nanog mailing list archives

Re: PPP Question


From: "Chris MacFarlane" <cjm () ican net>
Date: Wed, 10 Dec 1997 18:12:54 -0500

More to the point is that the frame size is negotiated while handshaking.
Once two devices agree on the size it is fixed for the duration of the
session.

Chris MacFarlane
Manager, Data Operations
ACC Telenterprises Canada
4162132023
cmacfarlane () acc ca
cjm () ican net

-----Original Message-----
From: George Janosik <gjanosik () torrentnet com>
To: nanog () merit edu <nanog () merit edu>
Date: Wednesday, December 10, 1997 4:09 PM
Subject: PPP Question


A quick protocol question.

Is a PPP frame size static or elastic?  RFC 1661 states:

 Information Field

     The Information field is zero or more octets.  The Information
     field contains the datagram for the protocol specified in the
     Protocol field.

     The maximum length for the Information field, including Padding,
     but not including the Protocol field, is termed the Maximum
     Receive Unit (MRU), which defaults to 1500 octets.  By
     negotiation, consenting PPP implementations may use other values
     for the MRU.

  Padding

     On transmission, the Information field MAY be padded with an
     arbitrary number of octets up to the MRU.  It is the
     responsibility of each protocol to distinguish padding octets from
     real information.

This is somewhat ambiguous.  If I read it straight it sounds like PPP
frames
are
static and that padding is used to maintain the MRU between endpoints.

But, it also says the the Information field "MAY" be padded up to the MRU.

I have hard time believing that a PPP frame would be static.
Very truly yours,

George J Janosik
Senior Systems Engineer
Torrent Networking Technologies
gjanosik () torrentnet com

412-851-1103





Current thread: