Putting PDP11/44 on the net...?

From: Zane H. Healy <healyzh_at_aracnet.com>
Date: Tue Nov 12 16:04:00 2002

> Since I'm (mostly to very dumb) when it comes to these things - I would
> like to ask for opinions/advice/recommendations from the List on what the
> best way would be to attach one of the terminal ports on the machine to
> the Net, to allow folks to telnet in and play with the system remotely.
>
> I was thinking phone-line -> modem-> Net-to-serial-box-> 11/44 port.
>
> There are 30 ports, all will run at least 9600, and I do have a
> registered and hosted (though inactive) domain name... not that the two
> would be related.
>
> This would of course be for during the periods that the system was on...
> and I sure as Hell am *not* considering leaving 'er up 24/7...
> electricity, noise, hAxOrZ (in that order) would deter that. Might be fun
> to have a mirrored emulator tho...
>
> Anyway - those of you who are smart in this area: how owuld you do this?

OK, here is how I'd try doing it. First, do you have a DSL Line? That
would be best, since as I understand it Cable companies don't like such
traffic on their lines. Then have a somewhere between a Sparc 2 to 20, and
a couple Aurora 16-port serial cards. Cable the cards on the Aurora
breakout boxes to the ports on the /44.

For the Sparc you can run something like the following software packages:
http://www.conserver.com/
http://www.eng.auburn.edu/~doug/console.html

You'd probably want to write some kind of wrapper, and setup a generic
account on the Sparc. Users log into the Sparc, it executes the wrapper
automatically, which figures out which console port to use for their
session. The hardest part of this would be getting users to disconnect
correctly. You'd probably need to figure out a way to disconnect sessins
that have been inactive for to long.

As an alternative, you could try to find a console server that supports
reverse telnet (is there such a beast, I know there are ones for reverse
LAT).

What OS are you planning on running on the /44? In the event that you're
running RT-11, you can get a free TCP stack and just connect the system
directly to your network.

                                Zane
Received on Tue Nov 12 2002 - 16:04:00 GMT

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