From owner-freebsd-stable Sat Sep 29 14:32: 8 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from zircon.seattle.wa.us (sense-sea-CovadSub-0-228.oz.net [216.39.147.228]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 8EDAC37B40D for ; Sat, 29 Sep 2001 14:32:04 -0700 (PDT) Received: (qmail 30785 invoked by uid 1001); 29 Sep 2001 21:32:34 -0000 From: Joe Kelsey MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-ID: <15286.15858.895050.893578@zircon.zircon.seattle.wa.us> Date: Sat, 29 Sep 2001 14:32:34 -0700 To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: networking design (was: 127/8 continued In-Reply-To: References: <20010928223358.11AE43E2A@CRWdog.demon.co.uk> X-Mailer: VM 6.92 under Emacs 20.7.1 Sender: owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Gary W. Swearingen writes: > Andy Sparrow writes: > > Solaris lets you set the POINTTOPOINT flag on ethernet links via ifconfig. Just because Slowlaris lets you set a flag does not make it right or even make it work the way that you think. > Which brings up another usability issue: FreeBSD's "ifconfig", > which doesn't let you set the flag, doesn't complain when you try: > > $ ifconfig de0 10.0.0.1 10.0.0.2; echo $? > 0 > $ ifconfig de0 > de0: flags=8c43 mtu 1500 So what? Again, you are using a multipoint network in an inappropriate manner. Fundamentally, Ethernet is not point-to-point. Attempting to use it in a point-to-point manner, no matter whether or not you "think" that it should theoretically should be usable in such a manner, is irrelevant. Physically, it is not a point-to-point network. If you want point-to-point, set up X.25 links between the various points and run your network that way (aka, "ATM"). The physical network (Ethernet, aka, 802.*) is set up as a multipoint, broadcast network. Trying to pervert it into something else through misuse of software is not going to change the nature of the network. This is not a "usability" issue, it is an issue of your misunderstanding of networking design. I suggest that you attempt to explain the rationale behind your current network design to everyone once again and maybe we can all help you to a better understanding of how to accomplish your goals. /Joe To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message