Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!pasteur!helios.ee.lbl.gov!nosc!tetra!budden
From: budden@tetra.NOSC.MIL (Rex A. Buddenberg)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: Dumb question: ping w/o icmp support?
Message-ID: <707@tetra.NOSC.MIL>
Date: 24 Oct 88 00:47:02 GMT
References: <Oct.20.21.31.00.1988.356@athos.rutgers.edu> <8810221819.AA10475@nsipo.arc.nasa.gov>
Reply-To: budden@tetra.nosc.mil.UUCP (Rex A. Buddenberg)
Organization: Naval Ocean Systems Center, San Diego
Lines: 18

Milo,

You are correct that ICMP and ARP et al should be part of a minimal
spec.  No arguments there...just the observation that getting
the right set of specs into a contract isn't very easy -- no cookbook
for TCP/IP.  The GOSIP effort is designed to head off some of
those problems.

Now, to DARPA's execution.  Making TCP/IP a trademark and requiring
certification certainly would handle a lot of your concerns, but
DARPA is an agancy for advanced research.  DCA should be doing
this kind of work at the production level, not DARPA.  Indeed,
they are doing some certification work and the horse is so far
out of the barn that trademarking TCP/IP is not fesible now.
Note that the Ada Joint Program Office (Ada, not ADA) is in the
office of the Secretary of Defense, not DARPA.

Rex Buddenberg