Talk:Intranet/Archive 1

Why the ?
Why do we need this? This is just another word, like apple. Apple gets capitalised in its own Wikipedia article, and it is fine. I don't see any reason to keep this template call, and warn the user that the word is not usually capitalised. Shall I remove it? Lgriot 16:32, 11 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Well if no-one opposes it, I'll just remove it then. Lgriot 18:00, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Links all spam?
The external links all seem to be spam/advertising. Any reason to keep any of them? Eleuther 15:22, 10 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Agreed, none of those were very relevant to the article, removed. Femto 19:42, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

naming conventions?
Are there any naming conventions for intranets? for example, if it's the intranet for company XYZ, would "Intra XYZ" or "XYZ Intranet" or "Inside XYZ" or whatever be appropriate? I realize you can name a site whatever you want, but maybe there is a popular convention that is especially clear or good.--Sonjaaa 18:40, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

When was the phrase first used?
I've just come upon an old web server stats which start in May 1995, and it's got the phrase 'internal start' to denote "intranet". I think I first heard some BT marketing person use it in the late 1990s, but I can't find any evidence. Anyone got a "coined date"?  BRIANTIST  (talk) 14:13, 17 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I found the word "intranet" on a Newsgroup from 1984, although I have no idea what the author is talking about or referring to, or even if it's the same context as we use it today: . Here's another post from the same year, which I'm pretty certain refers to exactly the meaning we're after: .  Hope this helps.  FranksValli 06:27, 27 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Worth noting that both use it as an adjective, not a noun. Nurg (talk) 22:19, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Well, there are a number of different versions of the history available and I cannot say which one is more correct than the other, but most commentators seem to agree that the term "intranet" was introduced around 1994. One version is that Steven L. Telleen coined the term while working at Amdahl. Here is how Dr. Telleen sees it:

"When I coined the term 'IntraNet' at Amdahl Corp. in the summer of 1994, it did have the connotation of an internal Web rather than just an internal Internet. In fact, the term we used internally before this was the too-cumbersome 'Enterprise-Wide Web.' So, while the ambiguity of "intranet" was apparent even back then, for lack of a better alternative, it caught on."

Quote found at: http://www.iorg.com/papers/iw/19981019-advisor.html   Dstenmark (talk) 21:30, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Intranet versus internal website
So, what's the difference between an intranet and a website that is only visible from inside the company network? --Nigelj (talk) 16:15, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

"Requirement to Create a Intranet" section
With all due respect to the author, I think this section is almost useless. Especially the bits about TCP/IP, "installing user programs" (a web browser?), and "build a homepage in HTML" (which suggests the most primitive intranet imaginable). Maybe it would be better as "Prerequisites for an Intranet"? Or alternatively as "typical approaches to intranets", highlighting the ways organisations can create an intranet (e.g. inhouse build, purchased specialist product, using groupware (like Lotus Notes). Silentz
 * I tried to beef up this section. Would appreciate any comments Poweroid 20:50, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
 * With all due respect to the author, I feel like this entire page is useless. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intraweb First 3 words on that page are; "Intranets are networks". Thus I fail to see the purpose of either Intraweb or Intranet being a topic deserving of it's own page on wikipedia. They are slang for networks and as far as I know slang doesn't go on wiki, unless that has for some reason changed. In that case this isn't an encyclopedia, but rather a social networking site where people leave their *opinions* instead of verifiable, justifiable and DEFINABLE facts. The very first change in the history of this wiki page proves this beyond doubt. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Intranet&diff=333289643&oldid=17289890 This is as ridiculous as "Web 2.0". It does not belong on wikipedia. 67.241.138.25 (talk) 04:16, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Secure
Is "secure" a required feature of an intranet? I would think not-- depending on the definition of secure. I think of a secure site being one that can't be read by anyone without authenticating first. I could see many intranets not meeting that definition of secure except for those individuals who might be responsible for updating content. Read open and write secure? —Preceding unsigned comment added by K1v1n (talk • contribs) 20:04, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

What is a serote in this context?
Is this a typo or vandalism or what? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.15.14.168 (talk) 21:58, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

Turd
This article is a turd. You should leave complex subjects to professional writers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.160.113.65 (talk) 00:15, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

History of the Intranet
I looked to this page to get an idea of the history of the intranet concept but there was nothing here. When were intranets first "invented", who was the first person to use the word, etc etc. I don't know the answer to these questions but would be interested to hear from somebody who does. Wikikob 09:30, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

indeed Intranetusa 03:00, 7 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I thought there was some history background recently, but my search back to late November indicates I'm mistaken. If you can find some information from a verifiable source, please update the article. David Spalding ( ☎   ✉   ✍  ) 18:04, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

The first public internet site was a chat room (Blog) called the "well" in March of 1986 where Greatful Dead fans could communicate. To truly understand the history of the internet you first must learn about the visionaries that developed it. To best learn about this go to http://www.pbs.org/opb/nerds2.0.1/ or watch the video "Nerds 2.0.1: A Brief History of the Internet" (1998) --A.Shabet -- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.192.249.149 (talk • contribs) 12:04, January 27, 2007


 * I believe you are referring to The Well, which was not initially either a web log (blog) or real-time chat room. It was a collection of discussion forums, a sort of super-BBS. Some detailed history of the origins of The Well can be found in Bruce Sterling's The Hacker Crackdown. Regardless, this is related to Intranet ... how? David Spalding ( ☎   ✉   ✍  ) 18:48, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

In 1994, Dr. Steven Telleen of the Amdahl Corporation first coined the phrase "intranet" in a paper entitled IntraNet Methodology. This is the earliest known use of the term and is generally credited as the first written description of the technology. http://grove.ufl.edu/~techlaw/vol3/issue2/kokka.html Indeed, it was always my understanding that "intranet" is a registered trade mark of Amdahl Corp, but I may be wrong about this.Johnsjames (talk) 08:11, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

The intranet was invented in 1994 in a mining company of third world. Its protocol was not TCP/IP, but IPX/SPX. Yes, the main server was Novell. Its original name was "Intern Internet" in a free translation. The big difference it's all the employees' computers could be a server at that time. After a long fight with the mainframe departament, the company recognized its creator and gived him a prize of 200 dollars in the year of 1996. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.54.166.9 (talk) 03:06, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

I believe the term was invented by a company which first registered under the name 'Intranet Solutions' in 1989 in Minneapolis. The company started life as a document management solution vendor. In the early 2000's they rebranded as Stellent, and then in 2006 were acquired by Oracle as its Enterprise Content Management solution. Today the solution is known as Oracle Universal Content Management (UCM).

When I worked for them in the early 2000's they were just getting into web content management. I tried to get them to introduce a term I coined for an integrated intranet / internet / extranet, but the term Ultranet never took off.124.189.96.64 (talk) 09:29, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Critical intranet research, anyone?
Intranets have become integrated part of almost every organisation’s information infrastructure. When intranets first were introduced a little more than a decade ago, they were hailed as the ultimate solution to almost any organisational issue; including anything from dissemination of management vision to integration of seemingly incompatible computer systems.

The twentieth century literature on intranet management unanimously – but often uncritically – recommended intranets to be effectively managed, not to be allowed to evolve in ad hoc manners, and to be standardised and formalised via enforced procedures and routines. Unless kept on a short leash, it was argued that the intranet would quickly degenerate and collapse. Consequently, many if not all intranets today are managed in a top-down fashion.

However, despite this tight governance, intranets appear to be heavily under-utilised and a quick web search reveals that there are plenty of texts on "why intranets fail" (and I'm not only referring to Luke Tredinnick's book "). In my own intranet research, I have questioned the need for management control since I couldn’t see why corporate webs would need to be suppressed in order to work whereas the public web thrived much as a result of lack of ownership and control. I think it would be useful to add a section on this to this entry.

At this year’s AMCIS conference in Toronto, Canada, August 14-17, Dr. Brian Detlor and myself are chairing a mini-track on Critical Intranet Research where we encourage a more critical approach to intranet studies, where the taken-for-granted views on intranets, intranet management, and intranet usage are scrutinised and questioned. We would like dissensus and conflicts among organisational actors and academic commentators to be highlighted and discussed rather than swept under the carpet as too often has been the case.

Any thoughts on this?

Dstenmark (talk) 22:11, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

First, you should note no one has touched this in over four years... Most likely because the people who have real world experience with management of a corporate intranet are not researching the field on Wiki, and if they are they aren't looking for a discussion.

But to address your question, as you noted there is no reason for management control, never was a reason for management control, and most likely will never be a reason for management control of an intranet in a corporate setting. At least not the strict noose-like control in place today. It is my belief, people like J.E. Scott spend a lifetime writing "rules" for how corporate should deal with content management with no real-world experience. As a matter of fact upon arriving to my office one Monday morning last month, I find sitting on my desk a print-out of Mr. Scott's latest work on the subject. It is titled User Perceptions of an Enterprise Content Management System (2011) and deals with (my take on it anyway)controlling the user's perception of Organizational Knowledge. A quick Google search brought me here and to an Abstract of his publication. Not wanting to violate Wikipedia's rules I'll leave the link to it instead of quoting the Abstract http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?arnumber=5718607 But in all honesty, you must read it. It is simply amusing to me to see how Mr. Scott and corporate intranet managers feel a deep, passionate desire to limit and control corporate intranets, right down to how the user should perceive the limitations placed on it. --75.17.205.29 (talk) 19:09, 29 February 2012 (UTC)me

Culture change platforms
Intranets are also being used as culture change platforms. For example, in IBM's "Jam" programme (like on wiki!), large numbers of employees could discuss key issues in online forums, and key ideas surfaced with the aid of text analysis tools.

Simplify
Just hacked the intro down a lot. All the waffle about Internet Protocol and FTP is implied by website.