Xref: utzoo comp.protocols.tcp-ip:2381 comp.lang.c:7033 Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!munnari!mulga!ditmela!latcs1!vertical!greg From: greg@vertical.oz (Greg Bond) Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip,comp.lang.c Subject: Re: C binding interfaces for TCP/IP Message-ID: <27@vertical.oz> Date: 2 Feb 88 02:36:43 GMT References: <25@vdelta.UUCP> <2168@cognos.UUCP> <7202@brl-smoke.ARPA> <610@cresswell.quintus.UUCP> Organization: Vertical Software, Melbourne, Australia Lines: 29 Summary: Some Protocols have High overhead In article <610@cresswell.quintus.UUCP>, ok@quintus.UUCP (Richard A. O'Keefe) writes: > In article <7202@brl-smoke.ARPA>, gwyn@brl-smoke.ARPA (Doug Gwyn ) writes: > > [talks about Sun XDR protocol] > > it up in the Sun reference manual and found that it had FAR too much > > overhead for my purposes. I ended up implementing my own scheme that > > runs much faster. > > How can a program run much faster than a PROTOCOL? > The protocol is one thing, the source-code implementation of it that > SUN give away is quite another. Correct. If the PROTOCOL requires significant overhead of bytes on the wire, then the IMPLEMENTATION will be limited in the speed it can achieve, no matter how good the code implementing it is. We may say that "standards" are more important than efficiency. In this case, Doug seems to have made the judgement that the application required an efficiency un-obtainable with XDR spec, and invented his own, and assumed the support responsibility etc. Yes, the protocol is not the implementation. But great implementation may not save a poor or inappropriate protocol. [ I make this as a general point; I have no knowledge of XDR per se ] -- #define WHOAMI Gregory Bond, Vertical Software, Melbourne, Australia #define ADDRESS greg@vertical.oz, uunet!vertical.oz!greg #define JOKE Ain't no-one here but us chickens... #include