Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ucbvax!QUABBIN.SCRC.Symbolics.COM!DCP
From: DCP@QUABBIN.SCRC.Symbolics.COM (David C. Plummer)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: Where to find... supdup and tn3270 specs
Message-ID: <19880122141133.1.DCP@SWAN.SCRC.Symbolics.COM>
Date: 22 Jan 88 14:11:00 GMT
References: <314575.880122.PAP4@AI.AI.MIT.EDU>
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 21


    Date: Fri, 22 Jan 88 00:44:08 EST
    From: "Philip A. Prindeville" <PAP4@AI.AI.MIT.EDU>

    Given that is a networking protocol, the most reasonable representation
    would be how the bits (bytes, or octets) appear 'on the wire', not how
    they pack into a particular machine's word.

    In view of the number of RFCs in print, we should know by now how to
    express an idea without reverting to assembly language (for any processor,
    whether esoteric or commonplace)...

I think MRC was right.  Have you read the RFC, or are you making attacks
based on hearsay?  There is no, absolutely no, assembly language in the
RFC.  As for your "on the wire" argument, TCP and IP don't even do that.
TCP and IP abstract the bytes into headers which are displayed and
discussed in the RFC as headers, not bytes on a wire.  They describe how
those headers appear on the wire, just as the SUPDUP RFC describes how
the 36 bit quantities appear on the wire.  I'm really trying to avoid
making disparaging remarks about people's inability to convert between
abstractions.