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PA2AGA > HDDIG 20.09.00 23:25l 178 Lines 6851 Bytes #999 (0) @ EU
BID : HD_2000_254F
Read: DC1TMA GUEST
Subj: HamDigitalDigest 2000/254F
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Sent: 000920/1901Z @:PI8HGL.#ZH1.NLD.EU #:16269 [Den Haag] FBB $:HD_2000_254F
From: PA2AGA@PI8HGL.#ZH1.NLD.EU
To : HDDIG@EU
Date: Sun, 17 Sep 00 16:39:12 MET
Message-Id: <hd_2000_254F>
From: pa2aga@pe1mvx.ampr.org
To: hd_broadcast@pa2aga.ampr.org
X-BBS-Msg-Type: B
> allocation or pointer handling just made the program leak memory or crash
> for other reasons, killing your entire station.
This was the failure of the tcp/ip coders. They somehow missed, or did not
consider, the obvious solution: partition the problem onto more than one
machine
Cost is not an issue since NET (NOS) can run on any old junker when it
does not have to bind all the "applications" into itself.
> It took until 1992 for freely available Unix-like systems to come on the
> market (I installed my first Linux system in december 1992), and THAT was
> something that would have been nice to have in the early NET/NOS days.
> (the first NET version was released in 1985)
It was available in late 1984 if you lived near Phil ...
> Now you could independently develop and run applications in separate
> processes, and have them crash independently. Plus existing applications
> could be used with packet radio without having to adapt them into the NOS
> environment. This was a big win, but it was too late.
And the model was still really tasks inside one process. The support for
running under DV never did seem to work right, OS/2 never caught on,
and doing things in Win 3.1 didn't seem to work right either.
> Most die-hard NOS users would not part with their system, learn Unix/Linux,
> buy a better (at least 386) system to run it on, etc.
Junker 286 became "free" or "nearly free" by the 1990 time frame.
I was giving them away as we junked 'em out at work then.
In any case, NET (NOS) could be run on XTs, which were very
available for free or near free a year or two earlier.
> (I am not counting the happy few that had an old 3B2 from work, to have a
> decent user population one needs to use hardware that anyone can get)
> Of course it became worse when Windows 95 finally appeared and all the hams
> went using that OS, for which usable interfaces between IP and packet radio
> did not appear for several years. The only "solution" was a separate box
> connected to a shack ethernet and running some router software (NOS, for
> example). This was just a too complicated solution when one could also run
> a packet terminal program interfacing with a TNC directly connected to the
> Windows box. The BBS user did not see any advantage of a network protocol
> anyway, as his connection is point-to-point over a local link.
> The really attractive applications only got widespread with the
> introduction of Internet in the general consumer market (around 1997, 1998)
> and by then the amateur packet network was already losing its most active
> proponents.
Approx 1992 is closer to the key year. Initial version of Mosaic was
available then, many email clients were available, newsreaders had
become robust. Even earlier all this could be done using WFW 3.11.
But see further comments below: if one used email and netnews,
one was divorced from the existing BBS network.
Development stayed stuck in the "monolithic single process" model,
and had not yet begun to move toward network computing. Maybe if
a few folks from Sun had been involved in the Ham Radio work things
would have turned out differently.
> So, it is not fair to say there was never a lack of applications and than
> anything that runs over TCP/IP works. It does now, but it did'nt back
> then!
Well ... it *did* but the folks involved with *NOS (JNOS, WNOS,
WAMPUS, et al) seemed stuck in the "monolithic single image" mode.
There was a lack of consideration of other system architectures, which
continues to this day. SNOS exists simply to demonstrate that it is
easy to solve the problem: it doesn't have any "applications" bound
in to it's code, it just does the networking and protocol translations.
Protocol translations: nntp <-> bulletins, smtp/pop3 <-> personal messages.
At the time that the NET -> NOS transitions took place, I was pretty much
out of the loop, being very busy doing a startup and then moving from
CA to OR. Wasn't paying much attention to ham radio again until
after Johan moved to Japan and the JNOS project was over.
--
... Hank
http://horedson.home.att.net
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 17 Sep 2000 08:33:10 GMT
From: nomail@rob.knoware.nl (Rob Janssen)
Subject: TCP/IP Address
Hank Oredson <horedson@att.net> wrote:
[Hank has something to add to every claim, but does not carefully read them
before he replied]
I am not going to play this game with you, Hank. But I only want to add
that a solution that needs multiple machines is not going to make it when
you want many packet radio amateurs as users of your system. That is
only for the nerds.
Rob
--
+----------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
| Rob Janssen pe1chl@amsat.org | WWW: http://www.knoware.nl/users/rob |
| AMPRnet: rob@pe1chl.ampr.org | AX.25 BBS: PE1CHL@PI8WNO.#UTR.NLD.EU |
+----------------------------------+--------------------------------------+
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 16 Sep 2000 09:04:41 -0400
From: "Bob Lewis" <rlewis@staffnet.com>
Subject: Windows software for an SCS PTC-IIe TNC
Take a look at the SCS web page http://www.scs-ptc.com They have a
variety of 3rd party windows programs (free and share ware) listed
under the software selection.
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 16 Sep 2000 17:06:29 -0400
From: "John K. Scoggin, Jr." <aat3bf@conectiv-comm.com>
Subject: Windows software for an SCS PTC-IIe TNC
Carlos -
Try AirMail2000 (www.airmail2000.com). It supports COM1-COM8 and
works nicely with the SCS PTC-II's (along with a lot of others - Jim just
added DXP38 support). Also has some rig control capability.
It is a dynamite application and free!
73's - john N3SKO/AAT3BF
"Carlos Portela" <cportela@simple-sw.com> wrote in message
news:8pvig3$1a7k$1@news.gate.net...
> Hi All,
>
> I just bought this unit and installed the software that came with it. The
> included software (PlusTerm) doesn't seem to be great but it probably
works
> for most people. However, in my case, I need to run the software from an
> IBM ThinkPad 600X which sets the COM port to 5 and PlusTerm says that this
> is an invalid port.
>
> There must be a good Windows program out there (FREE or reasonably priced)
> to control this great box. From what I hear this is a very good MPC that
is
> not well represented by the software bundled with it.
>
> Thank you in advance!
>
> Carlos
> W4EDB
>
>
>
------------------------------
End of Ham-Digital Digest V2000 #254
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