Subject: RE: general concerns cont.

From: [email-masked] (Scott Barvick)
Date: Fri, 25 Jun 93 14:54:22 EDT

I agree with Larry's issues and most of Himanshu's responses
except for the configuration aspects and the looping ring numbers.

1) Configuration:  DLS does not require both partners to be configured
for each other.  In the client server network, if all of the clients
are configured with the single server DLS IP address and the server DLS is
able to accept connections from unconfigured peers, then the server DLS can
wait for TCP connections from the client switches.  

Nonetheless, some type of discovery would be very useful.

2) Looping SR explorers.  While configuring all DLS switches with
the same virtual ring number eliminates looping through the DLS
backbone, a backup SR bridge connection which connects regions also
connected by DLS switches will result in looping of the explorers once
more within the source routed LAN portion of the network.  Painful
experience has shown this to hang some end stations.  The RFC does say
not to establish TCP connections between switches connected to the same
bridged LAN - for efficiency and (very likely) this reason.  

Scott