Summary

Tim Berners-Lee discusses the foundations of the World Wide Web and its development. The original idea behind the web was to create a decentralized web-like structure modeled after the human brain. He believed that the web could become a powerful means for collaboration between people and computers.

Key Takeaways

• Foundations of WWW: Modeled after brain’s web-like structure, an “emergent global brain”
  • Original idea was to form a web of information about CERN infra
  • Every node must be connected by relationship / link (internal and external)
  • Decentralized, used hypertext and TCP/IP standard protocols to encourage adoption; flexible, universal
• Tim Berners-Lee’s dream: Web becomes powerful means for collaboration between people, between computers
• W3C: Consortium to develop, maintain minimum standards for web - keep it open, widely adoptable
• Mosaic became overly synonymous with the web - Andreessen was first developer to push adoption

Notes

Chapter 1

• Married hypertext and internet
• Original idea was to form a web of information about CERN infra
• Every node had to be connected by relationship (link: internal and external)
• Relationships provide meaning to content much like brain
• Decentralized, used hypertext to encourage adoption due to flexibility
• IP and TCP to transmit information over internet vs manually wiring up computers
• First web server on NeXT computer
• URL to preserve address if server changed
• Needed to be universal

Chapter 2

• Spread to US through physics laboratory
• Web first written in Objc, converted to C
• Web clients had to be written for other OSs
• Mark Andreessen was first browser developer to take feedback, push adoption
• Mosaic became overly synonymous with the web, Andreessen made hard push

Chapter 3

• Needed consortium to develop standards for web to keep it open, widely adoptable
• W3C: MIT and CERN
• Goal: establish only minimum standards
• PICS to regulate content, banning pornography deemed unconstitutional
• DNS: hierarchical system of servers that map web address to IP address
  • 5 computers with master list
  • Root domains (com, org, gov) administers have most authority

Chapter 4

• Designer’s dream:
  • Web becomes powerful means for collaboration between people
  • Collaboration between computers
• Chose markup over programming language so human interpretable, wouldn’t crash
• The web as an emergent global brain