Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!mcgill-vision!snorkelwacker!bloom-beacon!EXPO.LCS.MIT.EDU!rws
From: rws@EXPO.LCS.MIT.EDU (Bob Scheifler)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: printing at X terminals
Message-ID: <9007231208.AA02366@expire.lcs.mit.edu>
Date: 23 Jul 90 12:08:47 GMT
References: <9007222107.AA26600@s6.Morgan.COM>
Sender: daemon@athena.mit.edu (Mr Background)
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 26


    But, that serial port that connects you to your office doesn't
    speak a general transport protocol, but rather a proprietary protocol
    especially developed to do compression of the X protocol (admitedly not
    designed for low-bandwidth environments) over your slow modem -- so all
    there is is an X stream, no room for anything else.

You've made an assumption about whether the X terminal at home speaks
something general (e.g. TCP over SLIP) or something special-purpose
(e.g. NCD's Xremote protocol or GraphOn's protocol), and whether that
special-purpose protocol allows multiplexing.  There is at present no
standard for a special-purpose protocol for doing X over slow serial
lines.  If and when such an intermediary protocol were attempted to be
made standard, the issue of multiplexing the line for other purposes
(like printing) would surely be argued.  It might even turn out to be
an "extension" of that special-purpose protocol, depending on how the
protocol was designed.  But that's still not the same as making it an
X extension.

    Unless you
    want me to run two modems to the office, one for the dedicated X
    stream, and one for a general purpose transport protocol link,
    something needs to get sacrificed.

The only thing that needs to be sacrificed is the notion that everything
should be an X extension. :-)