Path: utzoo!yunexus!geac!syntron!jtsv16!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!think!barmar
From: barmar@think.COM (Barry Margolin)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re:  Specification of Berkeley networking utilities
Message-ID: <29871@think.UUCP>
Date: 28 Oct 88 22:09:20 GMT
Article-I.D.: think.29871
References: <29743@think.UUCP> <12441844876.13.VAF@Score.Stanford.EDU>
Sender: news@think.UUCP
Reply-To: barmar@kulla.think.com.UUCP (Barry Margolin)
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA, USA
Lines: 21

In article <12441844876.13.VAF@Score.Stanford.EDU> VAF@SCORE.STANFORD.EDU (Vince Fuller) writes:
>
>    (1) A TELNET server that supports such a feature could send IAC DO
>    SEND-USERNAME (a new option I just made up) before sending the
>Actually, I think this capability is already defined in TELNET. Take a look at
>RFC927 for the details.

So it is.  I guess great minds think alike.

One problem with the protocol in RFC927, though, is that the userid
that is transmitted is interpreted as a 32-bit binary number.  Not all
OSes have numeric userids, though.  Multics and Genera both use
character string user names, and don't translate them into numbers
internally.

Why was the protocol defined in such a restrictive manner?

Barry Margolin
Thinking Machines Corp.

barmar@think.com
{uunet,harvard}!think!barmar