[Oberon] Multiple incompatibilities with ISPs

[eas-lab at absamail.co.za]

"Peter Easthope" wrote:-

> A few days ago I commented,
> 'PPP.Tool states "PPP is described in RFC (...)1584."
> This RFC is entitled "Multicast Extensions to OSPF".
> Perhaps the intended citation is RFC 1331'.
> 
> There is a later document, RFC 1548, _The Point-to
> -Point Protocol (PPP)_, which obsoletes 1331.
> 1548 should be cited in the PPP.Tool.
> 
> Also, PPPFSM.Mod could mention in a comment that 
> FSM = Finite State Machine.  RFC 1548 uses the terms 
> "LCP automaton" and "Option Negotiation Automaton".

FSM is a easy way to program for some applications.
But the extra layer can make it very difficult to reverse engineer.
Do the RFC's show the 'state transition diagrams' ? Or table(s) ?

As I recall you indicated/suspected a 'small incompatability
between n-o PPP and some ISP' ?  This could be a BIG job to
debug.

I'm reminded that when I started with V2.3.2 StandAlone, 
Mail.Panel would not connect.    P. Muller helped with some 
trace/debug patches; but I soon 'intuited' that there was a subtle
timing hardware incompatability and settled for TextMail.Mod
which connected. Later, V2.3.6 DOSbased still failed and only
at and after Beta 2001 version did Mail.Panel connect.
This 'delay till later, work around was cost effective'.

In your case if you could investigate the ISP with linux, which
has lots of debugging facilities, you could confirm which 'side' is
out of spec. : ISP or/and n-o ?

Do you consider cost vs. benefit ?
I usually 'seek other passengers to amortise the cost'.
eg. I want to write a hardware driver, but have decided to 
expand the task to be 'wrapped in a tutorial of how to
write hardware drivers in general with n-o'. IMO well overdue!

I notice Edgar refers to VCS in PPPMain.Mod .
This could be a very good reason to see if/how control version software
works.   A formal, disciplined frame-work for colaboration
might solve some main problems of n-o, besides PPP ?

VCS could perhaps be the 'passenger that pays the extra cost'
justifying the PPP investigation ?


-- Chris Glur.