[Info-vax] What would you miss if DECnet got the chop? Was: "bad select 38" (OpenSSL on VMS)

[Dirk Munk]

Michael Moroney wrote:
> David Froble <davef at tsoft-inc.com> writes:
>
>> Dirk Munk wrote:
>
>>> The DEC/HP way of DECnet over IP is not only offering DECnet over IP,
>>> but also OSI over IP (you can look at DECnet as just another OSI
>>> application). It is covered by three RFC's, RFC1006, RFC1859, and
>>> RFC2126, the latter is for IPv6.
>>>
>>> Both versions of DECnet over IP are incompatible.
>>>
>>> Now my simple question is, what should VSI offer, two incompatible
>>> versions of DECnet over IP?
>
>> If you look up thread at Michael Moroney's post, you'll see the reality.  He got
>> DECnet built, but that's all the time VSI is going to put into DECnet.
>
>> What you see today is all that you're ever going to see, with the understanding
>> of "never say never".  Your question(s) are already answered.  Not that you're
>> going to like the answer(s).
>
> Without looking into it, I would assume OSI over IP is just another user
> of IP and it "should work" with Multinet/the VSI IP.  But perhaps the
> DECnet V people conspired with the DEC TCPIP people to use an undocumented
> interface.  But we should already know the answer.  Does DECnet-Plus over
> IP work at all with the current Multinet implementation?

According to the DECnet-Plus SPD, only the HP IP stack is supported. It 
does not explicitly say that no other IP stack works of course.

DECnet-Plus relies on the PWIP driver, it must be loaded.

DECnet-plus at present uses RFC1006 and RFC1859. For DECnet-Plus to use 
IPv6, RFC2126 should also be implemented.

You should be able to see in the sources of DECnet-Plus and TCPIP 
services how these two products interconnect, we can't do that.

>
> The Multinet DECnet IV over IP is a Multinet-specific creation.  They must
> have written a driver that creates a pseudodevice that looks (to DECnet)
> like a network interface but really interfaces with Multinet's IP stuff.
>
> As to DECnet-Plus, I doubt I will be tasked with any further work there,
> other than, perhaps, getting it working on x86 once x86 VMS exists, and
> if a demand is seen for it.  But a customer waving money and shouting "We
> want DECnet!" could change that -- if such a customer even exists.
> I am a little surprised at the interest in DECnet here.
>

DECnet is a mature product, it works the way it does. I doubt if there 
are wishes to gte more functionality into DECnet, apart from being able 
to use it over IPv6 (implementing RFC2126, it dates from 1997!)

Because it is so simple to use, I think you will be surprised to see how 
often it is being used.

Using it over IP will give you the best of both worlds, a very simple 
VMS specific interface that does not exist in native IP itself, and the 
IP transport stack on your network. In that case you can look at it as a 
VMS specific IP protocol, what's wrong with that?