[Info-vax] Rethinking DECNET ?

[Johnny Billquist]

On 2014-09-06 17:59, JF Mezei wrote:
> On 14-09-06 07:05, Johnny Billquist wrote:
>
>> I would say that what happened was that already in the 80s, TCP/IP
>> proved that it already existed, it already worked, and was already
>> available on multiple platforms. In addition, it was actually a project
>> funded by the US Department of Defence, and of course they were using it.
>
>
> One problem:  the IP stack and applications were not up to snuff to
> replace security/functionality provided by the likes of DECnet. And IBM
> may not have had much functionality with SNA, but it had and wanted to
> maintain security levels.

I think we've already covered the security of DECnet, which is totally 
non-existant.

Functionality wise, DECnet do have some things in there which is way 
better (in my opinion) to what exists in the IP world, but also some 
things that are horribly worse. (CTERM anyone...?)

> SMTP did not have reliable ability to have read receipts, and many other
> functions that were part of X.400

Read receipts... I've never understood the point of them. It puts the 
world in a very syncronous mode, which sucks. MAIL-11 is still no fun, 
compared to SMTP. The receiving node have to be up when you write the 
mail, or else you cannot send it.
This is something I can understand for something like PHONE (or the 
equivalents under IP), but mail is almost by definition a 
non-interactive medium. Who cares if the receiving machine is up right 
now? And the receiver might, or might not read the mail. The receiver 
also might, or might not open the mail. The two are not the same, and 
software can actually only detect the latter. And I don't really care if 
the mail was opened or not. If the topic is something I need a response 
on before a certain point in time, I'll either write in my mail that I 
need that response, and have a default assumption that I believe 
everyone can live with in case I do not get a reply, or else I use 
another medium for my communication.

X.400, had it ever been put to the scale mail on the Internet is at, I 
doubt it would even have worked. You'd all be very happy with no spam, 
and no other mail as well, I'm sure...

> In other words, with OSI, they built a "cadillac" with plenty of
> functionality but at the end of the day, people only needed a much
> simpler Lada/Yugo.

OSI built a M2 Bradley, but people actually wanted a sports car...

> Another aspect to consider: it was not until early 1990s that the
> internet became "commercial".  Before that, it was seen more as an
> educational/military network not suited for widespread commercial
> deployment.
>
> Once the internet was unleashed to the masses, it of course became a no
> brainer that it should become the de-facto standard. But before that, it
> wasn't so obvious. (even though IP could be used internally).

Agreed that it wasn't until 1992 that internet became "commercial". 
However, at that point, there was really no alternative around anymore. 
So it was just as much a no-brainer from the point of view that nothing 
else could offer what was being done with TCP/IP. But it was only after 
it became "commercial" that other companies and institutions decided to 
recognize this fact, and everyone decided to give up on pushing OSI.

And yes, it was a research network before then, and the military cloned 
it for their own purposes. It was definitely suited for widespread use, 
but regulations prohibited this from being exploited for a long time.

	Johnny

-- 
Johnny Billquist                  || "I'm on a bus
                                   ||  on a psychedelic trip
email: bqt at softjar.se             ||  Reading murder books
pdp is alive!                     ||  tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol