DHWalker@UCIVMSA.BITNET (09/16/87)
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Date: Tue, 15 Sep 87 15:47:17 -0700
From: David Walker <dwalker@orion.cf.uci.edu>
I know this has been hashed over many times, but I haven't seen it
quite like this, so here goes...
Has anyone have a way to use TCP (UDP?) to connect two DECnet routing
nodes? It would be (I think) an ideal way to provide DECnet
connectivity for people in an IP environment. The DECnet people in
one subnet can designate one of their systems as one of these routers
to communicate with DECnet people in other subnets.
David Walker
Network Services Manager
University of CA, IrvineDCP@QUABBIN.SCRC.Symbolics.COM (David C. Plummer) (09/16/87)
I don't think you want to use TCP or UDP to transport DECnet packets. Rather, you probably want to use IP for that purpose. This would make DECnet a sibling of TCP, UDP, ICMP, etc. You probably find it useful to - to get an assigned number to stick in the IP protocol field, - circulate a draft RFC to make sure several people find the functionality sufficient (such as "How do you translate DECnet addresses to IP addresses?"), and - perhaps get some prototype implementations working to find the bugs and then publish your results as an RFC. I don't know the specifics of DECnet, but I am somewhat interested in what you come up with, as many of the same issues come up with CHAOSnet.
hedrick@TOPAZ.RUTGERS.EDU.UUCP (09/17/87)
If someone seriously needs this, and uses Cisco IP routers, please tell me. I have an implementation of DECnet for the Cisco routers. Encapsulating DECnet in IP would be fairly easy in my implementation. However there is no obvious advantage to doing this, unless you need to send DECnet between two Ethernets that are fairly far apart. That is, if somebody at UCI wanted to talk DECnet to somebody at Rutgers, it might make sense to send DECnet over the Arpanet encapsulated in IP (though I'd probably first investigate allocating a link type for DECnet). But for two Ethernets on one campus, this probably does not make sense. In order to get a DECnet host to send you packets for forwarding, you must implement most of the DECnet routing layer. Having done so, you might as well finish it and become a real DECnet router. In that case, there's no particular reason to encapsulate DECnet in IP. You might as well route it as DECnet.