straight by Mignon · · Score: 3, Funny
      Moderation Totals: Troll=1, ...

      That must have been my former advisor.

  4. A Posthumous Paper? by z84976 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Ye Gads!!! Forget packetswiching, this person has learned to communicate from beyond the grave!!

  5. Al wins by majority by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Dr. Donald Davies = 0 votes, Leonard Kleinrock = 0 votes, Al Gore = 4, microsoft = 1, the "I did" votes don't count. And I give 1 vote to CowboyNeal !

  6. This is ridiculous... by mellonhead · · Score: 2, Funny

    Next thing you know someone will claim Steve Jobs didn't invent the GUI and Bill Gates didn't write DOS...

  7. Bill Gates and Microsoft invented packets by Ukab+the+Great · · Score: 3, Funny

    Bill explained this quite clearly at his press conference yesterday. If Microsoft didn't invent TCP/IP, open source never would have made it.

  8. Sun invented it. by laserjet · · Score: 2, Funny

    Sun, being the DOT in Dot Com, invented everything that made the internet possible. Of course, this was back in the 80's when they hired Al Gore to head the whole project. Quite a successful venture, that.

    --
    Moon Macrosystems. Sun's biggest competitor.