David L. Mills

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David L. Mills
Mills in 2005
Born
David Lennox Mills

(1938-06-03)June 3, 1938
Oakland, California, U.S.
DiedJanuary 17, 2024(2024-01-17) (aged 85)
Newark, Delaware, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Education
Known for
Awards
Scientific career
Fields
InstitutionsUniversity of Delaware
Websitewww.eecis.udel.edu/~mills

David Lennox Mills (June 3, 1938 – January 17, 2024) was an American computer engineer and professor emeritus at the University of Delaware.[1] He was an Internet pioneer who led the Gateway Algorithms and Data Structures (GADS) Task Force. He was known as the internet's "Father Time"[2] for designing the Network Time Protocol, which is intended to synchronize all participating computers across different computer systems and networks to within a few milliseconds of Coordinated Universal Time.

Early life and education[edit]

David Lennox Mills was born in Oakland, California, on June 3, 1938.[2][3] His mother, Adele (née Dougherty), was a pianist, and his father, Alfred, was an engineer.[4][3] He had glaucoma since birth, but a surgeon saved some of the vision in his left eye when he was a child.[2] He attended a school in San Mateo, California, for the visually impaired.[5]

Mills earned his PhD in Computer and Communication Sciences from the University of Michigan in 1971.[5] While at Michigan, he worked on the ARPA-sponsored Conversational Use of Computers (CONCOMP) project and developed DEC PDP-8-based hardware and software to allow terminals to be connected over phone lines to an IBM 360 mainframe.[6][7]

Career[edit]

In 1977, Mills began working at COMSAT on synchronizing the clocks of computers connected to ARPANET, inventing the Network Time Protocol (NTP).[5][8][9] NTP is intended to synchronize all participating computers to within a few milliseconds of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).[10] He told The New Yorker in 2022 that he enjoyed working on synchronized time because no one else was working on it, giving him his own "little fief".[5] In the mid-2000s, Mills turned over full control of the NTP reference implementation to Harlan Stenn.[5]

Mills was a contributor to the standards and software that came to be the Internet. He was the chairman of the Gateway Algorithms and Data Structures Task Force (GADS) and the first chairman of the Internet Architecture Task Force.[11] He invented the DEC LSI-11-based Fuzzball router that was used for the 56 kbit/s NSFNET (1985),[12] and inspired the author of ping.[13] He authored 28 RFCs,[14] including two Internet Standards.[15]

In 1999, he was inducted as a fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery, and in 2002, he was inducted as a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) for contributions to network protocols and network timekeeping in the development of the Internet.[16] In 2008, Mills was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) for contributions to Internet timekeeping and the development of the Network Time Protocol. In 2013 he received the IEEE Internet Award "for significant leadership and sustained contributions in the research, development, standardization, and deployment of quality time synchronization capabilities for the Internet."[17]

Mills was a professor emeritus at the University of Delaware, where he was a full professor from 1986 to 2008.[5] He subsequently held an adjunct appointment at Delaware so that he could continue to teach.[18]

Personal life[edit]

Mills married Beverly Csizmadia in 1965.[4]

Mills was an amateur radio operator, with callsign W3HCF.[2][19][20]

His vision began worsening around 2012, and by 2022 he was fully blind.[5] Mills died in Newark, Delaware, on January 17, 2024, at age 85. He was survived by his wife, his daughter Leigh, his son Keith and his brother Gregory.[2][4][3][21]

References[edit]

  1. ^ David L. Mills. "Biography and Credentials". David L. Mills, PhD, Professor. University of Delaware. Archived from the original on October 9, 2022. Retrieved October 30, 2022.
  2. ^ a b c d e Proven, Liam (January 23, 2024). "David Mills, the internet's Father Time, dies at 85". www.theregister.com. Retrieved January 25, 2024.
  3. ^ a b c Vynck, Gerrit De (January 26, 2024). "David Mills, the internet's 'father time,' dies at 85". The Washington Post.
  4. ^ a b c Risen, Clay (January 26, 2024). "David L. Mills, Who Kept the Internet Running on Time, Dies at 85". The New York Times.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g Hopper, Nate (September 30, 2022). "The Thorny Problem of Keeping the Internet's Time". The New Yorker. Archived from the original on September 30, 2022. Retrieved September 30, 2022.
  6. ^ The Data Concentrator Archived January 11, 2011, at the Wayback Machine, David Mills, May 1968, CONCOMP Project, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
  7. ^ System/360 interface engineering report Archived January 11, 2011, at the Wayback Machine, D. L. Mills, November 1967, CONCOMP Project, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
  8. ^ RFC 778: DCNET Internet Clock Service, D. L. Mills, COMSAT Laboratories, April 18, 1981
  9. ^ RFC 958: Network Time Protocol (NTP) Archived January 20, 2024, at the Wayback Machine, D. L. Mills, M/A-COM Linkabit, September 1985
  10. ^ David L. Mills (2006). Computer Network Time Synchronization: The Network Time Protocol. Taylor & Francis. p. 3. ISBN 978-0-8493-5805-0. Archived from the original on July 18, 2014.
  11. ^ John S. Quarterman (1990). Matrix: Computer Networks and Conferencing Systems Worldwide (2 ed.). Digital Press. pp. 185–186. ISBN 1555580335.
  12. ^ "Fuzzball: The Innovative Router" Archived May 20, 2011, at the Wayback Machine, web page on NSF's "The Internet: Changing the Way We Communicate" Archived May 14, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  13. ^ "The Story of the PING Program". ftp.arl.army.mil. Retrieved January 21, 2024.
  14. ^ "RFC Index". Archived from the original on November 14, 2023. Retrieved January 21, 2024.
  15. ^ "Official Internet Protocol Standards". Archived from the original on January 16, 2024. Retrieved January 20, 2024.
  16. ^ "IEEE Fellows 2002 | IEEE Communications Society". Archived from the original on August 16, 2023. Retrieved August 16, 2023.
  17. ^ "IEEE Internet Award Recipients: 2013 – David Mills" Archived September 23, 2017, at the Wayback Machine, IEEE Web site, accessed January 27, 2013
  18. ^ "David L. Mills, PhD, Professor". Archived from the original on January 20, 2024. Retrieved January 21, 2024.
  19. ^ Dave Mills Personal Stuff Archived December 23, 2008, at the Wayback Machine, Web page, University of Delaware
  20. ^ "Amateur License – W3HCF – Mills, David L" Archived June 4, 2011, at the Wayback Machine, FCC Universal Licensing System
  21. ^ Edwards, Benj (January 19, 2024). "Inventor of NTP Protocol that keeps time on billions of devices dies at age 85". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on January 19, 2024. Retrieved January 20, 2024.

External links[edit]

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