Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 alpha 4/15/85; site ucbvax.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!ucbvax!tcp-ip From: tcp-ip@ucbvax.ARPA Newsgroups: fa.tcp-ip Subject: Re: tftp for bootstrap Message-ID: <8803@ucbvax.ARPA> Date: Fri, 5-Jul-85 13:15:26 EDT Article-I.D.: ucbvax.8803 Posted: Fri Jul 5 13:15:26 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 6-Jul-85 10:59:37 EDT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.ARPA Organization: University of California at Berkeley Lines: 38 From: lewisWe have been using a loader server for several years to load TIUs, BBN and Jeff Mogul also use versions of it to load GWYs. In our user testbeds, the same physical hardware is a multifunction box, depending on which module is loaded. We have found that the users often complained that the server was down, when in fact they specified improper file name syntax. This caused us to come up with two changes. There is a data base on the server hosts, which maps requestor's internet IDs to load file names (TOPS20 or Unix pathnames, depending on server). Wildcards in the database for Internet IDs exist to shorten the list. A default load then retrieves the file found in the database. In addition, Internet IDs with or without wildcards can be paired with another database file name, allowing separation of database administration for different hosts and ranges of hosts. Alternatively, the user can specify a file name to be loaded from the server. The first change involves finding the file to boot. If the user specifies any file, the database is not queried. To make it easier for the user to remember how to specify file names, we now allow suffixes to be left off and uppercase is converted to lower, and preceding blanks ( MYLOAD is myload.ext). In this case the default directory is searched. If the file name requested begins with a system directory delimiter, "<" on TOPS20 or "/" on Unix, the server takes the request literally, for people who supposedly know what they want. The second change, not implemented yet, is to return a text string to indicate the status. Currently, if the file is not found, the only perception the user has is the three minute timeout. The string packet should probably be allowed asynchronously with loading progress. It could report (file not found / illegal file name / file broken / etc.). The servee code resides in about 6K bytes nonvolatile memory, and the internet address is used as the database key for default booting. Probably some mechanism for privacy/accounting should be considered. -Mark Lewis