Re: AppleTalk to Ethernet bridge software for Mac?

[dempson@actrix.gen.nz (David Empson)]

Phil Beesley <pb14@le.ac.uk> wrote:

> In article <1ewcyq6.1b11uqs155la80N%dempson@actrix.gen.nz>, David
> Empson <dempson@actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
> 
> > There is one other restriction worth noting: if you have any AppleTalk
> > routers on the Ethernet, then LocalTalk Bridge won't work.  It must be
> > the only router on the network (TCP/IP-only routers don't count).
> 
> Are you sure on this final point ?

Not entirely.  I also made a slight error: LocalTalk Bridge is _not_ a
"router" per se.

> I have simultaneously run several copies of LocalTalk Bridge on
> ethernet'ed Macs on a network with hardware LT routers without problem.

The distinction is between bridges (which simply forward everything,
possibly with filtering restrictions) and routers (which can decide
where to send a packet between multiple available ports).

If your "hardware LocalTalk router" is actually just a bridge (quite
likely), then you have several bridges connected to an EtherTalk
network, but no routers.

It is still possible that the presence of a genuine AppleTalk router on
the Ethernet (supporting the Routing Table Maintenance Protocol and
implementing zones) may prevent LocalTalk Bridge from working.

> I thought the restriction was that you can only have a single installation
> of LocalTalk Bridge on a LocalTalk network segment.

This is definitely true.