Rather than approaching it as a science, students are merely told to memorize the specifications of the existing deployed devices. I get frustrated with how networking is taught in many places. What changes do you think need to be made to the way engineers and computer scientists are taught? Many network protocol designers learned the field from your books, and keep a copy on their bookshelves. And, try to think about and understand various approaches, and the tradeoffs between various choices. This is a combination of 'what customers are asking for', 'what customers don't even know they want yet' and 'what can be solved with something simple to understand and manage'. Start out with finding the right problem to solve. What advice would you give to fellow engineers? TRILL will fix these problems, but do it in a way that is completely compatible with everything. While spanning tree-based Ethernet was popular because of its simplicity and ability to self-configure, it didn't make optimal use of bandwidth, and was, for subtle geeky reasons, somewhat fragile. The thing that happened to be there at the right time isn’t necessarily better than the other ones.'Īt DDSN we believe in working hard and creating easy-to-use digital platforms for our clients to make their operations more efficient, so that they can focus on what they do the best.Ironically, one of the things I've been working on these days is replacing the spanning tree with a new technology, being standardized in IETF, called 'TRILL' (Transparent Interconnection of Lots of Links). And sometimes, things get invented multiple times until the time just happens to be right. Fun Factĭr Perlman disapproves of her title as Mother of the Internet because she says 'I did indeed make some fundamental contributions to the underlying infrastructure, but no single technology really caused the Internet to succeed. Radia has delivered keynote speeches across the world, and is still a computer programmer and engineer for Dell EMC. More recently she has invented the TRILL protocol to correct some of the shortcomings of spanning-trees. She also made large contributions to many other areas of network design and standardization, such as link-state routing protocols. She is renowned for her invention of the spanning-tree protocol (STP), which is fundamental to the operation of network bridges, while working for Digital Equipment Corporation. Radia Perlman is an American computer programmer and network engineer.

Her doctoral thesis at MIT addressed the issue of routing in the presence of malicious network failures.ĭr. Studying in MIT and being one of the 50 woman out of 1000, never really bothered her that much. I assumed I'd either get electrocuted, or I'd break something' It never occurred to me to take anything apart. She was the only woman in the class and after that class she said 'I was not a hands-on type person. Her teacher in high school encouraged her to take a programming class and that is how she started to consider a career that involved computers. It was her obsession of getting straight A's in all classes that acquainted her with computer science and maths. While growing up, Radia constantly talked about literature and music with her mother as she was really interested in those subjects. Radia is a prominent American computer programmer and network engineer. Her invention of the algorithm behind the Spanning Tree Protocol (STP), was instrumental in making today's internet possible. This week's quote is by the legendary 'Mother of Internet' - Dr. Things will just work, and will be self-managing.” The stuff I design, if I'm successful, nobody will ever notice. “The world would be a better place if more engineers, like me, hated technology.

Dr radia bendjema