ccgavin@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (Gavin Stone-Tolcher) (05/13/91)
I would like any opinions from people using the "Farralon Liaison" product to
provide a dial-in appletalk service. Any problems experienced and whether
applications running on the remote machine work with MacTCP would be nice.
Provision of a similar service using a NetComm R-Server bridge proved to be
a failure with regard to TCP/IP.
Thanks,
Gavin...
--
Internet: ccgavin@uqvax.cc.uq.oz.au Phone: +61 7 365 3942
Postal: Gavin Stone-Tolcher, Prentice Computer Centre (Network Management)
Queensland University, St Lucia, QLD Australia 4072.
--
Internet: ccgavin@cc.uq.oz.au Phone: +61 7 377 3942
Postal: Gavin Stone-Tolcher, Network Operations, Prentice Computer Centre
The University of Queensland, St Lucia, QLD Australia 4067. conrad@popvax.uucp (M20400@c.nobili) (05/13/91)
In article <1991May12.232358.25317@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au> ccgavin@brolga.cc.uq.oz.au (Gavin Stone-Tolcher) writes: >I would like any opinions from people using the "Farralon Liaison" product to >provide a dial-in appletalk service. Any problems experienced and whether >applications running on the remote machine work with MacTCP would be nice. I have posted explanations of Liaison several times before. I really love it. It is the single most flexible piece of network software I have seen. I think that every network administrator or user should have copies around. Personally I use it mostly for its dialup network bridging features. Right now I am dialed in to a Liaison router on my SE/30 at work and have five terminal sessions open through it (4 NCSA telnet, 1 tn3270), and a HyperFTP session. I also have a LocalTalk-based AppleShare file server volume mounted and have been printing things out on a LocalTalk LaserWriter IINT at work. I cannot imagine a more flexible (remember -- it is a _network_ connection) means of connecting myself to the world from home. Of course, none if these connections is really quick. But they are probably as fast or faster than those that many of the people reading this now are using. I don't know what the speed is -- I haven't used a slow modem for a while -- I can't remember whether this is like 1200 bps or 2400 bps.... Basically, don't try this with out a pair of *wicked-fast* mo- dems. I will let you know how it goes with the new V.32bis modems soon =8-) . Oh, yeah, of course I only use MacTCP versions of things, so no problem there. Check out the reviews and the literature carefully. Really cool product. Buy. >-- >Internet: ccgavin@cc.uq.oz.au Phone: +61 7 377 3942 > Postal: Gavin Stone-Tolcher, Network Operations, Prentice Computer Centre > The University of Queensland, St Lucia, QLD Australia 4067. I'm just a happy customer.... +---- C o n r a d C . N o b i l i ----+ | | | Harvard University | Internet: conrad@harvarda.harvard.edu | | Office for Info. Tech. | conrad@popvax.harvard.edu | | Information Services | BITNET: CONRAD AT HARVARDA | | Technical & User Services | CONRAD AT HARVSPHB | | 1730 Cambridge Street | voice: (617) 495-8554 | +---- Cambridge, MA 02138 | fax: (617) 495-0715 ----+
sjhg9320@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Maximum Slackness ) (05/13/91)
Liason does a very nice job at half-routing Local-talk devices and works well as a full router on its host machine, without noticably degrading the performance of forground tasks like Spreadsheets, Word Processors, etc. However, it does not as yet handle TCP/IP packets and is limited to Localtalk. -- ______________________________________________________________________________ ==============================================================================
sjhg9320@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Maximum Slackness ) (05/13/91)
Oops, forgot to add that Liasion works just fine with MacTCP. -- ______________________________________________________________________________ ==============================================================================
jqj@duff.uoregon.edu (JQ Johnson) (05/13/91)
We have been testing Liaison as a possible approach to providing dial-in
Appletalk service on our campus. We generally like it, though it is not
as plug-and-play as some other Mac networking. Some notes:
One poster stated that "it does not as yet handle TCP/IP packets and is
limited to Localtalk." A note of clarification is needed here. As a
router, Liaison does not route IP from one medium to Ethernet. However,
it works just fine passing IP-in-DDP. The following configuration is
legal and works fine:
Mac at home w/Liaisonnet Mac running Liaison on campus
\ / |
\__modem --- phone --- modem ----------------- localtalk
|
Fastpath etc.
|
Ethernet backbone ============================
In such a configuration, the home user can access AppleTalk resources
(printers, file servers, etc.) throughout the AppleTalk internet
accessible on the backbone.
Because of the presence of the Fastpath, it can also run most MacTCP
applications communicating with TCP-speaking nodes reachable on the
Ethernet backbone. One gotcha is the "most": there seem to be
timing-related bugs in MacTCP 1.0.1 that cause problems with some
applications (e.g. choosing Disconnect in Stanford MacIP causes the Mac to
crash because MacTCP doesn't correctly handle receipt of TCP data on a
port after the local end goes away). Also, if you run and exit from a
MacTCP connection, then shut down and reestablish the liaison connection,
the system will occasionally bomb if you again try to run a MacTCP
application. On the other hand, we've successfully run NCSA Telnet,
MacIP, Eudora, Network Time, XferIt, HyperFTP, and numerous other MacTCP
applications using Liaison.
A couple of other major gotchas that we've uncovered:
1/ Liaison and Liaisonnet do not yet work with System 7.
2/ In the above configuration, if the Mac at home has a local Personal
Laserwriter, it cannot print to the PLW while the liaison session is in
progress. Some other localtalk-connected devices do work, though.
Farallon has been working on this sort of problem.
3/ I wouldn't recommend it with a 1200b modem connection. Even at 2400b
it is only marginally satisfactory for interactive applications. A telnet
session at 2400b (with or without MNP5 compression) is unacceptably
inferior to using a standard asynch terminal emulator (e.g. kermit),
although Eudora works fine at 2400b. 9600b with compression (Liaison
works fine with MNP5 or V.42bis once you get flow control right) is more
acceptable, though still noticeably inferior (of course, you can have
multiple telnet sessions!).
4/ Finally, network administrators should note the danger of allowing
uncontrolled personal Appletalk routers. In the above configuration there
isn't too much danger of problems, but suppose someone dials in from home
using their own copy of Liaison rather than Liaisonnet. Havoc could ensue
as the remote Liaison attempts to defend a list of network numbers or to
change the zone name of the dialin "network".
The above caveats aside, we like Liaison much better than Shiva netmodems
or netserials for our application.
--
JQ Johnson
Director of Network Services Internet: jqj@oregon.uoregon.edu
University of Oregon voice: (503) 346-1746
250E Computing Center BITNET: jqj@oregon
Eugene, OR 97403-1212 fax: (503) 346-4397