Linux Token Ring Support Bringing Down Corporate Nets?

mjh asks: "I've been running Debian GNU/Linux on my company supplied laptop for 3 months now. I got permission from my manager to run it on the network, but I did not go through the somewhat rigorous process of getting the software certified. I have legitimate business reasons for using it on the corporate network (which is why my manager approved it). I even managed to get Lotus Notes to run under wine so I never had to boot into Winders at all (unless someone sent me a PPT doc). I was pretty happy...until I brought the entire network down." Anyone else running Linux on a Token Ring network who would care to talk about their own experiences?

"My company runs Token Ring at the office (puke!) I got drivers from the card manufacturer (Madge), and I'd been happily churning along. Then last week, we started seeing a bunch of errors on the network. These errors would bring everyone on the ring down. After a week of this kinda stuff, they eventually isolated it to me.

Reboot the laptop into Windows and the network card works just fine and they don't see any ring errors. Reboot into linux, and suddenly they start seeing ring errors. I don't really grok token ring, so I'm not entirely certain that I know exactly what the problem is. But, whenever I brought the token ring on line under linux, they saw ring errors, which eventually (as I understand it) would bring down the entire ring. Switch cards (same model) and it continues to happen. It looked to me (and the network analysts) that the Linux driver was causing the problem.

I tried switching to an IBM token ring card, but there's a bug and I hadn't patched for this. The people with the fluke would not wait around while I tried to figure this out. I didn't have any other token ring cards that I could try.

In the end, I agreed not to boot into Linux unless I went into the conference room (which is one of the only rooms in the building with ethernet ports). How should I have done this differently so that using Linux would have been a more positive experience for my company?"

Comments

Perhaps...

[Krellis]

The token is falling out, and getting caught in the ether net? You'd better go looking for it on the floor around you... :)

Tolkien Rings

[Anonymous Coward]

Last time I had a problem with my Tolkien Ring it was a Nazgul. Fortunately I had a CSU/DSU handy to whack it upside the head with (made by Gandalf, of course - wouldn't have worked otherwise).

Yeah, I know, jokes like this are a bad Hobbit...

Tolkien Rings Suck?

[tshak]

One ring to rule them all, One ring to find them.
One ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.

Re:Token Ring sucks, Linux TR REALLY sucks

[billstewart]

> Source Route Bridging anyone? try that with ethernet.

Well, that's just the point, isn't it? Source Route bridging was designed by people who Just Didn't Get It - it's doing almost all the work of a router without gaining any of the benefits. It doesn't deserve as much bashing as Microsoft, who also Never Did Get It about networking, because the folks who did SNA and its predecessors were trying to design protocols that would run well on systems with slightly more horsepower than digital watches, back when RAM actually cost money. It's possible to use Transparent Bridging on many kinds of IBM systems, and these days any of the mainframes will run TCP/IP. And almost all the applications can either be handled using tn3270 (since there aren't a lot of Genuine Original Green-Screen 3270 terminals left - almost everyone uses PCs with various boards in them) or if necessary encapsulated in IP using DLSW or other tunnelware.

Re:Tolkien Ring Networks....

[SEWilco]

The limit of five Tolkien rings can be a problem for large corporate empires. And adding a new ring can be quite a quest.