Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!gatech!ncar!husc6!bu-cs!kwe
From: kwe@bu-cs.BU.EDU (kwe@bu-it.bu.edu (Kent W. England))
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.lans
Subject: Re: BRIDGE's (ROUTER's)
Summary: What's in a name?
Message-ID: <36307@bu-cs.BU.EDU>
Date: 11 Aug 89 21:07:05 GMT
References: <11146@ibmpcug.UUCP> <1527@ns.network.com>  <8586@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Reply-To: kwe@buit13.bu.edu (Kent England)
Followup-To: comp.dcom.lans
Organization: Boston U. Information Technology
Lines: 28

In article <8586@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
 swb@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu (Scott Brim) writes:
>Just to keep it interesting, what Apple calls a bridge is what we would
>call a router.


	You are right, in "Inside AppleTalk" from APDA, Apple
consistently calls an AppleTalk router a "bridge".  But in the new
"Inside AppleTalk" published by Addison-Wesley (a book worth getting;
completely rewritten and very nice) somehow that nomenclature has
mysteriously changed.  It is now the "AppleTalk Internet Router".

	This funny excerpt from an Apple press release dated 22 May
89.  It takes the form of Q&A (Apple talks to itself):

Q: Is the AppleTalk Internet Router the same class of device that
other vendors call bridges? (eg, the Kinetics FastPath and Hayes
Interbridge) 

A: Yes. ... Some of these vendors refer to their product as a "bridge"
rather than a router.  Recent applications of both bridges and routers
are elevating the need to distinguish between the two. ...
------

	Of course, the only reason Kinetics ever called the FastPath a
"bridge" was so as not to confuse Apple users who read the Apple
literature.  Only Apple was ever confused about what a bridge really
is.