Talk:Series of tubes

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Series of tubes article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
Please sign and date your posts by typing four tildes ( ~~~~ ).
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Ask questions, get answers.

Article policies

Archives: 1

Series of tubes was a Social sciences and society good articles nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There are suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
January 3, 2007	Articles for deletion	Kept
February 7, 2007	Good article nominee	Not listed
December 25, 2007	Articles for deletion	Kept
March 18, 2010	Articles for deletion	Speedily kept
Current status: Former good article nominee

This article is of interest to multiple WikiProjects. Click [show] for further details.

WikiProject Computing

(Rated C-class, Low-importance)

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Computing, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of computers, computing, and information technology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.

C

This article has been rated as C-Class on the project's quality scale.

Low

This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Internet

(Rated C-class, Low-importance)

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Internet, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Internet on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.

C

This article has been rated as C-Class on the project's quality scale.

Low

This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Internet culture

(Rated C-class, Low-importance)

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Internet culture, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of internet culture on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.

C

This article has been rated as C-Class on the project's quality scale.

This article has not yet been checked against the criteria for B-Class status:
Referencing and citation: not checked Coverage and accuracy: not checked Structure: not checked Grammar and style: not checked Supporting materials: not checked Accessibility: not checked	To fill out this checklist, please add the following code to the template call: \| b1 <!--Referencing & citations--> = <yes/no> \| b2 <!--Coverage & accuracy --> = <yes/no> \| b3 <!--Structure --> = <yes/no> \| b4 <!--Grammar & style --> = <yes/no> \| b5 <!--Supporting materials --> = <yes/no> \| b6 <!--Accessibility --> = <yes/no> assessing the article against each criterion.

Low

This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Internet culture To-do:

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Article requests : View all requested internet culture articles
Expand : Pick an article from here or here
Photo : Category:Internet culture articles needing images
Stubs : All stubs are located here
Other : Category:Internet self-classification codes (!?); Try to get YouTube to FA; Tag all articles you find with {{WikiProject Internet culture}}
- See also Category:Internet culture articles needing attention

WikiProject Politics

(Rated C-class, Low-importance)

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.

C

This article has been rated as C-Class on the project's quality scale.

Low

This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

One of the best analogies for how the internet really works[edit]

Steven's description of the internet as a series of tubes sounds a lot like what happens as routers put packets in queues while buffering. There's got to be some reputable source out there that makes this point. It's too obvious to those of use that have actually worked on network hardware. I seem to remember this article making such a reference long ago but I can't find it now. Any help out there? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.180.173.100 (talk) 02:36, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

I get your point, but to counter that, he calls e-mail "an internet" so it's not at all clear he's speaking of it as an analogy. Interwebs (talk) 14:56, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

He probably got the analogy from someone trying to explain what happens when packets are stuck in buffers and delayed. Seeing a queue as a tube full of packets (or "internets") helps convey the idea that congested links will delay packets by buffering them in memory. Having prioritization allows some packets to move to the head of the "tube", a small VOIP packet, or a small packet from a player in a multiplayer game, would greatly reduce latency while doing little to affect a streaming movie service that can handle potentially seconds of latency. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.180.173.100 (talk • contribs) 20:55, 2019 January 24 (UTC)

(→‎One of the best analogies for how the internet really works)

Was Stevens old enough to have learned his electronics prior to the invention of the transistor? Prior to the use of first transistors, and then integrated circuits, computers, relays, indeed all electronics, did use tubes. They used vacuum tubes. The Eniac used vacuum tubes, and there are accounts of grad students, on bicycles, riding around replacing tubes that burned out.

Stevens had a bad reputation, for other reasons, but his comments makes a lot more sense if commentators were generous enough to assume that an old man said "tubes" when he meant "transistors". If there are RS that make this point, we should cite them. Geo Swan (talk) 19:54, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

It's clear given the context, which is packet prioritization, that "tubes" probably refers to queues in routers used to buffer packets when links are congested. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.180.173.100 (talk • contribs) 20:55, 2019 January 24 (UTC)

The article states "Edward Felten, Princeton University professor of computer science, pointed out the unfairness of some criticisms of Stevens' wording." But the article stops there. I think it'd be worth expanding on this in the article. As it stands, the article has a strong pop-culture bias to it; it's all about the punchline, but excludes any analysis. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.132.169.226 (talk) 14:25, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion[edit]

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

I Got it Yesterday - Senator Ted Stevens.ogg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 13:36, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

anhducwiki7

Wednesday, March 4, 2020