DECnet/E and DECnet-Plus

From: Johnny Billquist <bqt_at_update.uu.se>
Date: Thu Feb 5 17:42:59 2004

On Thu, 5 Feb 2004 meltie <lists_at_microvax.org> wrote:

> > > FWIW, there's an implementation of the "old" network terminal protocol
> > > in the DECnet/Linux kit; with some hacking you can probably port that
> > > and use it to talk to DECnet/E that way.
> >
> > The DECnet/Linux implementation is so bad that I'd say it's unusable.
> > (Atleast when I tested to/from an RSX system.)
>
> I've had no trouble with it using it to communicate with VAX/VMS. The
> author of most of it on the other hand..!

I wonder how much things you've tried...
I know that the people developing DECnet/Linux have used a VMS system to
communicate with to test things, but I had some problems even to that.
Trying to communicate with RSX was totally useless. Basically nothing
works. The only thing I managed to get to work was DAP access from the
Linux system to the RSX system for transferring files from RSX to Linux.
All other things with DAP fails. PHONE didn't work either. Hmm, what else
is there... Ah, yes, CTERM didn't seem to work either.

[...]

> From: Paul Koning <pkoning_at_equallogic.com>
>
> Johnny> On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 Paul Koning <pkoning_at_equallogic.com>
> Johnny> wrote:
> >> 1. DECnet/E only supports the "old" network terminal protocol,
> >> which is object 21. The other one is "CTERM" which is implemented
> >> by VMS and one or two other operating systems, but not DECnet/E.
> >> In fact, I think none of the PDP11s do it; it's way too complex.
>
> Johnny> RSX definitely implements CTERM. I think it's object 23.
>
> Object 23 is the old RMTERM protocol. CTERM is 42.

Ah. Sorry. I looked at the known objects of my RSX system, and had to pick
between 23 and 42, I picked the wrong one. :-/

23 is handled by RMHACP and 42 by RTH. I knew both were interactive
terminal protocols, but I had a hard time remembering which was which.

> >> 2. DECnet/E works fine on E11. It's been a while since I've tried
> >> that but I did use it, under Linux that is. I was using the "tap"
> >> pseudo-ethernet to debug DECnet/Linux against DECnet/E...
> >>
> >> FWIW, there's an implementation of the "old" network terminal
> >> protocol in the DECnet/Linux kit; with some hacking you can
> >> probably port that and use it to talk to DECnet/E that way.
>
> Johnny> The DECnet/Linux implementation is so bad that I'd say it's
> Johnny> unusable. (Atleast when I tested to/from an RSX system.)
>
> Unuseable for what? I didn't use it with RSX, but it works fine with
> RSTS. That include rmterm... (I added that for RSTS and TOPS/20 but
> not for RSX; maybe someone else has by now, if not I expect volunteers
> would be welcomed...)

Well, like I said before. Access from RSX to Linux don't work at all.
Access from Linux to RSX works for reading files, but not writing. PHONE
don't work, and CTERM didn't work if I remember correctly (I'm a bit
unsure about CTERM, since it's been a few months since we disabled
DECnet/Linux again).

Also, PHONE with VMS systems don't work as they should either. I can't
remember if I tried that much with DAP, but even if it works better there
must obviously be some serious bugs in there since it fails so abmyssaly
with RSX.

        Johnny

Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus
                                  || on a psychedelic trip
email: bqt_at_update.uu.se || Reading murder books
pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol
Received on Thu Feb 05 2004 - 17:42:59 GMT