The Information Processing Techniques Office of ARPA: One of the sources of modern computing.

The history of ARPA's early years and its incredible involvement in the development of many technologies that shape our modern computing is often overshadowed by, at best, the story of ARPANET, which later gave rise to the Internet.

At the beginning: The incredible shockwaves of Sputnik

The launch of Sputnik 1 by the Soviet Union on October 4, 1957, sent shockwaves through the Western world, primarily because it marked the first time that any country had successfully launched a man-made object into orbit around the Earth.

This event had several profound impacts:

• Technological and Military Implications: The success of Sputnik highlighted the Soviet Union's significant advances in rocket technology, which had direct military implications, particularly in the context of the Cold War. The capability to launch a satellite into space demonstrated potential intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) reach, raising immediate concerns about nuclear security among Western nations, especially the United States.
• Political Impact: Sputnik created a perception of technological lag in the West, particularly in the United States, sparking fears of vulnerability and a loss of global leadership. The event became a pivotal moment in the Cold War, intensifying the arms race and prompting a reassessment of national priorities and capabilities.

In reaction President Ike Eisenhower established the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), now known as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), on February 7, 1958.

The mission of ARPA was to initiate and carry out research and development projects that would push the boundaries of technology and science.

The initial focus included space, but with the creation of NASA in July 1958, ARPA's mission shifted to other diverse research sectors.

In this article, however, we will concentrate on the aspect related to computing through its branch, the Information Processing Techniques Office (IPTO).

The Information Processing Techniques Office (IPTO).

As computing began to rapidly evolve, its strategic importance increased significantly.

In response, a dedicated branch of ARPA was established in 1962, the IPTO which was fortunate to be led by an impressive roster of prominent figures.

• J.C.R. Licklider (1962 - 1964)

Licklider (1915-1990) or simply "Lick," was a pioneering figure in the field of computer science, particularly known for his visionary ideas about interactive computing and the global network.

Licklider earned a PhD in psychoacoustics from the University of Rochester in 1942, exploring how humans interpret sound waves. His academic and professional journey led him through roles that intersected psychology, engineering, and computing.

In the early 1950s, Licklider worked at MIT where his interests shifted towards information technology and computer science.

His seminal paper, "Man-Computer Symbiosis" (1960), proposed that human brains and computing machines would complement each other, functioning cooperatively. This work laid the foundational ideas for human-computer interaction.

After his time at ARPA, Licklider returned to MIT, and later for other institutions, continuously advocating for his vision of interactive computing.

His ideas have profoundly influenced modern computing, especially in the areas of the internet, graphical computing interfaces, and online interaction.

• Ivan Sutherland (1964 - 1966)

Ivan Sutherland (1938-) is a pivotal figure in the history of computer science, renowned for his contributions to computer graphics and interactive computing.

After obtaining his Bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the Carnegie Institute of Technology, Sutherland continued his studies at Caltech, where he earned a Master's degree.

He then moved to MIT for his PhD financed by ARPA, which he completed in 1963.

His doctoral thesis, "Sketchpad: A Man-Machine Graphical Communication System," introduced the first graphical user interface for computers, which laid foundational concepts for the field of computer graphics and user-interface design.

During his tenure, he contributed significantly to the development of computer systems and networks.

His laboratory at the University of Utah is considered the birthplace of 3D Computer Generated Imagery (CGI) and has trained an all-star team in the field.

Sutherland also co-founded Evans & Sutherland with David Evans in 1968, a company that specialized in creating hardware and software for computer graphics. This company played a critical role in the development of graphical applications for both commercial and military purposes.

Throughout his career, Sutherland has received numerous awards for his contributions, including the Turing Award, which he received in 1988 for his work in computer graphics.

• Robert Taylor (1966 - 1969)

Robert Taylor (1932-2010) Taylor's contributions to computer science are foundational, particularly in the areas of computer networking and human-computer interaction.

Taylor earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Texas at Austin and a master's degree in psychology. His interest in technology and human interaction would later deeply influence his work in computing.

Taylor's career took a significant turn when he joined NASA as a project manager, where he first started to appreciate the potential of computer networking.

At IPTO, he was instrumental in funding early research into computer networking, which included the ARPANET, the precursor to the modern Internet.

In 1970, Taylor moved to Xerox PARC, where he founded and led the Computer Science Laboratory.

During his tenure at Xerox PARC, Taylor oversaw the development of key technologies that are fundamental to personal computing today, including the development of the graphical user interface (GUI), the mouse, and Ethernet technology.

He left PARC in 1983, following tensions with its management, to establish the DEC Systems Research Center (SRC), where he brought together a remarkable team that included Butler Lampson, Charles Thacker, and Leslie Lamport, all future Turing Award winners. Among SRC's achievements was the creation of AltaVista, the first search engine to achieve widespread success.

Taylor's vision was that computers should be used as tools to augment human intelligence and facilitate communication, not just as number-crunching machines. His emphasis on user-friendly interfaces and networked communication shaped the future of computing.

For his contributions, Taylor received numerous accolades, including the National Medal of Technology and Innovation.

• Lawrence Roberts (1969 - 1973)

Lawrence Roberts (1937-2018) attended MIT, where he earned both his bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering, followed by a Ph.D. in the same field.

His early work at MIT involved the development of one of the first computer networks, the TX-2, an experimental computer designed for large-scale graphical processing and networking experiments.

In 1966, Roberts was recruited by Robert Taylor, the director of the IPTO, to further the development of computer networks.

Roberts became the chief scientist of the ARPANET project in 1967.

His pioneering work involved setting the technical foundations of the network, including the introduction of packet switching—a method for effectively transmitting electronic data—which revolutionized communications.

Roberts also co-designed the original ARPANET protocol, the Network Control Protocol (NCP), and played a critical role in the transition to the more modern Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), which remains the basis for today’s internet communications.

After his tenure at IPTO, Roberts continued to influence the field of networking as the CEO of Telenet, the first packet-switched network accessible to the public, and through various other leadership roles in the tech industry.

Lawrence Roberts' contributions to computer networking have earned him multiple accolades, including induction into the Internet Hall of Fame.

These four directors shared a common vision for the mission of the IPTO: to fund risky, out-of-the-box projects that may have long-term but significant returns on investment for the technological prowess not only of the U.S. military but also of the nation, rather than focusing on quick practical applications.

An approach that closely resembles that of genuine private venture capitalists.

Upon assuming leadership of the IPTO, Licklider's first initiatives were to fund and support the establishment of computer science departments at several leading universities, and to advance research in time-sharing and networking.

The laboratories and research projects emerging from the IPTO during the period from 1962 to 1972 were numerous and varied in their levels of success.

I will now share some of the most significant ones with you.

SRI, Douglas Engelbart, The Mother of All Demos

Douglas Engelbart was a pioneering computer engineer who is most famously known for his 1968 presentation, referred to as "The Mother of All Demos."

This demonstration was groundbreaking as it introduced several key concepts of modern computing for the first time, including the computer mouse, video conferencing, hypertext, word processing, hypermedia, object addressing and dynamic file linking, as well as a collaborative real-time editor.

Engelbart's work at SRI (Stanford Research Institute) was significantly supported by the IPTO, which was headed by J.C.R. Licklider at the time Engelbart received his funding.

Licklider's vision of a man-computer symbiosis influenced Engelbart, who shared similar ideas about augmenting human intellect through computers.

Everyone who attended the Fall Joint Computer Conference in San Francisco in 1968 felt as though they were witnessing the future.

Indeed, the future they glimpsed then came to fruition through the subsequent work at Xerox PARC and later Apple.

For those who don't know the Mother Of All Demos, here's a short post with a video dedicated, and beware: it's a real head turner! ??

https://lnkd.in/d5mv_-XX

The creation and strengthening of Computer Science departments

IPTO played a crucial role in the establishment and development of several computer science departments across the United States during the 1960s

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - was a major hub for early computer science research.
• Stanford University - Stanford's computer science department, along with the Stanford Research Institute (SRI), were significant recipients of IPTO funding.
• University of California, Berkeley - received significant ARPANET-related research funding and has been a leader in computer science.
• Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) - has a history of strong ties to ARPA-funded research, particularly in the development of artificial intelligence and robotics.
• University of Utah - Notably influential in the development of computer graphics, the University of Utah's computer science program received substantial support from IPTO.

Virtually all computer science departments established or developed by universities in the 1960s were supported by the IPTO.

This not only led to numerous groundbreaking research projects but also trained a significant number of professionals, many of whom would go on to shape the computing landscape of the future.

One of the birthplaces of 3D CGI: Ivan Sutherland's laboratory

In 1965, David Evans founded the computer science department at the University of Utah, heavily funded by IPTO.

In 1968, he recruited Ivan Sutherland, who had been a professor at Harvard following his departure as director of the IPTO.

One of Sutherland's conditions for joining was the establishment of a company that would work in synergy with the laboratory.

This led to the creation of Evans & Sutherland, a groundbreaking venture in computer graphics and visualization technology.

3D visualization technologies offered significant potential, particularly for applications such as CAD (Computer-Aided Design) and flight simulators.

A substantial portion of the funding for these developments came from IPTO.

The list of PhD graduates from the early years is truly an all-star lineup :

• John Warnock (1940-2023), future pillar of PARC, creator of PostScript, and co-founder of Adobe.
• Alan Kay (1940-), the father of Smalltalk and a significant contributor to Object-Oriented Programming, a key figure at PARC before moving on to Atari and later Apple, recipient of the prestigious Turing Award.
• Ed Catmull (1945-)? future co-founder of Pixar, president of Disney Animation, recipient of the prestigious Turing Award.
• James Clark (1944-) is a prominent figure in hardware architecture for 3D graphics and co-founder of Silicon Graphics, as well as co-founder of Netscape.
• Henry Fuchs (1948-), one of the fathers of 3D rendering, Real Time and Virtual Reality
• Frank Crow, the father of anti-aliasing techniques and Yet Another key figure at PARC, who later joined Apple.
• Fred Parke (1943-), even Miley Cyrus highlighted his work on facial modeling and animation in her 2013 music video "We Can't Stop," which is quite a recognition.??
• Henri Gouraud (1944-), best known for his contributions to computer graphics, particularly the development of the Gouraud shading technique, which revolutionized the rendering of 3D objects by simulating smooth lighting transitions across surfaces.
• Bùi T??ng Phong (1942–1975) was a Vietnamese-born computer scientist and pioneer in the field of computer graphics. He is best known for developing the Phong shading technique and the Phong reflection model, which are foundational in rendering realistic 3D graphics by simulating light interactions on surfaces.

3D CGI being my area of expertise, you can explore more details about this iconic place in the field through the article I dedicated to Henri Gouraud by following this link.

https://lnkd.in/d87ZiCdU

The Race for the Holy Grail of Time-Sharing

One of the major challenges of the 1960s, heavily funded by the IPTO and often forgotten today, was the race for time-sharing, a concept that allowed multiple users to interact with a single computer simultaneously.

This is why I will take a closer look at it.

• Compatible Time-Sharing System (CTSS) - MIT

Developed by MIT's Project MAC in the early 1960s, CTSS was one of the first operational time-sharing systems.

• Multics (Multiplexed Information and Computing Service) - MIT, Bell Labs, GE

A successor to CTSS, Multics was designed as a highly reliable and secure time-sharing system.

It introduced key concepts in operating systems, including hierarchical file systems and dynamic linking.

Although Multics was complex and costly, it influenced the design of modern operating systems, particularly UNIX.

• Berkeley Timesharing System - UC Berkeley

This system focused on advancing time-sharing technology and its applications.

• System Development Corporation (SDC) Time-Sharing - RAND Corporation

SDC created one of the first time-sharing systems for military and government use, focusing on secure multi-user environments.

• Time-Sharing Experiments at Carnegie Mellon University

Carnegie Mellon used IPTO support to explore interactive computing, with significant contributions to programming languages and operating systems for shared environments.

These time-sharing systems laid the groundwork for interactive computing, user-friendly operating systems, and eventually personal computing.

IPTO's funding and vision were critical in fostering the development of technologies that made computing accessible to more users, enabling the transition from batch processing to interactive systems.

This shift was a cornerstone of modern computing, influencing everything from software development to networking and human-computer interaction.

The first age of artificial intelligence

IPTO played a pivotal role in the early development of artificial intelligence (AI) by funding foundational research at leading institutions such as MIT, Stanford, and Carnegie Mellon University.

These investments catalyzed many breakthroughs in AI concepts and technologies that are still influential today.

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT): Project MAC

Natural Language Processing (NLP): Early work on understanding and generating human language.

Robotics: Development of mechanical systems capable of performing tasks like object manipulation.

AI Pioneers Involved: Marvin Minsky (co-founder of the MIT AI Lab), Seymour Papert (work on AI and education, such as LOGO programming).

• Stanford University: Stanford Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (SAIL)

Shakey the Robot: Was one of the first robots to incorporate reasoning and navigation in a physical space.

Heuristic Programming Project (HPP): Focused on applying AI to solve complex problems, such as in medicine and mathematics.

AI Pioneers Involved: John McCarthy (co-creator of Lisp, coined the term "artificial intelligence"), Edward Feigenbaum (expert systems pioneer).

• Carnegie Mellon University (CMU): Logic Theorist and AI Applications

Logic Theorist: Developed by Allen Newell and Herbert Simon, this program was an early AI system that could prove mathematical theorems.

General Problem Solver (GPS): A first step towards creating general-purpose AI systems capable of reasoning.

Speech Understanding Research: Early work on systems capable of recognizing and processing spoken language.

AI Pioneers Involved: Allen Newell, Herbert Simon, Raj Reddy (speech and robotics).

Despite confronting the initial AI winter, this first wave of research still managed to explore numerous new avenues and identify various dead ends, paving the way for future advancements.

ARPANET

ARPANET is the most well-known legacy of ARPA, and I won't go into detail about its history and key figures.

This topic warrants a dedicated article, given the wealth of high-quality coverage already available.

Instead, the focus here is on the visions and motivations of J.C.R. Licklider and Bob Taylor, specifically their efforts to facilitate resource sharing between remote computers.

As early as 1960, following his seminal article "Man-Computer Symbiosis," J.C.R. Licklider recognized the benefits and power of interconnected machines in time-sharing systems.

The motivations of J.C.R. Licklider and Bob Taylor aligned perfectly with the ethos of the IPTO at the time: their goal was not to create a network solely for military use, but rather to enhance laboratory productivity by facilitating the interconnection of these facilities.

As with the other programs, the technological benefits for the US military would be an indirect consequence.

Although financed by Pentagon funds, ARPANET was a civilian network, not a military one.

Can you imagine the Pentagon generals sharing their network with the West Coast beatniks of the late '60s? (In '69 Ronald Reagan, then governor of California, finally sent in the state's National Guard to quell the protests at Berkeley.)

When the Party's Over

This early era of ARPA was marked by extraordinary creative freedom, where funding was ample and researchers operated with a remarkable degree of autonomy, unburdened by the usual Pentagon technocracy and bureaucracy.

The organization was characterized by short decision-making chains, where scientists themselves were the decision-makers, fostering a culture of risk-taking and innovation.

There was a close rapport between funders and researchers, fostering an environment conducive to groundbreaking developments.

However, the often brilliant outcomes of these ventures were sometimes difficult for generals, politicians, and lawmakers on Capitol Hill to fully appreciate or understand.

How could they have imagined in the early 1970s the profound impact that all their work, including ARPANET, would have on the power of the USA in the decades to come?

And it was Senator Michael Joseph Mansfield who blew the whistle on a return to “reasonableness”.

The 1973 Mansfield Amendment sharply curtailed defense research funding through the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), which is notably independent from military operations, by stipulating that funds be allocated only to projects with direct military applications.

This legislative change dramatically cut ARPA's support for many university-based computer science initiatives.

To clearly signify the shift in focus, the "D" for Defense was added to ARPA, transforming it into DARPA.

Consequently, numerous American computer science experts moved to private research institutions like Xerox PARC.

Paradoxically, this migration is often lauded for accelerating the growth of the modern computer technology industry.

Here’s a list of some notable Xerox PARC researchers with ties to IPTO:

• Butler Lampson co-founder of Xerox PARC, previously worked at Berkeley, which had received IPTO funding for various projects. At PARC, Lampson was involved in the development of the Alto personal computer and contributed to a wide array of computing technologies.

• Robert Taylor founded and managed the Computer Science Laboratory at PARC, where he played a key role in creating an environment that catalyzed numerous advancements in computing and was instrumental in recruiting top talent to the team.
• Alan Kay was involved in the FLEX machine project at the University of Utah, which was IPTO-funded. At PARC, Kay contributed significantly to the development of object-oriented programming and was the principal architect behind the Smalltalk system, which greatly influenced modern GUIs.
• John Warnock another alumni of Sutherland's laboratory significantly contributed to the development of graphics standards, particularly through his work on the Interpress protocol, a precursor to the PostScript language.

• Charles Thacker worked at the Berkeley Computer Corporation, a project influenced in part by IPTO initiatives, before joining Xerox PARC. At PARC, he was a lead designer of the Alto computer and played a crucial role in developing Ethernet and advancing other key technologies.

• Bob Metcalfe after working at MIT on projects that were part of the IPTO-funded ARPANET development, Bob Metcalfe moved to PARC, where he co-invented Ethernet.

• Chuck Geschke conducted IPTO-supported research in computer science at Carnegie Mellon University before joining PARC, where he worked on the development of the Interpress graphics protocol and the PostScript page description language.

In fact, a colossal proportion of the first PARC teams benefited in one way or another from IPTO funds.

And of course, it wasn't just Xerox PARC that benefited from the excellence of those who were trained by IPTO-funded projects, but the entire ecosystem.

IPTO 1962-1972: A look back from 2024

This period of just over 10 years remains a unique time of creativity and freedom that not only led to the emergence of many essential technologies but also helped train those who would play a significant role in shaping our current computing landscape.

The four directors from this period could proudly say that they contributed incredibly to the power of the USA, whether from an economic, cultural, strategic, and of course, military perspective.

Taking inflation into account, it is estimated that during this period, IPTO investments ranged from $600 million to $1 billion.

More than fifty years later, the return on investment has been substantial :

• The laboratories and educational programs established with its assistance remain among the most prestigious in the world today, having educated thousands of talented tech entrepreneurs and innovators, and yielding hundreds of significant innovations.
• Indirectly, the funding of these laboratories also nourished a broad ecosystem of companies, enabling many of them to emerge and innovate.
• A culture of risk-taking, out-of-the-box thinking, entrepreneurship, and innovation was reinforced and helped shape much of the mindset of Silicon Valley.
• Many projects carried out have, over the decades, taken on a prominent role in our lives and economies :

-> All our Operating Systems owe something to the work on time-sharing.

-> GUIs have become the standard, just like interactivity.

-> Real-time 3D and CAD/CAM are essentials in many sectors, from entertainment and industry to military applications.

-> And of course, ARPANET, which evolved into the Internet, has become a cornerstone of our world since the creation of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee.

• Only the first wave of work on AI did not have the anticipated effects.

To paraphrase Churchill: Rarely have so many innovations owed so much to so few men.??

This decade was truly a golden age of innovation in our sector, and the IPTO holds a remarkable place in it that should not be forgotten.??

PS : For those of my readers who experienced this period or have firsthand information that could correct any errors and inaccuracies in the sources that allowed me to write this article, please do not hesitate to share in the comments.