[ntp:questions] bitsy.mit.edu retired?

Rick Jones rick.jones2 at hp.com
Sat Aug 16 00:51:21 UTC 2008


Richard B. Gilbert <rgilbert88 at comcast.net> wrote:
> David L. Mills wrote:
> > Bitsy.mit.edu is alive, but not running NTP for whatever reason.
> > 
> > Bitsy.udel.edu was among the first public timetellers in the
> > world, including clepsydra.decwrl.com and fuzzball dcn1.arpa
> > (128.4.1.1). They first chimed circa 1984. Of the three, only
> > 128.4.1.1 has public chime, but now a Pentium called
> > rackety.udel.edu.

> Ten years is about three lifetimes in computer years.  You can keep
> an old box running for longer but many people don't run them even
> that long!

> Sooner or later you get to the point where the poor old thing can't
> run something you want to run; the applications you need, need more
> RAM than the box will hold or need more CPU cycles than the box can
> do.  Then it's a paper weight or a door stop!

> Bitsy may have found a place in the Computer History Museum.  Or
> maybe a place in a dumpster.

Specifics of systems named bitsy or with an IP of 128.4.1.1 asside,
since a system's hostname and IP can be passed-on from one generation
of hardware to another, that a name/IP has been active for N units of
time cannot really be used as an accurate estimate of the age of the
hardware behind it :)

I've had several systems over a number of years called
tardy.cup.hp.com...

rick jones
-- 
portable adj, code that compiles under more than one compiler
these opinions are mine, all mine; HP might not want them anyway... :)
feel free to post, OR email to rick.jones2 in hp.com but NOT BOTH...




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