March 1998
Daniel Stenberg releases curl
Daniel Stenberg released curl in March 1998 — the command-line HTTPHyperText Transfer Protocol — the protocol browsers use to request and receive web pages. client embedded in phones, cars, and CI pipelines.
What it was for
libcurl ships in billions of devices — every APIApplication programming interface — a defined way for programs to talk to each other or to a service. test script and embedded firmwareSoftware stored in hardware that controls a device — persists across reboots and updates infrequently. update likely uses it. Stenberg's single-maintainer stewardship model is a case study in critical infrastructure.
People
- Daniel Stenberg — creator
Why it's here
curl/libcurl became the universal HTTPHyperText Transfer Protocol — the protocol browsers use to request and receive web pages. transfer library.
Why it mattered
It standardized how programs speak HTTPHyperText Transfer Protocol — the protocol browsers use to request and receive web pages. across platforms.
What it solved
Each platform had incompatible HTTPHyperText Transfer Protocol — the protocol browsers use to request and receive web pages. client APIs.
Media
ImageDaniel StenbergDaniel Stenberg casually green.jpg: Deniel Stenberg derivative work: Akishima Yuka, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons