Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!mcdchg!laidbak!stevea
From: stevea@i88.isc.com (Steve Alexander)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: UDP bind question
Message-ID: <1990Feb23.052940.5871@i88.isc.com>
Date: 23 Feb 90 05:29:40 GMT
References: <9002201434.AA04791@dcrocker.pa.dec.com> <9002201904.AA04950@yuba.WRS.COM>
Sender: usenet@i88.isc.com (Usenet News)
Organization: INTERACTIVE Systems Corporation, Naperville, IL
Lines: 24

In article <9002201904.AA04950@yuba.WRS.COM> hwajin@yuba.UUCP (Hwa Jin Bae) writes:
>Pretty much the only difference, if any, that exists between various
>implementations has to do with the name of the STREAMS device you 
>open via TLI to get a TCP STREAM or any other protocol STREAM.  One
>other prevalent and possible difference seems to be the address
>binding semantics.  Beyond these, there are *NOT* that many differences.

You missed the worst one of all.  Options management.  Most vendors use
sockaddr_in for TCP & UDP addresses, but everybody has a different option
format.  Still, I agree that it's probably easier to port TLI applications 
between systems than socket applications, if for no other reason than that 
no two vendors can agree on where the header files go.

The bottom line is that AT&T should have defined protocol bindings for TLI,
or at least put pressure on vendors of UNIX System V add-on packages to be
more compatible with each other.

It'll probably be even worse when OSI implementations start proliferating, 
since there isn't even a reference standard like there was for UNIX TCP/IP
implementations (at least not until 4.nBSD comes out, if then).

--
Steve Alexander, Software Technologies Group    | stevea@i88.isc.com
INTERACTIVE Systems Corporation, Naperville, IL | ...!{sun,ico}!laidbak!stevea