Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!uwvax!oddjob!ncar!gatech!purdue!i.cc.purdue.edu!j.cc.purdue.edu!mace.cc.purdue.edu!dls From: dls@mace.cc.purdue.edu (David L Stevens) Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip Subject: Re: Subnetting Message-ID: <12@mace.cc.purdue.edu> Date: 9 May 88 15:34:15 GMT References: <8805090727.AA11410@uc.msc.umn.edu> Reply-To: dls@mace.cc.purdue.edu.UUCP (David L Stevens) Organization: PUCC UNIX Group Lines: 14 Differing subnet sizes are not really a problem on all systems-- the "only if your software isn't up to snuff" comment applies. 4.3BSD includes enhancements to ICMP to ask for the interface's netmask ("ICMP_MASKREQ"). I don't know of any user-level program that uses this (yet). Also, I don't think it's been clear that the "variable size" subnets are by individual bits, not just bytes. You can split a class B net number into 17 bits of network and 15 bits of host, if that's what you really want to do. Some software only supports A subnetted to B and B subnetted to C (ie, by bytes), though. Void where prohibited. Your mileage may vary. Of course, if you have sources, you can fix it. -- +-DLS (dls@s.cc.purdue.edu)