Date: 12-MAY-1987 16:17:10 From: SYSKERMIT%vax1.central.lancaster.ac.uk@Cs.Ucl.AC.UK Subject: File NOSKERM.BWR The original version of MS-Kermit with windowing supplied by 'The Source' (who developed the windowing extension) did not handle Xon/Xoff flow control correctly. This version of Kermit was also used in the terminal emulator 'PROCOMM' at level 2.2. NOS Kermit uses software flow control but on a directly connected terminal no transfer problems were found. However when connecting through our local area network, as this does not have the required bandwidth, the flow control error in MS-Kermit prevented any transfer unless the window size was reduced to '2'. I understand that the MS-Kermit with windows as been corrected, and so has 'PROCOMM' which is now at level 4.0, but as yet I have neither available - any offers? Paul Jarvis 29/10/1986 When a large file is received and is made permanent as a direct access file then the time taken to 'DEFINE' this file and copy it to a valid user device may be long enough for the local micro Kermit to time out and thus abort any further transfers. Until such time as a fix is available (I'm trying) the only way round this problem is to increase the local timeout value. Another permanent file related problem occurs when an existing indirect access file is to be 'REPLACED' by a file which, because of its length, must be direct access. When this happens currently the file is left local and a warning message issued in the log file. Paul Jarvis 4/11/1986 **** Version 1.30 - 19 January 1987. This version contains a complete re-write of the interactive command parser, the addition of a useful help facility, addition of TAKE and STATUS commands, addition of BINARY file format (as defined by UMRCC) and a correction to processing duplicate data packets. The default packet length is also increased to 94. The compilation symbol PSR has been added in an attempt to enable windowing at versions of NOS below 2.3 The new version is sent as a complete new source file and not as a series of modification directives as was originally proposed. This is because the modifications amounted to 3000 lines which is about 20% of the total. The CDC display code character set cannot represent the full ASCII range. If a file is transferred in either direction using the display code character set (DIS64) then the transfer will be aborted if an attempt is made to transfer a character which has no corresponding display code. The offending character is written to the log file in octal. It has been noticed that when using Procomm 2.4 (which supports sliding windows) that if an illegal character is discovered after Procomm has sent the End-of-File packet then Procomm ignores the Error packet it receives and assumes the transfer to be correct. I think this is a bug in Procomm. Any comments would be appreciated, and it's easier now I'm on Email (see below). Paul Jarvis 19/01/1987 (CMAAH24@UK.AC.IC.CC.VAXA) ---------------- Date: 19-MAR-1987 16:25:42 From: CMAAH24@UK.AC.IMPERIAL.CC.VAXA There are two corrections for NOS Kermit following. The first corrects sending the CAPAS byte if it is zero, i.e. no extensions. It appears that at least one version of Kermit objects to receiving a CAPAS byte whatever its value. The second error is far more serious and concerns wild card processing. The character '*' in a file name should be interpreted as zero or more characters, unfortunately I currently interpret it as 'mess up the filename completely'. The following modifications should be applied to the original source using the utility 'MODIFY'. There is still a slight problem with wild character processing. The characters '?' and '#' should both represent any single character. If two or more are used at the end of a file name the processing is wrong. For example:- GET FR?? should match any file name having four characters beginning FR. However NOS Kermit will incorrectly match two and three character file names as well. To be investigated... Paul P.S. These modifications update the revision level to 1.31 *IDENT APJ0001 */ *** P. JARVIS 20/02/1987 */ **** CORRECT INITIAL 'S' PACKET TRANSMISSION TO OMIT */ **** SENDING 'CAPAS' BYTE IF WINDOWING DISABLED. *DECK KERMIT *D 4115 NG X3,BCP14 CAPAS BYTE NOT REQUIRED *D 4211 CON -1 DEFAULT CAPAS */ END OF MODSET (APJ0001) *IDENT APJ0002 */ *** P. JARVIS 19/03/1987 */ **** CORRECT WILD CODE TRANSFERS. *DECK KERMIT *D 133 VERSION MICRO 1,,*1.31* *D 5485 BFN10 SB3 B4+B4 *D 5494,5495 LX6 B3 POSITION NAME SB4 B0 CLEAR REMAINING CHARACTER COUNT BX7 X2+X7 ADD TO FILE NAME MASK */ END OF MODSET (APJ0002)