The Corporation for National Research Initiatives (CNRI), based in

Reston, Virginia Reston is a census-designated place in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States, and a principal city of both Northern Virginia and the Washington metropolitan area. As of the 2020 U.S. census, Reston's population was 63,226. Founded in 1964, Rest ...

, is a

non-profit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...

founded in 1986 by

Robert E. Kahn Robert Elliot Kahn (born December 23, 1938) is an American electrical engineer who, along with Vint Cerf, first proposed the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP), the fundamental communication protocols at the hear ...

as an "activities center around strategic development of network-based information technologies", including the

National Information Infrastructure The National Information Infrastructure (NII) was the product of the High Performance Computing Act of 1991. It was a telecommunications policy buzzword, which was popularized during the Clinton Administration under the leadership of Vice-Presid ...

(NII) in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. CNRI develops the

Handle System The Handle System is a proprietary registry assigning persistent identifiers, or ''handles'', to information resources, and for resolving "those handles into the information necessary to locate, access, and otherwise make use of the resources". ...

for managing and locating

digital information Digital data, in information theory and information systems, is information represented as a string of Discrete mathematics, discrete symbols, each of which can take on one of only a finite number of values from some alphabet (formal languages ...

. CNRI obtained

DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Adva ...

funding for the development of JPython (

Jython Jython is an implementation of the Python (programming language), Python programming language designed to run on the Java (programming language), Java platform. It was known as JPython until 1999. Overview Jython programs can import and use any ...

), a

Python Python may refer to: Snakes * Pythonidae, a family of nonvenomous snakes found in Africa, Asia, and Australia ** ''Python'' (genus), a genus of Pythonidae found in Africa and Asia * Python (mythology), a mythical serpent Computing * Python (prog ...

implementation Implementation is the realization of an application, execution of a plan, idea, scientific modelling, model, design, specification, Standardization, standard, algorithm, policy, or the Management, administration or management of a process or Goal ...

in and for

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

, initially created by

Jim Hugunin Jim Hugunin is a software programmer who created the Python programming language extension Numeric (ancestor to NumPy), and later created Python implementations for the Java Platform (Jython) and for Microsoft .NET platform ( IronPython); he ha ...

. The MEMS and Nanotechnology Exchange (MNX) is an effort located at CNRI that provides semiconductor implementation services to the United States and was established with support from DARPA.

History

CNRI formerly operated the Secretariat of the

Internet Engineering Task Force The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is a standards organization for the Internet standard, Internet and is responsible for the technical standards that make up the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP). It has no formal membership roster ...

Guido van Rossum Guido van Rossum (; born 31 January 1956) is a Dutch programmer. He is the creator of the Python programming language, for which he was the " benevolent dictator for life" (BDFL) until he stepped down from the position on 12 July 2018. He ...

, pioneer for

open source software Open-source software (OSS) is Software, computer software that is released under a Open-source license, license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and Software distribution, distribute the software an ...

and creator of Python, at one time worked for this company. The formation and early funding of the

Internet Society The Internet Society (ISOC) is an American non-profit advocacy organization founded in 1992 with local chapters around the world. It has offices in Reston, Virginia, United States, and Geneva, Switzerland. Organization The Internet Society ...

were led by CNRI. At the first meeting of the Internet Society board,

Vint Cerf Vinton Gray Cerf (; born June 23, 1943) is an American Internet pioneer and is recognized as one of "the fathers of the Internet", sharing this title with TCP/IP co-developer Robert Kahn. He has received honorary degrees and awards that inclu ...

, representing CNRI, offered, "In the event a deficit occurs, CNRI has agreed to contribute up to USD102000 to offset it." In the event, the contribution was not needed. CNRI did cover many of the expenses of the Internet Society in 1992. They also paid Cerf's salary during 1993, when much of his time was devoted to building the Internet Society.

Handle System

In 1996, the

Association of American Publishers The Association of American Publishers (AAP) is the national trade association of the American book publishing industry. AAP lobbies for book, journal and education publishers in the United States. AAP members include most of the major commercial ...

announced that

R. R. Bowker R. R. Bowker LLC (trading as Bowker) is an American limited liability company domiciled under Delaware General Corporation Law, Delaware Limited Liability Company Law and based in Chatham, New Jersey. Among other things, Bowker provides bibli ...

and the CNRI had been selected to design a

Digital Object Identifier A digital object identifier (DOI) is a persistent identifier or handle used to uniquely identify various objects, standardized by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). DOIs are an implementation of the Handle System; th ...

system. The effort was initiated after a year-long study of the need for a system to identify electronic copyright ownership and to manage the digital purchase of rights. The CNRI Handle system was first demonstrated at a February 1997 meeting of the Professional/Scholarly Publishing (PSP) division of the AAP meeting in

Washington, DC Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and Federal district of the United States, federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from ...

. The

is a technology specification for assigning, managing, and resolving

persistent identifier A persistent identifier (PI or PID) is a long-lasting reference to a document, file, web page, or other object. The term "persistent identifier" is usually used in the context of digital objects that are accessible over the Internet. Typically, s ...

s for digital objects and other resources on the Internet. The DONA System is under consideration at the

ITU The International Telecommunication Union (ITU)In the other common languages of the ITU: * * is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for many matters related to information and communication technologies. It was established ...

and has been adopted by several countries.

D-Lib

D-Lib Magazine ''D-Lib Magazine'' was an online magazine dedicated to digital library research and development. Past issues are available free of charge. The publication was financially supported by contributions from the D-Lib Alliance. Prior to April 2006, th ...

'' was an on-line magazine dedicated to digital library research and development, produced by CNRI.

MEMS and Nanotechnology Exchange (MNX)

MNX was established with support from the United States Department of Defense (DoD), specifically, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The MNX is a design and fabrication service provider to the United States research and development (R&D) community for micro- and nano-systems made using semiconductor-based fabrication methodologies. Since its founding in 1998, the MNX has completed over 3,000 different fabrication projects, many of these projects representing cutting-edge research having significant national security and economic importance. MNX has provided implementation services to over 1,000 organizations in the United States, including: defense contractors; DoD and Federal laboratories; leading academic researchers; fortune 500 companies; and many start-ups. The MNX at CNRI was founded and is managed by Dr. Michael Huff.

MEMS Clearinghouse (MEMSNet)

The MEMS Clearinghouse was originally established at USC/ISI with support from the United States Department of Defense (DoD), specifically, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The MNX of CNRI took over the management of the MEMS Clearinghouse under the management of Dr. Michael Huff. It was then renamed the MEMSNet. The MEMSNet includes a number of information and service offerings including: an extensive material property database with references; MEMSTalk which is an on-line discussion groups of people interested in semiconductor technologies; news articles about semiconductor technologies; events and meetings; and more. At one time, MEMSNet was the most popular web site for MEMS technology.

Software

DO Repository and DO Registry

CNRI developed the Digital Object (DO) Repository software, with digital object architecture which provides a mechanism for the creation of, and access to, digital objects as discrete data structures with unique, resolvable identifiers.

GNU Mailman

GNU Mailman GNU Mailman is a computer software application from the GNU Project for managing electronic mailing lists. Mailman is coded primarily in Python and currently maintained by Abhilash Raj. Mailman is free software, licensed under the GNU General Pu ...

is a free

mailing list manager A mailing list is a collection of names and addresses used by an individual or an organization to send material to multiple recipients. Mailing lists are often rented or sold. If rented, the renter agrees to use the mailing list only at contra ...

Python

Python releases 1.3 through 1.6, see

Python License The Python License is a deprecated permissive computer software license created by the Corporation for National Research Initiatives (CNRI). It was used for versions 1.6 and 2.0 of the Python programming language, both released in the year 2000 ...

DurusWorks

DurusWorks was developed by the MEMS and Nanotechnology Exchange program at CNRI managed by Dr. Michael Huff for semiconductor foundry network operations. DurusWorks release 1.2. Dr. David Binger and Neil Schemenaur were the principal developers of DurusWorks.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Non-profit organizations based in Reston, Virginia Reston, Virginia