Cambridge Ring (computer network)

Last updated

Cambridge Ring Cambridge Ring.jpg
Cambridge Ring

The Cambridge Ring was an experimental local area network architecture developed at the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge starting in 1974 [1] and continuing into the 1980s. It was a ring network with a theoretical limit of 255 nodes (though such a large number would have badly affected performance), around which cycled a fixed number of packets. Free packets would be "loaded" with data by a sending machine, marked as received by the destination machine, and "unloaded" on return to the sender; thus in principle, there could be as many simultaneous senders as packets.

Contents

The network ran over twin twisted-pair cabling (plus a fibre-optic section) at a raw data rate of 10 megabits/sec. [2] There are strong similarities between the Cambridge Ring and an earlier ring network developed at Bell Labs based on a design by John R. Pierce. [3] [4] [5] That network used T1 lines at bit rate of 1.544 MHz and accommodating 522 bit messages (data plus address).

People associated with the project include Andy Hopper, David Wheeler, Maurice Wilkes, and Roger Needham. [6] [7] A 1980 study by Peter Cowley reported several commercial implementors of elements of the network, ranging from Ferranti (producing gate arrays), Inmos (a semiconductor manufacturer), Linotype Paul, Logica VTS, MDB Systems, and Toltec Data (a design company who manufactured interface boards). [8]

In 2002, the Computer Laboratory launched a graduate society called the Cambridge Computer Lab Ring named after the Cambridge Ring. [9]

See also

Related Research Articles

The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is one of the main protocols of the Internet protocol suite. It originated in the initial network implementation in which it complemented the Internet Protocol (IP). Therefore, the entire suite is commonly referred to as TCP/IP. TCP provides reliable, ordered, and error-checked delivery of a stream of octets (bytes) between applications running on hosts communicating via an IP network. Major internet applications such as the World Wide Web, email, remote administration, and file transfer rely on TCP, which is part of the Transport layer of the TCP/IP suite. SSL/TLS often runs on top of TCP.

A virtual circuit (VC) is a means of transporting data over a data network, based on packet switching and in which a connection is first established across the network between two endpoints. The network, rather than having a fixed data rate reservation per connection as in circuit switching, takes advantage of the statistical multiplexing on its transmission links, an intrinsic feature of packet switching.

In telecommunications, packet switching is a method of grouping data into packets that are transmitted over a digital network. Packets are made of a header and a payload. Data in the header is used by networking hardware to direct the packet to its destination, where the payload is extracted and used by an operating system, application software, or higher layer protocols. Packet switching is the primary basis for data communications in computer networks worldwide.

In telecommunications, message switching involves messages routed in their entirety, one hop at a time. It evolved from circuit switching and was the precursor of packet switching.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Physical Laboratory (United Kingdom)</span> National measurement institution of the UK

The National Physical Laboratory (NPL) is the national measurement standards laboratory of the United Kingdom. It sets and maintains physical standards for British industry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">ARPANET</span> Early packet switching network (1969–1990), one of the first to implement TCP/IP

The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was the first wide-area packet-switched network with distributed control and one of the first computer networks to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the technical foundation of the Internet. The ARPANET was established by the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) of the United States Department of Defense.

Packet Switch Stream (PSS) was a public data network in the United Kingdom, provided by British Telecommunications (BT). It operated from the late 1970s through to the mid 2000s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Department of Computer Science and Technology, University of Cambridge</span> Computer science division at the University of Cambridge

The Department of Computer Science and Technology, formerly the Computer Laboratory, is the computer science department of the University of Cambridge. As of 2023 it employed 56 faculty members, 45 support staff, 105 research staff, and about 205 research students. The current Head of Department is Professor Alastair Beresford.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Wheeler (computer scientist)</span> British computer scientist (1927–2004)

David John Wheeler was a computer scientist and professor of computer science at the University of Cambridge.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roger Moore (computer scientist)</span> American computer scientist, 1939–2019

Roger D. Moore was the 1973 recipient of the Grace Murray Hopper Award from the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). It was given "for their work in the design and implementation of APL\360, setting new standards in simplicity, efficiency, reliability and response time for interactive systems."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andy Hopper</span> British computer scientist

Sir Andrew Hopper is a British-Polish computer technologist and entrepreneur. He is treasurer and vice-president of the Royal Society, Professor of Computer Technology, former Head of the University of Cambridge Department of Computer Science and Technology, an Honorary Fellow of Trinity Hall, Cambridge and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Titan (1963 computer)</span>

Titan was the prototype of the Atlas 2 computer developed by Ferranti and the University of Cambridge Mathematical Laboratory in Cambridge, England. It was designed starting in 1963, and in operation from 1964 to 1973.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Number One Electronic Switching System</span> Defunct telecommunications node in the United States; part of the Bell System

The Number One Electronic Switching System (1ESS) was the first large-scale stored program control (SPC) telephone exchange or electronic switching system in the Bell System. It was manufactured by Western Electric and first placed into service in Succasunna, New Jersey, in May 1965. The switching fabric was composed of a reed relay matrix controlled by wire spring relays which in turn were controlled by a central processing unit (CPU).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alexander G. Fraser</span> British-American computer scientist (1937–2022)

Alexander G. Fraser, also known as A. G. Fraser and Sandy Fraser, was a noted British-American computer scientist and the former Chief Scientist of AT&T.

In computing, a firewall is a network security system that monitors and controls incoming and outgoing network traffic based on predetermined security rules. A firewall typically establishes a barrier between a trusted network and an untrusted network, such as the Internet.

The Symposium on Operating Systems Principles (SOSP), organized by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), is one of the most prestigious single-track academic conferences on operating systems.

The Cambridge Distributed Computing System is an early discontinued distributed operating system, developed in the 1980s at Cambridge University. It grew out of the Cambridge Ring local area network, which it used to interconnect computers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">NPL network</span> Historical network in England pioneering packet switching

The NPL network, or NPL Data Communications Network, was a local area computer network operated by a team from the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in London that pioneered the concept of packet switching.

Roger Anthony Scantlebury is a British computer scientist who worked at the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) and later at Logica.

References

  1. ↑ "A brief informal history of the Computer Laboratory". University of Cambridge. 20 December 2001. Archived from the original on 13 November 2010.
  2. ↑ Roger Needham (1979). "Systems Aspects of the Cambridge Ring". Symposium on Operating Systems Principles : 82–85. doi:10.1145/800215.806573.
  3. ↑ John R. Pierce, Network for Block Switching of Data, Bell System Technical Journal, Vol. 51, No. 6 (July–August, 1972); pages 1133-1145.
  4. ↑ W. J. Kropfl, An Experimental Data Block Switching System, Bell System Technical Journal, Vol. 51, No. 6 (July–August, 1972); pages 1147-1165.
  5. ↑ C. H. Coker, An Experimental Interconnection of Computers Through a Loop, Bell System Technical Journal, Vol. 51, No. 6 (July–August, 1972); pages 1167-1175.
  6. ↑ Andrew Hopper; Roger Needham. "The Cambridge Fast Ring Networking System" (PDF). Orl-88-1. doi:10.1109/12.5983.
  7. ↑ Andy Hopper (2016). Prof. Andy Hopper - The Cambridge Ring and the Computer Lab. Cambridge, UK: Centre for Computing History – via YouTube.
  8. ↑ "The Ring" (PDF). Cambridge Computer Lab Ring. 2005. pp. 12–13.
  9. ↑ "Cambridge Computer Lab Ring". Cambridge Computer Laboratory. 2024.


Crystal Clear app network.png

This computer networking article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.