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From: nelson@CLUTX.CLARKSON.EDU (Russell Nelson)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc
Subject: standard interface
Message-ID: <8711221938.AA16256@clutx.clarkson.edu>
Date: Sun, 22-Nov-87 14:38:10 EST
Article-I.D.: clutx.8711221938.AA16256
Posted: Sun Nov 22 14:38:10 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 26-Nov-87 07:16:41 EST
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Organization: The ARPA Internet
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I have several points:

o Phil is incorrect: MS-DOG is not just a bootstrap loader, but it's a
  filesystem driver as well.  This is no advantage as the filesystem happens
  to be poorly thought out.
o Greg is incorrect: A "grown up" operating system need not be large and
  inefficient.  Imagine where we would be today if Microsoft had had the sense
  to provide USABLE device drivers for the screen, keyboard, and serial ports.
  We would be able to run protected mode programs with no great overhead.

But that's besides the point.  The problem with Phil's scheme of providing
everything in one program is that the user has no control over what services
are provided.  If you want your tcp/ip to provide different services, like
NNTP, or Unix Talk, you have to recompile NET.  If you have an unsupported
interface, you have to recompile NET.

The solution is to split NET apart into seperately loaded modules, which
talk to one-another via a shared software interrupt.  That is what the
discussion is about, and that's my current project.