<soapbox>
That is why I hate Ethernet with a passion. Ethernet should be for LANs
only; using Ethernet for WANs and PTP links is the vilest invention in
the entire history of data networking in my opinion.
My medium of choice for PTP links (WAN) is HDLC over a synchronous
serial bit stream, with a V.35 or EIA-530 interface between the router
and the modem/DSU. Over HDLC I then run either RFC 1490 routed mode or
straight PPP (RFC 1662); in the past I used Cisco HDLC (0F 00 08 00 IP
header follows...). My 4.3BSD router (or I should better say gateway as
that's the proper 80s/90s term) then sees a PTP interface which has no
netmask at all, hence the near and far end IP addresses don't have to
have any numerical relationship between them at all. No netmask, no MAC
addresses, no ARP, none of that crap, just a PTP IP link.
</soapbox>
MS
That's not a soapbox, that's a soap factory!
What about NAT, ATM cell tax, unnecessary addressing fields in PTP
protocols (including your beloved HDLC), SSAP, DSAP fields not being big
enough in 802.2 necessitating SNAP, IPX directly over 802.3, AAL1
through AAL4, PPPoE "dumbell" MTUs and MSS hacks? Some of those are far
worse sins in my opinion.
Michael Sokolov wrote:
That is why I hate Ethernet with a passion. Ethernet should be for LANs
only; using Ethernet for WANs and PTP links is the vilest invention in
the entire history of data networking in my opinion.
Ah, but who's to say that all PTP links are WANs? Are you really going
to run an OC-48 from one router to another _in the same building_ when
you need 1Gb/s between them? Have you looked at how much more that
would cost? Ethernet interfaces, particularly copper, are dirt cheap.
Even for MANs or WANs, the price of a pipe (plus equipment at each end)
will still often be significantly lower for Ethernet than for "real"
circuits--especially if you don't plan on using all the bandwidth all of
the time.
My medium of choice for PTP links (WAN) is HDLC over a synchronous
serial bit stream, with a V.35 or EIA-530 interface between the router
and the modem/DSU. Over HDLC I then run either RFC 1490 routed mode or
straight PPP (RFC 1662); in the past I used Cisco HDLC (0F 00 08 00 IP
header follows...). My 4.3BSD router (or I should better say gateway as
that's the proper 80s/90s term) then sees a PTP interface which has no
netmask at all, hence the near and far end IP addresses don't have to
have any numerical relationship between them at all. No netmask, no MAC
addresses, no ARP, none of that crap, just a PTP IP link.
Well, it'd certainly be nice if someone would make something even
cheaper than Ethernet for that purpose (which would squeeze out a few
more bits of payload), but so far nobody has. It's hard to beat
Ethernet on volume, and that's the main determinant of cost/price...
S