GE> As I see it, the original use of [the "baud rate"] field
in the days 
 GE> when modems usually did not have speed buffering was to adjust the 
 GE> DCE-DTE speed to the expected DCE-DCE speed. 
 GE>
 GE> If you expected a 300 bps connection you set your serial port to 300
 GE> bps. If you expected a 1,200 bps connection you set your serial port
 GE> to 1,200 bps. If you expected a 2,400 bps connection you set your
 GE> serial port to 2,400 bps.

If it's any help, your view is borne out by the text of FTS 0005 version 3:

           This baud rate is indicative only of the maximum baud rate that
           may be expected when connecting to a node and is generally of use
           only where a calling node needs to adjust the baud rate used to
           dial to the caller's modem speed in order to achieve a
           connection, a requirement that with modem technology available in
           1996 is rarely if ever needed. This information is largely
           superseded by modem protocol flags (see next section) where any
           two nodes using a common protocol may have other expectations
           with regards to actual transfer rates. Use of the baud rate field
           alone is therefore depreciated.

 GE> Are there any nodelist processing programmes (besides the InterMail
 GE> nodelist compiler and old versions of the FrontDoor nodelist
 GE> compiler) which will refuse to process a nodelist with speeds above
 GE> 9,600 bps or act up in other ways?

If they cannot handle values up to 38400, they are not following the text
of FTS 0005 version 3, which also states:

          Field 7: Baud rate

            This field contains one of the values: 300, 1200, 2400, 9600,
            19200, or 38400.

Don't mistake me for an FTS 000x supporter merely because I quote it, by
the way.  I happen to think that the "official" technical
standards should have been scrapped and replaced by properly written,
clear, detailed, unambiguous, and well thought out technical standards
years ago.  

 ¯ JdeBP ®

--- FleetStreet 1.22 NR