Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!xymox.UUCP!philf
From: philf@xymox.UUCP (Phil Fernandez)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.ibm
Subject: Re: TCP/IP over SNA
Message-ID: <8909261335.AA08004@jade.berkeley.edu>
Date: 26 Sep 89 04:45:35 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: Phil Fernandez 
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 43

In article <8909250654.AA16455@jade.berkeley.edu> Robert Young writes:
>I have a Sequent system (S81) connected to our 4381 mainframe through
>SNA. We have already purchased the TCP/IP tapes from IBM but are waiting
>for a hardware solution to connect the two systems. Initially, someone in
>technical marketing (IBM) suggested we use an RT and a token-ring to
>ethernet router but the idea never cooked. Now they are suggesting some
>type of channel attached device (Ethernet) to connect the two systems.
>Any ideas, suggestions and/or comments?

IBM sells a box called the 8232, which is an industrially-packaged
PC/AT with one or more net interface boards (Ethernet and/or Token Ring)
plus one ore more channel interface boards.  It is their current
standard offering for host-attach to Ethernet, and is fully supported
by the mainframe-based TCP/IP software.  I had some experience with
this box when I used to work at Stanford; for the most part it works
pretty well.  With the 8232, you can just put the 4381 onto your
Ethernet in just the same way you'd attach any other workstation or
mini.

>So far it looks like the IBM people we deal with are not completely sure
>about any clear solutions.

I can't resist a little bit of IBM-bashing in this case.  The IBM
sales and systems engineering force is just not up-to-speed on the
TCP/IP and Ethernet product offerings for VM or MVS.  When I was
working at Stanford, IBM was trying to sell us TCP/IP software for a
3090 running MVS.  They kept trotting in more senior "experts," up to
the level of a "Regional Networking Specialist."  Each of them spouted
so much silly or plain false nonsense about TCP/IP that I could barely
sit through the meetings.

This lack of marketing commitment would really scare me about becoming
too depending on an IBM TCP/IP solution for a S/370 system.

(This are purely my own opinions, and do not reflect those of my employer)


+-----------------------------+----------------------------------------------+
| Phil Fernandez              |             philf@metaphor.com               |
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| Metaphor Computer Systems   |"Does the body rule the mind, or does the mind|
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