Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!mcvax!cernvax!jmg
From: jmg@cernvax.UUCP (jmg)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.lans
Subject: Re: Ethernet broadcast
Message-ID: <664@cernvax.UUCP>
Date: 6 May 88 06:29:55 GMT
References: <2520@ihwpt.ATT.COM>
Reply-To: jmg@cernvax.UUCP ()
Organization: CERN European Laboratory for Particle Physics, CH-1211 Geneva, Switzerland
Lines: 18
Keywords: application/protocol failure

In article <2520@ihwpt.ATT.COM> dsb@ihwpt.ATT.COM (debbie butler) writes:
>
>Are there any applications or protocols that *require* the use
>of Ethernet's broadcast mechanism?  Do they fail without it?

Try putting Macs on Ethernet, either by direct Ethertalk connection
or a Kinetics FastPath. You will then see lots (too many) broadcasts.
They use their own version of arp (AARP), plus also bursts of (identical)
broadcasts when trying to establish and defend a unique node number.
Then there are the routing (RTMP) packets every 10 seconds.
I think that someone in Apple thought that they could treat an Ethernet
just like their own LocalTalk, rather than a multi-host multi-protocol
medium with hundreds (thousands) of connections.
-- 
 _ _  o |             __                    |    jmg@cernvax.uucp
| | |   |     _      /  \  _   __  _   __  _|    jmg@cernvax.bitnet
| | | | |_)  /_)     |  __/_) | (___\ | (_/ |  J. M. Gerard, Div. DD, CERN,
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