DECNET IV & V Cohabitation

[John Belicka]

Greeting from Canada!

I'm in the midst of adding a series of Alphaservers running Decnet V to an old herd of VAX running Decnet IV.

Not knowing either instance of Decnet well I'm looking for advice. Without having to upgrade a live Decnet IV environment, how do I 'introduce' the Decnet IV environment to the Decnet V environment and vice versa? I.E., how do I add definitions for the nodes of each environment to the other ? I'd like these environments to 'see' each other to allow migration of code amongst them as we gradually transition off the VAX gear.

Is there by chance a resonable whitepaper or document out there which reviews management of these types of Decnet? I'm thinking along the lines of a concise architectural review along with typical administrative tasks - configuration, addition of known nodes/objects, etc.

All assistance would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance

John B

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello John,

the first question you should ask yourself is if there is any functionality in DECnet Phase V that is important enough for you to use it on your Alphas. We, as many other shops, run Phase IV on our Alphas for ease of use and stability. Since you do have an established Phase IV environment that might be the best solution for you too.

And no, while the default install for Alpha suggests DECnet-OSI/Plus/Phase V, the traditional Phase IV is there and available easily.

Greetings, Martin

[John Belicka]

Yike, really have to watch my spelling.

Thanks Martin.

According to the HP engineer who did the base install on the Alpha gear, phase V will permit us to take advantage of Advanced Server implementation (DECNET via IP, etc).
My network infrastructure group wants Decnet out of the picture to focus on a 'pure' TCP LAN.

How do I define the Decnet IV nodes on Decnet V and vice versa? For starters I think this will suffice. The Alpha products have been defined in terms of Decnet V so there's nothing there that needs changing.

John

[Mike Naime]

Hey John:

After telling your lazy Network folks to go stuff it! Ask for a management LAN that you can run DECNET on! Hopefully you have enough extra NIC ports that you can add another LAN.

We have a "BACKUP/MANAGEMENT" LAN that uses DECNET exclusively. No IP traffic or IP addresses there. This LAN could also be used for CLUSTER connectivity if needed.

Since we have 2-node production clusters, we run a crossover cable between two NIC ports for cluster/sql traffic.

If you find any white papers on DECnet management from other sources, please post the link.

[Didier Morandi_1]

To me, DECnet Plus (aka Phase V or DECnet OSI) as no interest but DECnet over IP.

As you will need DECnet over IP, you have to have it. My first suggestion is to go on training, as DECnet Plus management is just awful.

Then, to answer your question about nodes registration, here it is:

1. register under Phase IV new nodes (whatever DECnet they run)

$ mc ncp set node 123.45 name FOO
$ mc ncp def node 123.45 name FOO

First command loads volatile memory (instant data availability, but lost when restarting DECnet), next one load permanent database.

2. register under DECnet Plus

$ mc decnet_register

then follow questions. But PLEASE read the doc on decnet_register before coming back here for questions :-)

(do not) enjoy!

D.

PS: to be able to use DECnet Plus over IP, you need to enable the PWIP driver via tcpip$config:

$ @sys$manager:tcpip$config
choice 4
choice 1

then stop then restart TCP/IP (do NOT do that from a Telnet session :-)

[Antoniov.]

Hi John
Decnet phase IV and V cannot live toghere on same node; this message appear every installation of OpenVms.
For me and my customer I've planned Decnet phase IV and TCP/IP cohabitation, without using decnet phase V.
I think, but it's only my personal view, using Decnet/osi is only money spent. Decnet phase IV is stable and new feature of Decnet/osi (phase V) are avaiable on TCP/IP; furthermore TCP/IP is compatible with no WMS systems so it simple connect also windoze PC and unix/linux machine.

Bye
Antoniov

[Ian Miller.]

as long as you give your DECnet/Plus nodes phase IV compatible addresses then its not a problem. Personally I've been running mixed phase IV/V networks for years with not a problem. DECnet/Plus is fine when you get used to it - it just takes a while - training does help. Use DECNET_REGISTER to add the nodes as described. Use the LOCAL namespace - the DECDNS distributed namespace is not really worth the hassle. As IP networks are a fact of life wether people like it or not then DECnet over IP is useful. Recent versions of DECnet/PLUS make it easy to configure.

[Lokesh_2]

Hi,

I am also having Decnet Plus, with Decnet phase IV along with TCPIP. And find no problem at all. Decnet plus works well with phase IV.

On Decnet plus nodes, you can use the following exe, for further help.

**************************************

$run sys$update:decnet_migrate
DECNET_MIGRATE> help


HELP

The DECNET_MIGRATE utility provides system and network managers with
functions to ease the transition from DECnet Phase IV to DECnet-Plus.

These functions aid in:

- Creating a command file to create or delete interphase link entries
in the reachable address table of a DECnet-Plus level 2 router that must
use both DECnet-Plus and DECnet Phase IV level 2 protocols.

- Collecting and reporting current network configuration information.

- Determining what paths node-to-node communication takes through the
network.

- Converting NCP commands to their NCL equivalents, and using LSE to edit
an NCL command file.


Additional information available:

COLLECT CONVERT CREATE EDIT EXIT HELP REPORT
SHOW_PATH Usage_Information

Topic?

DECNET_MIGRATE>
DECNET_MIGRATE> exit
******************************************

Best regards,
Lokesh

[Antoniov.]

Hello folks,
I wrote "Decnet phase IV and V cannot live toghere on SAME NODE";
this message appear on every installation of OpenVms.
This doesn't means a network mixed can't work, means every node may have installed Decnet phase IV or Decnet/Iso.
Decnet/Iso is is good? Everybody have a own idea: I wrote also never used Decnet/iso because I don't feel need use it and it's only my regard.

Bye
Antoniov

[Didier Morandi_1]

Antonio wrote:

"This doesn't mean a network mixed can't work, [it] means every node may have installed Decnet phase IV or Decnet/OSI."

Course it works, fortunately :-)

"Decnet/OSI is it good? Everybody have a own idea."

I never met anybody defending DECnet Plus (aka OSI), but as this forum is fortunately a technical-only forum, I will not comment here.

I just posted in the c.o.v. forum (comp.os.vms) a procedure which does MC NCP SHOW KNOWN LINKS under DECnet Plus.

Enjoy.

D.

[Ian Miller.]

parhaps you could post the show know links dcl to dcl.openvms.org along with calculate_vups.com?

[Didier Morandi_1]

Will do. I'm currently awfully in a hurry to post my new newsletter on the VAX/VMS to Itanium Migration Issue. I will take some time to document my best procs, then I will submit them to Ken Farmer.

Thanks for the reminder.

D.

[Antoniov.]

Didier wrote:

> Course it works, fortunately :-)
Every node may have installed Decnet pahse IV and Decnet/osi

Excuse to all, I wrong.
Everytime I've installed OpenVms I read a warning message told me don't install Decnet/osi and Decnet phase IV, so I always bilieved it is not possible.

Bye
Antoniov

[Didier Morandi_1]

Antonio,

What is possible is to have mixed DECnet networks.

What is impossible is to install DECnet IV and DECnet V on the same system.

Better?

D.

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

To come back to the original posters issue.

If your networks folks want to go IP only (which is in some way understandable given the support for DECnet e.g. by Cisco), you either have to switch all your systems to Phase V (including the VAXes) to use DECnet over IP or bite the bullet and migrate entirely to IP. If I had to make this choice I most probably would go the IP route rather. Besides of the managability of Phase V you will also always have the problem that your network guys will claim that any connectivity problem you have is actually caused by encapsulating the alien protocol (which is not true, but they will use it as an excuse anyhow)