Re: [Linux-decnet-user] Hello

[Steven W. <st...@ch...>]

Hi,

On Thu, Apr 01, 2004 at 01:39:28PM -0500, David Mitton wrote:
> 
> Hello there,
> 	I've just joined this list, and I don't know how much time I have to 
> 	spend on the subject.  But I'd like to offer some help if possible and a 
> few comments.
> 
> - I see that you've rescued a set of DECnet specs from Matt Thomas.  They 
> are no longer visible on the HP website.
> 
> I have a copy of DAP 7.3.1 dated 21-April-1995 (in text and .RNO) that I'd 
> be willing to contribute.  You only seem to have V5.6 (which is mostly good 
> enough)
> I was the DAP Architect for a number of years until Aug 1995
>
That would be interesting to look through, although right now I don't
have a lot of time to work on this - as you can probably tell by the
lack of recent patches :-)

> Someone recently gave me a hard copy of a LAT spec.  I needed some info for 
> an IETF RFC reference.  It was interesting that I could not get a complete 
> answer out of the "official" folks.  Seems that LAT is winding down.
> 
> - I was also the designer/implementor of DECnet-DOS and it's 
> kernel.  Though the neurons are a bit rusty, I used to do a DECnet socket 
> programming tutorial at DECUS.  I don't know how well your sockets match 
> ours, but I may be able to dig up some old material.
> 
> - One of the FAQ pages says that "DECnet was designed for the VAX", well 
> I'm sure a few of the contributors could tell you that PDP-11 and 
> DECsystem-10 DECnets predated VMS by a number of years.  Most DEC 
> architectures were little endian.  The VAX by it's heredity continued that.
> 
> - Oh Steve W., I did find a use for raw sockets, to implement MOP functions.
>
We have packet sockets for this though under Linux, so I guess they
are still pretty redundant ...

> - I used to like to say I was the last one to implement DECnet Phase-IV, in 
> PathWORKS for Windows 95. (we rewrote my DOS TSR kernel as a protected mode 
> Windows component, because no one else would)
> Now I find that you guys have taken my claim away.  sigh  ;^p
> 
> Dave.
> 
>
:-) I'm told that our version is the only multithreaded DECnet stack
but I'm not 100% certain to claim that. I'd like to have a go and clean
up some more of the code at some stage and add one or two extra
features: zero copy for example.

Its always good to hear from another implementor of DECnet
as hints and advice are always welcome. If you want to take up
one of the outstanding tasks, please feel free :-)

Steve.