Robert “Bob” Metcalfe ’69, a research affiliate of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) and an honorary life member of the MIT Corporation, has been awarded the 2022 Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Award for his invention of Ethernet AM Turing Award. The award, often called the “Nobel Prize of computing,” comes with a $1 million prize provided by Google.
Metcalfe is the founder of 3Com Corporation, which designs, develops and manufactures computer network equipment and software and is credited by the ACM with “inventing, standardizing and commercializing Ethernet”, the earliest and most widely used Ethernet is one of the network technologies. 3Com, Metcalf’s Silicon Valley startup founded in 1979, helped make Ethernet commercially viable by selling networking software, Ethernet transceivers, and Ethernet cards for small computers and workstations. When IBM introduced the personal computer, 3Com introduced the first Ethernet interface for the IBM PC and its clones.
Metcalfe is currently a research affiliate in computational engineering at MIT and, after 11 years at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is also professor emeritus of electrical and computer engineering. Metcalf graduated from MIT in 1969 with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and industrial management.
“The profound impact Bob’s work has had on computer science and the world cannot be overstated,” said Daniela Rus, director of CSAIL and the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Professor in MIT’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS). . “With the invention of Ethernet, it enabled seamless communication and information sharing, paving the way for countless applications that have become integral to our daily lives. From the Internet to online video streaming and more, Ethernet forms the foundation of modern technology and changed the way we connect. It would be difficult to understand life without the connectivity that Ethernet provides.”
Ethernet, start
Metcalfe’s famous 1973 memo on “Broadcast Communications Networks” proposed connecting the first personal computer, PARC’s Altos, into a building, paving the way for devices to communicate with each other and share information in local area networks . The first Ethernet had a speed of 2.94 megabits per second, approximately 10,000 times faster than the terminal network it replaced. The memo recommends that the network should adapt to new technologies such as fiber optics, twisted pair, Wi-Fi and power networks, and replace the original coaxial cable as the primary communication method with “over Ethernet.” This contribution was later immortalized in their 1976 work. Communications of the ACM Article “Ethernet: Distributed Packet Switching for Local Computer Networks.”
But what came before Ethernet? Metcalf likes to call it a form of luck. “My first assignment at Xerox was to put it on the ARPANET, which I had done for Project MAC. I built the necessary hardware and software, and Xerox connected it. Later, Xerox Palo Alto The goal of the research center’s Computer Science Laboratory was to create the first modern personal computer and have one on every desk – imagine that,” he said. “So they asked me to design a network for this purpose. I got a network card with 60 chips. It was the second luckiest thing in my life. The first child was born to my parents.”
Metcalfe isn’t alone in his pursuit of efficient network communications. He was also linked to Ethernet co-inventor David Boggs, who died last year. Metcalf and Boggs began to avoid using wires, but the idea was short-lived. “We went to a place at the University of Hawaii that had packet wireless and discovered right away that we couldn’t use a neutral wire. The radio was too big, too expensive, and slow. We had to have more than zero wires, so we decided to have one. This one Wires will be shared between connected computers.”
standardize things
Metcalfe and Boggs formulated the recipes for Jerrold Tap, Manchester encoding, and ALOHA random retransmissions that gave Ethernet a completely new look. The first method pierces the coaxial cable and connects to the center conductor without cutting the cable. Manchester encoding allows the clock to be within the packet. Finally, ALOHA random retransmissions are allowed in rounds. The two then built many sites and connected them to Ethernet and wrote network protocols to use it.
“We had to develop an Ethernet standard. I served as the so-called ‘marriage broker’ connecting Digital Equipment Corporation, then the second largest computer company in the world, Intel Corporation, a brand new semiconductor company, and Xerox Corporation, a large systems supplier,” Metcalfe said. “We created the DIX Ethernet standard and submitted it to the IEEE. After a few painful years, it became standardized. Then a big war broke out, a three-way battle between the Ethernet companies and IBM and General Motors. General Motors Cars failed quickly, but IBM hung on for 20 years. All of them wanted their technology to be the standard everyone used to connect computers. Ethernet won.”
Today, Ethernet is the dominant channel for wired network communications worldwide, handling data rates from 10 gigabits per second (Gbps) to 400 gigabits per second (Gbps), with 800 Gbps and 1.6 Gbps technologies emerging. Therefore, Ethernet has also become a huge market. According to the International Data Corporation, the revenue of Ethernet switches alone will exceed US$30 billion in 2021.
Life at MIT
MIT has long been Metcalf’s second home, and he can’t stay away from it for too long.
From 1970 to 1972, he worked in JCR Licklider’s Dynamic Modeling Systems Group on connecting MIT to the ARPANET. “It all happens on the ninth floor of Tech Square — where all the interesting things in the world happen,” Metcalf said. “In 1979, after I left Xerox, I came back to MIT and became a consultant to Michael Dertouzos. I was selling Ethernet, and Mike’s people were selling something called Token Ring. stuff. He and I were on opposite sides of a big debate. He was for Token Ring, I was for Ethernet. Dertouzos wanted me to join that fight, which I did for most of 1979, at During this time, I founded the company 3Com during my time at LCS.”
Metcalf has been a member of the MIT Corporation since 1992. In 1997-98 he served as president of the MIT Alumni Association. During the 2015-16 academic year, he served as a Visiting Innovation Fellow in the MIT Innovation Initiative and the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, where he mentored students in various entrepreneurial activities. In 2022, Metcalf joined CSAIL as a research affiliate to conduct computational engineering research.
Jeff Dean, senior fellow at Google and senior vice president of research and artificial intelligence at Google, said in an official ACM statement: “Ethernet is the foundational technology of the Internet, supporting more than 5 billion users and facilitating modern life.” “Today, the world’s approximately With 7 billion ports, Ethernet is so ubiquitous that we take it for granted. However, it’s easy to forget that without Bob Metcalfe’s invention and his enduring “every computer must be networked” Vision, our connected world will be different.”
Past Turing Award winners who have taught at MIT include Sir Tim Berners-Lee (2017), Michael Stonebraker (2014), Shafi Goldwasser and Silvio Micali (2013), Barbara Liskov (2008), Ronald Rivest (2002) , Butler Lampson (1992) ), Fernando Corbato (1990), John McCarthy (1971), and Marvin Minsky (1969).
Metcalf will officially receive the AM Turing Award at the annual ACM Awards Dinner on June 10 this year at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco.