Nonstandard netmask experience wanted

Jim Carter jimc at math.ucla.edu
Mon Oct 8 07:30:00 AEST 1990


We have SunOS v3.5.2 on a 3/280 with two Ethernet interfaces.
/etc/rc.boot contains (in this order):

/etc/ifconfig ie0 $hostid0 -trailers up netmask 0xffffff00 \
	broadcast 128.97.4.255
/etc/ifconfig ie1 $hostid1 -trailers up netmask 0xfffffe00

The net that ie1 is on has 512 addresses, hence the netmask of fffffe00.
That part works fine.  However, /etc/ifconfig reveals that the netmask of
ie0 has also been set to 0xfffffe00, causing the machine to miss broadcast
packets from that side.  

Does anyone know if SunOS v4 has the same bug?  Does anyone know why it
happens?  I can think of several solutions (such as giving up the RFC919
broadcast address, or changing 128.97.4.* to 128.97.5.*), but does anyone
have a solution that really solves the problem?  Please mail responses as
our news machine has a real short expiration time.  

James F. Carter        (213) 825-2897
UCLA-Mathnet;  6221 MSA; 405 Hilgard Ave.; Los Angeles, CA, USA  90024-1555
Internet: jimc at math.ucla.edu            BITNET: jimc%math.ucla.edu at INTERBIT
UUCP:...!{ucsd,ames,ncar,gatech,purdue,rutgers,decvax,uunet}!math.ucla.edu!jimc



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