Tuesday February 21 1995, Mike Bilow writes to John Poltorak:

 >>> What is TCP/IP, FTP and UUCODE/UUENCODE? Can anybody help me?

 RL>> TCP/IP is a networking protocol.  It allows two computers connected to
 RL>> each other (via a modem, paralell prot,

 JP>> I didn't think that the parallel port interface was covered
 JP>> by any of the TCP/IP protocols...

 MB> SLIP, Ethernet, PPP, and so forth.  There is a relatively widely used link
 MB> layer protocol for the parallel port known as PLIP, which is obviously
 MB> similar to SLIP.  There is a (DOS) PLIP driver available with full source
 MB> code in the Clarkson/Crynwr distribution, and a number of platforms,
 MB> including Linux, have native PLIP support.

 MB> I do not know if a PLIP driver exists for OS/2, but the new parallel port
 MB> drivers which come with the operating system are specifically designed to
 MB> support attaching non-printer devices such as network adapters or disk
 MB> drives. Such add-on devices require a device driver of their own, but all
 MB> of the hooks are there already.  Use of the parallel port for non-printer
 MB> tasks is common in certain situations, especially with portable computers.

Yes, I'm aware of parallel port comms and have used LAPLINK over a parallel
cable, and would love to have an OS/2 solution for this. I would also like
to be able to use NFS via PLIP, but I don't think this protocol is known
about - I'm sure IBM haven't heard of it, so I wouldn't expect a PLIP
driver for their TCP/IP within the next couple of years.

John

--- GoldED/2 2.50.Beta4+