The "name" in this context the host/network/gateway name such as SRI-NIC.ARPA. 3COM.COM would not have been legal back then. Nowhere does it imply that any of the other fields are so restricted. ------ Original Message ------ From: "Bakul Shah" To: "Ron Natalie" Cc: "The Unix Heritage Society" ; "Internet History" Sent: 3/11/2021 4:02:50 PM Subject: Re: [TUHS] [COFF] Pondering the hosts file >On Mar 11, 2021, at 12:32 PM, Ron Natalie wrote: >> >>Amusingly one day we got an Imagen ethernet-connected laser printer. >> Mike Muuss decided the thing should be named BRL-ZAP and since I >>didn't know what to put down as the machine type, and it did have a >>68000 in it, I had Jake put 68000 in the entry in the host table. >> >>The next day I got all kinds of hate mail from other BSD sites who >>assumed I had intentionally sabotaged the host table. Apparently, >>the BSD systems used a YACC grammar to parse the NIC table into the >>Berkeley one. The only problem is they got the grammar wrong and >>assumed the CPU type always began with a letter. There parse blew >>up on my "ZAP" host and they assumed that was the desired effect. > >This is understandable as >a) All the "official machine names" in various assigned numbers RFCs >start with a letter. >b) the BNF syntax for the "host table specification" entries in RFC 952 >or 810 are not precise enough. >> ::= PDP-11/70 | DEC-1080 | C/30 | CDC-6400...etc. >> >>NOTE: See "Assigned Numbers" for specific options and acronyms >> for machine types, operating systems, and protocol/services. >> >> for machine types, operating systems, and protocol/services. >> >c) 68000 was not an official name! >:-) :-) :-) > >>I countered back that using a YACC grammar for this was rediculous. >>There was already a real popular file on UNIX that had a bunch of >>fields separated by colons and commas (/etc/passwd anybody) that it >>was never necessary to use YACC to parse. > >Can't argue with that! Though that doesn't mean a handwritten parser >wouldn't have complained about 68000. >