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From: steveh@hammer.UUCP (Stephen Hemminger)
Newsgroups: net.unix-wizards
Subject: Re: Is 4.2BSD a failure?
Message-ID: <1097@hammer.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 28-Jan-85 11:26:49 EST
Article-I.D.: hammer.1097
Posted: Mon Jan 28 11:26:49 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 30-Jan-85 05:28:07 EST
References: <17100032@wdl1.UUCP> <47500007@ccvaxa.UUCP>
Reply-To: steveh@hammer.UUCP (Stephen Hemminger)
Distribution: net
Organization: Tektronix, Wilsonville OR
Lines: 19
Keywords: 4.2Bsd, Netwoking

<47500007@ccvaxa.UUCP>
>				...  The most significant addition was the
>	support for networking, which may be the last gasp of the
>	networking-inside-the-operating-system approach.

False.  The socket model (or stream I/O system) is necessary for several
reasons.

1) There are other network protocols that often need to be added, would
you prefer each vendor add his/her own system calls?

2) Not all protocols will have smart boards.  How about workstations
where putting a $5K board in to do networking is economic suicide.

3) Even the smart TCP/IP boards don't know how to do IP forwarding so
they won't work on gatways (last I heard anyway).

4) With 4.2Bsd there are fairly clean "object oriented" interface points
to allow hooking up network devices that work at higher levels.