Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!helios.ee.lbl.gov!pasteur!agate!eos!amelia!ames!ncar!tank!oddjob!uxc!uxc.cso.uiuc.edu!uxe.cso.uiuc.edu!krauskpf
From: krauskpf@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.appletalk
Subject: Re: zone= entry in config.tel for Mac N
Message-ID: <66000025@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu>
Date: 25 Aug 88 22:02:00 GMT
References: <3770@louie.udel.EDU>
Lines: 39
Nf-ID: #R:louie.udel.EDU:3770:uxe.cso.uiuc.edu:66000025:000:1837
Nf-From: uxe.cso.uiuc.edu!krauskpf    Aug 25 17:02:00 1988



I can speak for NCSA - Greg is correct.

Here is the text of a note posted some months ago when we were planning
the use of zones in NCSA Telnet v2.2:

>   
>   Once we get a zone,network,node address for the FastPath, NCSA Telnet can
>   use any interconnection to get to a FastPath.  The problem comes when we
>   try to find a FastPath to use.
>   
>   How can NCSA Telnet find the FastPath?
>   
>   1.  A local-zone NBP query.  This can cross bridges, but not zones. NBP is
>       the best way to do this lookup.  Currently supported for the KIP
>       gateway only.  Kinetics "combined" gateway does not support NBP.
>       Kinetics has suggested that NBP may be a part of future gateway 
>       software but they have not announced that it will be so.
>   
>   2.  An all-zone NBP query.  Do you really want this type of broadcast query
>       to go to all zones?  We currently do not support this.
>   
>   3.  A DDP broadcast on the local network with an encapsulated ARP packet
>       (this being an ARPANET type of ARP).  Currently supported for Kinetics'
>       gateway software.  DDP broadcasts do not cross bridges, so this cannot
>       find a FastPath across a bridge.  We would rather use NBP.
>   
>   I hope this explains what does and doesn't work.

Since then, we have compromised.  The zone= parameter specifies that the
NBP query should be targeted at a SPECIFIC zone name.  An earlier note
on this list confirmed that this works four zones away.  As noted
above, this cannot help users of the old Kinetics combined gateway code.

NBP is required for zone traversal, so KIP or later releases of 
Kinetics software have to be used in the FastPath.

Tim Krauskopf                                        timk@ncsa.uiuc.edu (ARPA)
National Center for Supercomputing Applications      14013@ncsavmsa (BITNET)