[HECnet] Downtime next week

[Johnny Billquist]

Christine Caulfield wrote:
On 20/08/09 09:41, Johnny Billquist wrote:
Gregg Levine wrote:

Hello!
Steve I have three here, all DEC Server 90s. They aren't exactly
friendly to the Linux-DECNet code. Whereas the 200s are more to their
liking (The code base that is.)

However there's something about the basic 200 that resembles the PDP
background for them......

There are plenty of problems with the Linux LAT code (this isn't
DECnet). I tried looking at it a few years ago, but decided that it
would be easier to rewrite all of it instead of trying to fix that code.
But then I got sidetracked (as often happens), so I haven't done
anything about it.
Several people have already come to that conclusion, including me! It was written while I was reverse-engineering it so it's built up as a heap of guesses on top of other guesses. It works most of the time, to VMS, but as I didn't (and still don't) have anything else to test against that's where it stayed. I don't even have many DECservers to test against any more, my 90s power supply died (twice) and the 200 melted after the fans broke down :-( So the code languishes in its current state.

I also happen to think that C++ is a bad language choice. :-)
But it don't seem that many people are inclined to fix this. We'll see
what happens in the future. The LAT specs are atleast available
nowadays, so it should be easier to do this "right" now.

That said, I have also had problems with the Linux DECnet code.
Christine might remember me complaining in the past. :-)
It works fine with VMS, but horribly with RSX (which also is true of the
LAT code).
Although I've not tried doing much with Linux DECnet to RSX it's always seemed to work for me when I have tried it. I suspect that any problems here are much easier to fix. Even though the main protocol is in the kernel (unlike LAT) it's pretty solid code, so anything that needs fixing will most likely be in userspace. Most (though not all!) of that was written from proper specifications so should be easier to work with than LAT.

I think it's all userspace programs that I have had problems with.

Then again ... I've not had any bug reports from anyone about either and it's quite hard to fix bugs you don't know about :-P

Sorry, you're right. I think I've only talked with you on perhaps rather
vague terms about the problems I've had.

But as we now have HECnet, this is way easier to work on.
I suggest you log into MIM, and then just try to do a few different things:

1) Try phone to a Linux box. Initiated from both sides.
2) Try accessing files from both sides to the other side.

Neither of these things worked when I last tried.
And that's a start atleast. :-)

	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