Re: DECnet/OSI over TCP/IP

From: Antonio Carlini (arcarlini_at_iee.org)
Date: 02/19/04 

Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2004 17:35:42 +0000

Rob Brooks wrote:
> The name change from DECnet/OSI to DECnet-plus was primarily to indicate that
> a node running DECnet/OSI could still communicate with a DECnet Phase IV node
> running the NSP transport -- the DECnet/OSI product was not simply an OSI
> stack -- it was DECnet (NSP) and OSI.
>
> I'm sure that Antonio could fill in here with a bit more information.

No, I think you covered pretty much everything.

DECnet-VAX Extensions was a transitional product: WANDD and PSI were
ready to ship but Routing was not, so Extensions was a way of getting
something out of the door. (Or so I'm told, that was a bit before my
time). Actually, some of the WANDD stuff (DSW42 and DSF32 drivers for
example) only ever existed as a Phase V driver: there was some wicked
hack that faked enough of EMAA and NCL on a Phase IV box to allow the
driver to run anyway. So some of you may have been (still be?) using
Phase V stuff without knowing it :-)

The first version of DECnet/OSI did support V5.5-2 so you *could*
install that (V5.5 or V5.6 I think). But you would be much better off
upgrading the OS to V7.3 and using the latest DECnet-Plus.

The ability to run DECnet over IP came sometime in the V6 timeframe. So
if that is a requirement, you do have to upgrade. It depended on the UCX
  Pathworks API (usually called PWIP) and pretty much all the 3rd party
stacks supported that, so DECnet should work over any of them.

The alternative would be to pick one of the 3rd party stacks which would
  tunnel Phase IV DECnet over IP. Actually being able to find the kit
now might be a problem though.

> When the product was still known as DECnet/OSI (if that's what you mean
> when you say "In the days of MR/X.400"), one could tunnel DECnet over IP
> using UCX and DECnet/OSI.

MRX lasted well into the DECnet-Plus days. I'm not sure exactly when MRX
ceased and the replacement (Mailbus??) took over. I do remember having
to get deeper into MRX than was good for me as a result of some change
in the way DECnet handled NSAPs; luckily the MRX guys lived on the same
floor of the building! (ISTR that most of the difficulty was having to
run INSPECT [a security lockdown tool] on everything, even the test
machines; most of the mail gateway products had issues with INSPECT and
had to be "tweaked" in non-standard ways to comply).

Antonio 

--
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Antonio Carlini             arcarlini@iee.org