RFC 374

RFC 374 💖 NIC 11099 ✨

okay so bestie, this is RFC 374 🎀 by Alex McKenzie at BBN, NIC 11099, dated 19 July 1972. It's giving early internet gossip, and there are two big updates for every site 👑

NEW IMP SYSTEM IS RELEASED ! 🚀🔥

okay so the new IMP software from the previous RFCs (#331, #343, #359) was apparently released successfully on Tuesday July 18 💅 We ran from 10:00am that day until Wednesday afternoon with very few network problems blamed on the new system. We are literally so happy with how it's doing and we expect to keep the new system up permanently!! 😭🫶

We know that in a system this big, bugs can pop up at any time, so we're asking the whole network community to help hunt them down 🦋 We also think the new system might feel different to users, both terminal users and Hosts. Please be patient while you get used to any change in the "feel" of the network 🌸 Also, PLEASE REPORT ANY SUSPECTED NETWORK MALFUNCTION TO THE NCC AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. Evidence of bugs, guesses about what went wrong, etc. are always useful 🧚 but don't wait for proof before reporting a suspected malfunction 💜 The NCC phone number is (617) 661-0100. Feel free to call collect!! 📞✨

The one known shortcoming of the new software is that it makes a long-standing TIP software problem worse 😬 The TIP now often seems to forget to send an Allocate control message for some active connection, so the Server-to-User path gets blocked. We are treating the fix as our highest priority!! 🔥 Our current data suggests this is most likely to happen when there are several users and the Server Host is a TENEX system. If you know of other situations where this has happened, please let us know!! 🙈

Now that the new system is up, all sites with Model 516 IMPs will get a phone call asking them to set the switches on their IMPs like this 🍓

HALT INH         - on
W.D.T.           - on
AUTO RSTRT       - on
MEMORY PRTCT     - on

SITE POWER PROBLEMS ⚡💀

ngl the network has been going through some serious drama because of the yearly summer problem where everyone needs more electricity than is available 😩 Here's the tea:

• During June, between 1/4 and 1/2 of the IMP down time was because of site power failure. 😭
• During the weekend of July 15-16, two sites were down all weekend because of air-conditioning failure, which was apparently linked to power failures or brownouts 🥵 That left several sites connected to the rest of the net through only one path, and according to Murphy's law, that path eventually failed. Nine sites got partitioned from the rest of the net 💔
• On July 18, an underground power transformer that powered the entire computer room at site 27 failed, knocking IMP 27 out of action for several hours (and it could easily have been several weeks.) 🫠

Obviously, in these cases there's not much the NCC or the site can do to restore service 🙈 We expect these situations to continue or even get worse as the summer goes on. Please try to keep your cool when they happen. We don't like them either!! 🌈🫶

💅 This RFC was put into machine readable form for entry into the online RFC archives by BBN Corp. under the direction of Alex McKenzie. 1/97