Memories

How NZ connected to the internet – The University of Waikato context

Kevin Broughan

Emeritus Professor, University of Waikato, Hamilton, Mathematics and Statistics

It all began in 1980 when my family and I spent a year of study leave from the University of Waikato at Cambridge University in the UK. This presented many challenges, especially since the Kiwi dollar was weak against the UK pound and university salaries quite low. However the academic result of the leave was great, with the Corn Exchange Computing lab providing several innovative software systems for doing mathematics like algebra and calculus, not just number crunching. I was hooked. Alan Turing, with his deep insights, had shown that theorems and programs were fundamentally alike organisms, while living in different environments, and I returned to Waikato wanting to explore the consequences of this reality.

With my students we set about providing some software to make work in this area possible. In searching for tools I hooked up with Richard Fateman, a computer science prof at UC Berkeley and leader of a project with the grandious title “The representation and manipulation of mathematical knowledge”! I joined that project in 1984 and spent several profitable periods on the Berkeley campus. Along the corridor from my office in Evans Hall exciting things were happening with extensions being written to AT&T Unix by the Systems Development Project. These included protocols for things like TCP/IP, which are still being used as a fundamental part of the internet to this very day.

I returned to Waikato and discussed these developments with John Houlker, at that time a member of the computer services division. We met often, sharing a tea room and working in building sited next to one another on the Waikato campus. He had long black hair and a keen interest in mathematics and physics, as well as computing. Information about the ether-networking of the Berkeley campus was also exchanged and inspired our own developments For example the first piece of ethernet cable at Waikato, was between the Computer Centre and my office, laid through a ditch dug by my students. In the normal NZ way no one hesitated to get their hands dirty.

As it happened, the mathematical work required Unix, and together John and I persuaded the University that it would be valuable to emulate that operating system under VAX/VMS, the University computer system of that time. Before too much longer the Eunice Unix emulator written by the Wollongong Group (but based in Silicon Valley) arrived and was implemented. Oh joy – it had all of the Berkeley extensions including those needed for TCP/IP.

Thus began a period of strenuous technical activity at Waikato with John leading the charge. It was to lead to NZ becoming part of the worldwide internet with the University of Waikato as the NZ hub. That part of the story has been well documented. See for example the book “Connecting the Clouds – The Internet in New Zealand’ by Keith Mathews.

I started part time through my degree with Campus Media doing Multimedia development (I recall the “Reactor Factory” for Conan Fee – a DVD instructional software for chemical reactions.) Great project – developed using Macromedia Director. Multimedia development soon gave way to the growth of the internet and 17 years of web development followed, working both for Campus Media and then Waikato Regional Council. Around 2016 I moved into management role and enjoying working more with people than computers these days.

Fondest memory? Hacky sack – almost any time we could. A great group of students from our year and the enthusiasm of Dr David Bainbridge saw us take to having a pop-up hacky court … kind of a mash-up of volleyball and hacky sack. We set the court up where S block now stands.

From my time at Waikato I gained friendships and local opportunity which have served me well.

Paul Kennett

Team Leader – Environmental Data, Waikato Regional Council, Hamilton

I chose to study with CMS because I wanted to incoporate te reo Māori in interface technology and my fondest memory is of the awakening of subject areas and the engagement with staff.

To prospective students I’d say there are many opportunities to find your passions, taught by some really great people!

For me the coolest thing about CMS is the people. I have met some awesome people, from the staff in the office(s), technical support, tutors, fellow lecturers and researchers to a whole bunch of great students.

Te Taka Keegan

Associate Professor – School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences, University of Waikato

I joined Gallagher Group as a software/firmware developer in 2008 and then joined Gallagher’s cloud team in year 2015 as development engineer and technical leader. I joined Influx Energy Data in 2020 as a senior development engineer and promoted to Senior Software Architect in 2021.

I’m leading the development team in Influx Energy Data Ltd. The development team has released services and infrastructure that provide innovative competitive advantages for Influx and customers, and lower the cost to serve.

The education I received in University of Waikato laid a solid foundation for my career so far.

I chose to study there because it is the best computer science school in New Zealand, there are excellent professors, labs and great tutors.

Zhiwei Liu

Senior Software Architect – Influx Energy Data Ltd, Hamilton

I am leading the development of the technology strategy and roadmap in support of Gallagher Security’s strategic goals, and providing Architectural leadership and coordinating the wider Architect community within Gallagher.

The BCMS (Information Systems) degree provided a good opportunity to develop technical, business, and soft skills which have allowed me to do a variety of roles and were good preparation for my leadership journey.

This was the only dedicated Computing degree in the country when I started it in 1992. I liked that Waikato was a leader in this field and had created a specific degree to recognize the importance of this area of study.

I loved the feeling of growing my knowledge in an area that was clearly developing fast on a global scale. You could see all the opportunities that were appearing in the world and how technology had the potential to change things for the better.

To prospective students: CMS offers a wide range of opportunities inside the broad field of Computer Science and allows students to find the area within this field that they resonate the most with.

My time at Waikato gave me an excitement about what technology changes can achieve and an understanding of how technology and the business world need to come together to unlock this potential.

There were many late night lab sessions over my time at Waikato but one in particular stands out in my memory. This was a time when email was still a bit of a novelty and disk storage was extremely precious. So when my sleep deprived brain (no alcohol or drugs involved) decide to send an email with the subject “I have become comfortably numb” to “Everyone” I was unpleasantly surprised to see this actually worked and the email go to everyone at the Uni with an email address. Even less pleasant was telling off I got the next day for frivolous use of the email system and wasting precious disk space 🙂

Andrew Scothern

Chief Architect – Gallagher, Hamilton

In the early 1990s, having 24-hour access to the labs was a thing, not many people had personal desktops. I remember the late nights in the G-basement labs — alas, mainly due to playing computer games off the server using those fluorescent green or yellow screens DEC terminals. Wonder if anyone from that era — 1990/1991/1992 remembers the games we played?

I enjoyed the group projects – the connections built working together completing those don’t-think-we-can-complete-them-in-time and why-are-all-of-them-due-in-the-same-week deadlines; I am still in touch with some of my BCMS group mates! I did a summer internship working with 9 to 10 other (second and third year) SCMS statistics students at HortResearch; we were analysing fertiliser results from experiments conducted in the 1930s! It was an interesting summer — besides the Genstat work — my kiwi friends introduced me to many NZ experiences — Waingaro springs, my first (and last!) 125km bike ride to Whangamatā (they said it was going to be fun….), giant Jaffas!

There were a couple of lecturers who come to mind:

Zaidah Razak –she taught me in my second year (COBOL) and a third year Information Systems paper; I remember in the first lecture, after she spelt out the assessment items of the course, there was dead silence. She had high expectations of us, there was a LOT to do — but she gave us the belief that we could do it, and yes, the sense of achievement when we did it! (Ended working for her after my BCMS)

Bob Barbour, he supervised my 420 capstone project. Bob was a very supportive and understanding supervisor — he was happy to supervise me over the summer prior to my fourth year in which I developed a HyperCard application which tracked mouse movements — think I developed an application after the 420 too. I later returned to pursue a PhD under Bob.

To prospective students I’d say: It’s a family-like environment; because of the smaller classes, lecturers and tutors know the students by name, and are truly supportive and encouraging of the student; also opportunities to be taught/supervised/work with world class researchers.

Alvin Yeo

Developer/Industry Engagement Manager – University of Waikato

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Memories

Memories

How NZ connected to the internet – The University of Waikato context

23 January 2017

Paul Kennett

Te Taka Keegan

Zhiwei Liu

Andrew Scothern

Alvin Yeo

John Doe

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John Doe

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John Doe

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