Conference hydra::amiga_v1

    I rushed back to the Amiga conference to post this right after I
    read it but Dave beat me to it....
    
    I called the company mentioned in this post and this product looks
    to be for real; they are just starting beta test right now (and
    still looking for additional sites, although they appear to be looking
    more for serious business/corporate users than hobbyists). The person
    I talked to didn't have any information on availability date or
    pricing but was happy to take my name and address and said she'd
    send their technical literature as soon as it's ready. She did indicate
    that it would NOT be a requirement to have any kind of ethernet
    board to run their software; they will support links made through
    the serial port.

You mean you could take 2 Amiga's, connect a cable between thier serial ports
and run DECNET?

That would be neat! 

John

    If they are making DECnet/Amiga don't they have to Ok the effort
    through us? (using "us" as a eupamism (sp) for DEC in general)  If so,
    they would have to get some sort of license to call it "DECnet
    compatiable" and somewhere internally *someone* should have some info?
    
    George
    

    They don't need a license from DEC to build a DECnet-compatible product
    any more than DEC needs a license from IBM to build a Bisync or SNA-
    compatible product, or GTE needs a license from AT&T to build a
    telephone-compatible product.  To require a license would invite
    stifling of competition by burdensom licensing conditions.
        John Sauter

    Re: .4 (John)
    
    I didn't mean on the general protocol, what I meant was on (at least)
    the utilities such as Mail, etc.  Whatever.  Also, license might not
    have been the right word.  Agreement, perhaps.  I worked for a company
    and Apollo wrote software allowing one of our boards to run on thier
    machine under thier software.  They contacted us and gave us
    information, etc. and was wondering if somewhere in the DECnet group
    thier might be some spec mailed from this company about thier net
    product forthcoming.
    
    George
    

    Re:  licenses, agreements, etc.
    
    One of the original DECnet developers runs his own company now which
    ports DECnet to myriad machines.  Haven't heard that he has a license
    or agreement with us.  Internally...
    
    A year ago there was a big push from the field to get various MS-DOS
    machines approved for DECnet-DOS.  At that time only Big Blue and
    one or two other brands were supported, even though almost any MS-DOS
    machine could run it successfully.  Since that time the list of
    supported PC vendors has grown slowly.
    
    For the Macintosh, where Digital is apparently not doing any Mac-native
    software development, I think there is some sort of formal support for
    independent software vendors developing DECnet-compatible applications.
    I also think there is some sort of program office with a real budget.
    
    Since Amiga has sold about half the number of machines as Macintosh,
    and sells worldwide at a roughly equal rate, I wondered whether
    there should be Digital support for Amiga networking.  A few months
    back I asked a VP in NAC what was needed to support another brand
    of personal computer, besides a clear business benefit to Digital.
    He said, "One million units sold." 
    
    What reader of this notesfile is ready to champion an official support
    program, convince management, etc.?

    Documents which describe the DECnet protocols (some of them, anyway)
    are in the SDC and can be purchased by anybody.  The important part of
    the utilities is their protocols; I wouldn't _want_ the same human
    interface on an Amiga as VMS offers!
    
    The person referred to in .6 is Stu Wecker.  I worked with him in the
    early days of DECnet, and I can't imagine him paying DEC a license fee
    for any of his products.
    
    While it would be helpful to any DECnet implementor to get assistance
    from Digital, it isn't necessary.  If you don't want to buy the books
    you can always hook a line analyzer to a couple of DEC products.  The
    protocol isn't very hard to deduce, if you are at all familiar with the
    OSI work.
        John Sauter

    re:.6
    
    It will probably take more than a champion and a 1 million installed
    base.  It needs customers with real $$$ asking for it to be included
    under the NAS program.  TSSnet and other DECnet implementations for
    the Mac fit under that somehow.  DECnet-DOS exists because of an
    installed base of over 10 million.  The Mac market is much smaller.
    The Amiga market....
    
    The big question is if this is just going to be a quick port of
    TSSnet or an Amigaized multitasking version.  Endnode only?
    
    -Dave

    re .6:
    clone support is growing slowly because of tight budgets and
    the legal risks involved with saying a particular clone is 
    "supported" without adequate testing.
    We have yet to find the mythical 100% compatible.
    Getting a good definition for what "supported" means is also an
    interesting exercise. 8^)
    
    The current desktop strategy is one of accomodation, cost cutting,
    and reducing risk.  DECnet-MAC would have been fun to develop, but
    since there were already vendors offering something similar...
    I suspect the same will happen for DECnet-Amiga, someday.
    
    And yes, it is possible to run DECnet between two systems at home
    over a serial connection.  I had a Rainbow and a Compaq Plus hooked
    up that way for awhile.  Both DECnet endnodes.

    dennis	(DECnet-DOS engineering)
                                                     

Re: .8

>    [For DECnet to be done by DEC for a non-DEC machine:]
>    It needs customers with real $$$ asking for it to be included
>    under the NAS program.  TSSnet and other DECnet implementations for
>    the Mac fit under that somehow.

Actually, the Mac doesn't seem to have fit that description.  The DEC/Apple
joint-development deal is mostly dead:  It was a good deal for Apple
and a bad deal for DEC.  It really isn't such a great idea for DEC
to encourage our customers to by someone else's products in preference
to DEC pcs and terminals.

A study proved to DEC that no one buys a VAX because they have a
bunch of Macs and the VAX will talk to them.  On the other hand, it
is true that people who own a VAX will buy Macs if the VAX will
talk to them.