Re: [9fans] Client/server program sample code request..

[presotto@plan9.bell-labs.com]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1830 bytes --]

Depends on what code you're taking about.  The datakit code in research
Unix was a fraction of the size of our IP stacks.  The code
that ran on the datakits themselves was larger but still a tiny
fraction of the size of CISCO's IOS or, the equivalent at that time,
a Unix machine being used as a router.

If you're comparing Datakit to Ethernet, then you're right.
I, however, tend to compare Datakit to IP.  Both ran on a number
of media and provided transport level protocols with defined
services.

Our datakit nodes were definitely not the worlds most reliable
LAN's.  If you compare against IP running on an Ethernet, then
a coax is certainly a lot more reliable than a Datakit node with
an interface for each host.  However, as a WAN, our network was
a lot more reliable than our equivalent IP networks whose
nodes were usually BSD Unix boxes with multiple interfaces
plugged in.  The latter had a bad habit of eating all their
MBUF's or crashing for a strangely large number of other reasons.

The host interface boards for both networks were similar in
reliability, i.e., crappy.   We lived with both Ethernet(carrying IP)
and Datakit plugged into the same machines for a long
time.  Having both networks definitely improved connectivity
over either one by leaps and bounds.  One of the reasons for
a general dial() routine was to try first one then the other.

As datakit development died off, its reliability fell way
behind that of IP, largely because routers got a lot more
reliable while datakit stayed the same.

Datakit died for a lot of good reasons; slow machine interfaces,
central control at a time autonomy was being exploited,
proprietary hardware and protocols, support by few
computer manufacturers, static routing, ...  I don't
believe that reliability was one of them.

[-- Attachment #2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 1697 bytes --]

From: "Boyd Roberts" <boyd@planete.net>
To: <9fans@cse.psu.edu>
Subject: Re: [9fans] Client/server program sample code request..
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 04:51:03 +0200
Message-ID: <024a01c02509$1d40e720$89c584c3@cybercable.fr>

datakit:

    not known to work reliably at any speed, but the code is huge

:-)