Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!SEISMO.CSS.GOV!rick
From: rick@SEISMO.CSS.GOV (Rick Adams)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: SLIP working group?
Message-ID: <8803300417.AA14103@beno.CSS.GOV>
Date: 30 Mar 88 04:17:29 GMT
Sender: usenet@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 27


I still maintain that in the real world, there is no need for
a checksum with packet transmission. IP and TCP do it fine.

This is based on 4 years experience with 8 "real world" SLIP installations
including leased lines from Washington, DC to Amsterdam, San Diego, Albany,
and a few "local" sites < 50 miles away.

Current modem technology is such that the connection is already
virtually error free. The same can be said of dialup modems if
you don't buy the cheapest junk you can get. (I.e. if you're cheap buy
something with MNP error correction. If you want something to work great,
spend the $1000 on a Trailblazer.)

The biggest virtue of "my" SLIP is that it is so trivial to implement.
A big part of that reason is that it makes TCP/IP do the
retransmission & error detection. Complicated protocols won't catch
on no matter how nice they look on paper. (E.g. a previous RFC on
Async protocols for serial lines that was never implemented (or at
least widely implemented.)

Does anyone REALLY have proof that it is necessary to complicate the
protocol? Or is it just an obsession with what is theoretically
required.

Often practical engineering confounds theoretical science.

--rick