In message , at 15:25:35 on
Sun, 17 Mar 2024, Mark Goodge
remarked:
>On Sun, 17 Mar 2024 00:05:27 +0000, Roland Perry wrote:
>
>>In message , at 17:55:45 on Thu, 14
>>Mar 2024, Rupert Moss-Eccardt remarked:
>>>On 14 Mar 2024 16:17, Roland Perry wrote:
>>>> In message , at 11:36:52 on Thu, 14
>>>> Mar 2024, Rupert Moss-Eccardt remarked:
>>>>>On 14 Mar 2024 06:48, Roland Perry wrote:
>>>>>> In message , at 20:13:18 on Wed, 13 Mar
>>>>>> 2024, Tim Ward remarked:
>>>>>>>On 13/03/2024 19:43, Roland Perry wrote:
>>
>>>>>>>> For a trip of the kind you are making, I would dedicate about two
>>>>>>>>hours.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Back in the olden days you used to go to a shop called a "travel
>>>>>>>agent" and ask them. Typically it took them a little longer than
>>>>>>>the actual flight to work out what ticket to sell you.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> That's because at best they had a Prestel system with a limited number
>>>>>> of airlines on it. On the other hand, a lot of fares were regulated, so
>>>>>> it didn't matter as much who you flew with, or which routing you took.
>>>>>
>>>>>I think a lot of travel agents used EasySABRE which wasn't Prestel.
>>>>
>>>> What date was that introduced?
>>>
>>>Started centrally in the 60s, became networked soon thereafter
>>
>>What network infrastructure was used, mindful that Internet broadband
>>wasn't a thing until late 90's. And then only in London.
>
>The original SABRE used a direct-dial system straight into the central
>mainframe (an IBM 7090 initially, later System/360) using a bespoke
>protocol.
Just the one, somewhere fairly central?
>The first iteration of EasySABRE operated over dial-up via
>Compuserve and later AOL.
That's an improvement. I was an avid user of CompuServe, but sadly the
nearest POP was in London, which was a long distance call.
>It didn't become Internet based until the 90s.
It would have, given when Internet connectivity became a thing. But we
were talking at least a decade before.
>Even in the Internet era it was capable of running over a dial-up
>connection, right up to the point at which it closed down in 1999. But most
>travel agents typically had ISDN, until always-on broadband reached
>widespread availability.
The regulator (OFTEL) regarded ISDN as broadband, albeit the very lowest
speed which qualified for that description - two channels bonded giving
128k. If anyone thinks ISDN is really baseband, they'll have to take
that up with OFTEL (using a time machine).
I think I first got ISDN at home in 2000/2001 via BT's Home Highway
product, although one of the ISPs I was calling, had a whole two-line
ISDN POP from about 1985/6, mainly for staff but I think we did publish
the number.
HH was a bit like early ADSL, it was rolled out fairly slowly and you
needed to be living both near an enabled exchange (although, by the
Millenium the majority were) and also not too far from the exchange if
it was being delivered on copper/aluminium (which HH was); businesses
who had ISDN PABX from the early 90's generally had to have fibre dug
to them from the exchange, which wasn't cheap - about £15k in today's
money, but at least it was a flat fee, not by distance.
Then by 1999 there was a "secret" one-line ISDN POP inside one of the
cabinets at LINX-Telehouse. Best connectivity on the planet. Best
dial-up anyway. At our London office we had gigabit fibre - eat your
heart out Openreach and FTTP.
It had to be that fast because it was a ring connecting all the
independent co-location data centres like Redbus and Interxion, and was
carrying about half the entire UK's Internet traffic at any point in
time. (It was before private peering, which later skimmed of lots of the
ISP-ISP backbone traffic).
--
Roland Perry
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