Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!mit-eddie!ll-xn!ames!necntc!linus!philabs!klb
From: klb@philabs.Philips.Com (Ken Bourque)
Newsgroups: comp.os.vms
Subject: Re: Terminal servers TCP/IP
Message-ID: <3168@briar.Philips.Com>
Date: 18 Jan 88 18:31:44 GMT
References: <133*eidem@regtek.unit.uninett> <646@cfa247.cfa250.harvard.EDU> <3924@ames.arpa>
Reply-To: klb@briar.philips.com.UUCP (Ken Bourque)
Organization: Philips Laboratories, Briarcliff Manor, NY
Lines: 17

Bridge Communications makes TCP/IP terminal servers - we use them and they work
well.  Mixing the network between DECnet and TCP is a bit of a pain, though.
The TCP-only machines (Bridge terminal servers and Suns (although you can get
DECnet for Suns)) can't talk directly to the DECnet only machines (VMS).  To
communicate you must go through a system that has both, which is workable but
not always convenient.  For example, on a DECnet-only machine, if you want to
transfer files to a TCP-only machine you have to log in to a TCP machine to run
FTP, since you can't do that on the DECnet machine.  Or, if you are on a
LAT terminal and want to log in to a Sun you must first log in to a VMS machine
(since Sun's can't handle LAT) and then use Telnet.  I strongly suggest that
you choose one of the protocols as your "mainstay" and implement it on every
machine (probably TCP because it runs on everything whereas DECnet and LAT
don't).  In that way you'll have a nice uniform method of going from one
machine to any other machine, and you won't have to educate people on the
special cases of going from one protocol to the other.

-- 
Ken Bourque    klb@philabs.philips.com    ...!{uunet,ihnp4,decvax}!philabs!klb