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Historic IEEE 802 Group Looks Back and Forward

Posted by samzenpus on from the state-of-things dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The IEEE MAN/LAN Standards Committee — better known as the people who brought us Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth — is celebrating its 30th anniversary next week. This article has interviews with the original committee chairman and other veteran members, and reveals some of the inside situation. It also looks at some of the upcoming 802.x standards including one that sends data by modulating visible light."

7 of 45 comments (clear)

  1. IEEE Bluetooth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    IEEE did not develop the Bluetooth standard

    1. Re:IEEE Bluetooth? by east+coast · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The IEEE didn't develop any of the mentioned technologies. They just standardized them.

      --
      Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
  2. Upcoming? by silverdr · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Don't we use visible light in optic fibre for some time now? ;-)

    --
    Now, mod me down freely. My karma can't get any worse...
  3. Re:So let me just get this straight by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Just a little pompous? The miracle is that equipment from hundreds of different suppliers can inter-operate at all. As imperfect as it is, I have a lot of admiration for the IEEE standardisation process, for what it has achieved. Those who work with IEEE standards (distinct from those who use the final product) will grumble about shortcomings, but still get excited when you can plug "A" into "B" and it works.

  4. Wonderful... by elFarto+the+2nd · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ...prehaps they could get around to increasing MTU from 1500.

  5. Ah, the ol' 802.3 gang... by BubbaDave · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Cool. I've worked with Paul Nikolich (when ADC broadband bought bought the CMTS company he was at), and have run into some of this cast of characters during the 802.3ah Ethernet in the First Mile meetings. Interesting folks.

    I think it was Geoff (I could be wrong, this was a while ago) that said we would not need high-speed uplink from the home because 'there just isn't that much relevant content out there'. That was a pretty good chuckler.

    I'm sure Michael Coden of Codenoll feels snubbed, he always claimed to me he was the co-inventor of ethernet.Never believed him.
    He did pioneer one interesting product- a distributed ethernet switch that would operate over a unidirectional fiber ring- worked pretty well after I fixed the gaping hole in his protocol.

    Dave

  6. Small correction by dtmos · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The official name of 802 is the IEEE 802 "LAN/MAN Standards Committee," not the other way around.