I’m obviously way behind in my reading: IBM owns Redhat
This is not news… except to me, but I thought the article might be interesting to someone. https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a24397193/ibm-red-hat/ ../Dave
On 2020-05-20 10:31 PM, David Mason via talk wrote:
This is not news… except to me, but I thought the article might be interesting to someone.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a24397193/ibm-red-hat/ <https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a24397193/ibm-red-hat/?source=nl&utm_source=nl_pop&utm_medium=email&date=102918>
IIRC, IBM also had some involvement with SuSE a few years ago and ran it on their "big iron". Back in the late '90s, when I was working at IBM, I was on the distribution lists for various software and I'd frequently find packs of a few CDs in my mail slot. One of the lists I was on was for Linux and the pack would contain the various distros available at the time. In fact, I first started working with Linux at IBM, when I installed Mandrake on a ThinkPad, where it took a bit of effort to get it working with token ring. A co-worker was never able to get Debian going properly on a micro channel desktop system, again due to token ring issues. Linux didn't like token ring. ;-) My first Linux experience at home was a firewall, based on Slackware, though I had tried earlier setting up Yggdrasil, without much luck.
On Wed, May 20, 2020 at 10:49 PM James Knott via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 2020-05-20 10:31 PM, David Mason via talk wrote:
This is not news… except to me, but I thought the article might be interesting to someone.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a24397193/ibm-red-hat/ < https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a24397193/ibm-red-hat/?source=nl&utm_source=nl_pop&utm_medium=email&date=102918
IIRC, IBM also had some involvement with SuSE a few years ago and ran it on their "big iron". Back in the late '90s, when I was working at IBM, I was on the distribution lists for various software and I'd frequently find packs of a few CDs in my mail slot. One of the lists I was on was for Linux and the pack would contain the various distros available at the time. In fact, I first started working with Linux at IBM, when I installed Mandrake on a ThinkPad, where it took a bit of effort to get it working with token ring. A co-worker was never able to get Debian going properly on a micro channel desktop system, again due to token ring issues. Linux didn't like token ring. ;-)
Or perhaps IBM token ring didn't like Linux TCP/IP, but now they do. I think IBM's business plan of the day was for semi-open source stacks. They had released the OSI bus architecture as "open" source in order to encourage outside industrial manufacturing of compatible peripheral component products. I believe however, they wished to keep certain token passing methods under the rose, so to speak. By then, M$ was a preferred ISO partner alongside INTEL.
My first Linux experience at home was a firewall, based on Slackware, though I had tried earlier setting up Yggdrasil, without much luck.
My first true Linux experience was buying Jan Carlson's monthly Red Hat CD
at tlug in the mid nineties. Best five bucks I ever spent. Not only was the LILO install robust, he had amassed a huge collection of open source resource configuration scripts to help with resource configuration issues for sound, modem's, NIC's and associated running services. All that came with give me a call if you have a problem, Prior to that I had successfully installed Minix on a dumpster dived 8088. I got those 24 - 3.5in floppy disks for $25 from a hacker running slack. He told me he used a pop top from a can as the on off switch on his own recycled box. He laughed when he told me he had to keep an eye out on the street because the new safety pull tops, which didn't leave you with a sharp shard of metal in your hand, wouldn't work and the old ones were getting harder to find. That was also the best $25 buck's I ever spent, even though I was on my own with problem solving. Sorry to digress, but social distancing has me walking down memory lane.
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On 2020-05-27 10:44 AM, Russell Reiter wrote:
Or perhaps IBM token ring didn't like Linux TCP/IP, but now they do.
Isn't Token Ring pretty much dead now? Back in the 90s it provided better performance than Ethernet, as there were no collisions and there was also the move to 16 Mb TR. But when switches and then 100 Mb Ethernet became popular, Token Ring was left in the dust.
On Wed, May 27, 2020, 10:54 AM James Knott via talk, <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 2020-05-27 10:44 AM, Russell Reiter wrote:
Or perhaps IBM token ring didn't like Linux TCP/IP, but now they do.
Isn't Token Ring pretty much dead now? Back in the 90s it provided better performance than Ethernet, as there were no collisions and there was also the move to 16 Mb TR. But when switches and then 100 Mb Ethernet became popular, Token Ring was left in the dust.
I believe it's used in bidirectional fiber-optic communications. To what extent, I'm not sure and to be honest I just looked that up.
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On 2020-05-27 11:01 AM, Russell Reiter wrote:
Isn't Token Ring pretty much dead now? Back in the 90s it provided better performance than Ethernet, as there were no collisions and there was also the move to 16 Mb TR. But when switches and then 100 Mb Ethernet became popular, Token Ring was left in the dust.
I believe it's used in bidirectional fiber-optic communications. To what extent, I'm not sure and to be honest I just looked that up.
Are you referring to FDDI? If so, that's also obsolete. I have worked with fibre and when a single fibre is used, different wavelengths are used for each direction.
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 11:01:31AM -0400, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
I believe it's used in bidirectional fiber-optic communications. To what extent, I'm not sure and to be honest I just looked that up.
FDDI was essentially token ring on fiber, but it too is long dead due to ethernet. I don't recall seeing anything in the last couple of decades that used token ring. I am curious what you found. -- Len Sorensen
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 11:18 AM Lennart Sorensen < lsorense@csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 11:01:31AM -0400, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
I believe it's used in bidirectional fiber-optic communications. To what extent, I'm not sure and to be honest I just looked that up.
FDDI was essentially token ring on fiber, but it too is long dead due to ethernet. I don't recall seeing anything in the last couple of decades that used token ring. I am curious what you found.
Sorry that was just a reference to the fact that FDDI is deployed in the past. You'd have to figure that if the effort was made to use a dedicated fiber network in a complex, business or government, they'd still be using it wouldn't they? The reference also said it's losing ground, but as with all things tech, optical connections are becoming commonplace in IoT and old stuff becomes new again. The paranoid me wonders if my computer speakers are a microphone also. :-0
-- Len Sorensen
-- Russell
On 2020-05-27 11:41 AM, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
Sorry that was just a reference to the fact that FDDI is deployed in the past. You'd have to figure that if the effort was made to use a dedicated fiber network in a complex, business or government, they'd still be using it wouldn't they?
Given that FDDI is only 100 Mb and not that popular to begin with, I doubt you'll find much. I suppose, if you look hard enough, you might find some ARCnet too.
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 11:49 AM James Knott via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 2020-05-27 11:41 AM, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
Sorry that was just a reference to the fact that FDDI is deployed in the past. You'd have to figure that if the effort was made to use a dedicated fiber network in a complex, business or government, they'd still be using it wouldn't they?
Given that FDDI is only 100 Mb and not that popular to begin with, I doubt you'll find much. I suppose, if you look hard enough, you might find some ARCnet too.
I'm not all that sure it wasn't all that popular for Wide and Metropolitan backbone infrastructure fabrics; finance, rail and automobile signalling and routing come to mind. Nor do I assume that those area's are uniformly operationally current. That's for the bots and RAT Trojans in the global data stream to check for and perhaps exploit. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1I-cNbscZE&feature=emb_logo I can't say for sure whether token ring on optical networks has left the IoT entirely. Fiber and associated hardware is still very expensive. In some process and control systems redundancy and fail-over take necessary priority. Gigabit-speeds are not necessarily more desirable than trust in those resource sharing networks. Depending on location in the world and size and purpose of actual needs, I think some places in this world wide web, might be still be paying off the amortized cost of the original cards and cables of optical token rings, and even employing recycled and new old stock products, but that's just my opinion ---
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On 2020-05-27 04:26 PM, Russell Reiter wrote:
I'm not all that sure it wasn't all that popular for Wide and Metropolitan backbone infrastructure fabrics; finance, rail and automobile signalling and routing come to mind
Funny thing, I have been working with telecom, computers and networks for decades, but have never, not once, seen FDDI implemented anywhere. On the other hand, I know that the the LRTs in the Toronto area have lots of Ethernet over fibre. For example, on the Finch line, there are some 432 strands of fibre, connected to standard switches and routers. Another technology that has been used is something called "resilient packet ring", which is Ethernet in a ring configuration, for redundancy. I have worked with equipment that supports it. There was also a TDM technology called SONET that was employed in rings. I have a bit of experience with it, from back in my Unitel days. BTW, my first experience with ring networks was on the Air Canada reservation system, when it was at 151 Front St. W.. That system used time division multiplexing, rather than packets on a LAN. There were 2 versions at 8 Mb and 2 Mb. All the various devices, such as disks, tape stands and more were connected to these rings. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resilient_Packet_Ring https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchronous_optical_networking
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 5:15 PM James Knott via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 2020-05-27 04:26 PM, Russell Reiter wrote:
I'm not all that sure it wasn't all that popular for Wide and Metropolitan backbone infrastructure fabrics; finance, rail and automobile signalling and routing come to mind
Funny thing, I have been working with telecom, computers and networks for decades, but have never, not once, seen FDDI implemented anywhere.
I don't necessarily think that's a funny thing, you don't typically get the pedigree of every network your data traverses, unless you actually search for it.
On the other hand, I know that the the LRTs in the Toronto area have lots of Ethernet over fibre. For example, on the Finch line, there are some 432 strands of fibre, connected to standard switches and routers. Another technology that has been used is something called "resilient packet ring", which is Ethernet in a ring configuration, for redundancy. I have worked with equipment that supports it. There was also a TDM technology called SONET that was employed in rings. I have a bit of experience with it, from back in my Unitel days.
Toronto is a pretty late adopter of LRT tech, so in that sense, others have done our structural groundwork for us. I rode my first articulated urban LRT vehicle in Europe in 1967. The pilot LRT project for Toronto didn't materialize til 2001. Sure we had a couple of bendy buses but surface LRT was not on the Toronto transit radar at all; not for all those decades. World class Toronto is a buzz word politicians and business people like to toss around, but in some way's it's still just plain old Hogtown. Sometimes parsimonious, sometimes provincial and sometimes petulant. At it's worst, it can be all those things at once. At its best it rises above all those all too human failings, to pull together and get the job done. Like now during covid-19, we are all pulling together by standing apart. Probably the best transit design in the history of the city was the Prince Albert viaduct which added the subway tracks under that bridge long before there were subways in the area to connect those tracks to. That was world class hometown capacity planning, in its day.
BTW, my first experience with ring networks was on the Air Canada reservation system, when it was at 151 Front St. W.. That system used time division multiplexing, rather than packets on a LAN. There were 2 versions at 8 Mb and 2 Mb. All the various devices, such as disks, tape stands and more were connected to these rings.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resilient_Packet_Ring https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchronous_optical_networking
Wasn't that Air Canada system linked to the US carriers through SABRE Inc's frame relay system which allowed consumers to be able to access a computerized booking system using DTMF tones. They'd navigate a voice menu in order to check their flight plan data. Reservation agents had one data access point to add, modify and delete computerized reservation data and speak to consumers at the same time. Once booked, customers phoned into voice messaging to be informed of current flight info, or choose to connect to an agent as needs be. . It's all old hat now, but back in the day, it was wait and wait on the line for an agent to pick up the phone. Not like today where you ... wait and wait on the line to speak to an agent. The only difference between then and now is that while you wait, instead of counting phone rings, a computer with a much sexier voice than HAL tells you, the average wait time, your number in the wait que and some of the fabulous timeshare offerings the company has for you, once you've waited long enough to talk to a human who might be actually able to solve your booking problem.
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| From: Russell Reiter via talk <talk@gtalug.org> | the Prince Albert viaduct | which added the subway tracks under that bridge long before | there were subways in the area to connect those tracks to. That was world | class hometown capacity planning, in its day. The Prince Edward Viaduct. I imagine that actual rails were not part of the original build. I suspect that two world wars and the depressions delayed use of the route for the tracks. In the end, the part over Rosedale Valley did not get used. Fun fact: apparently the first Toronto Subway was 100% funded by the TTC fare boxes.
On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 2:16 AM D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
| From: Russell Reiter via talk <talk@gtalug.org>
| the Prince Albert viaduct | which added the subway tracks under that bridge long before | there were subways in the area to connect those tracks to. That was world | class hometown capacity planning, in its day.
The Prince Edward Viaduct.
Sorry you are correct. I must have been thinking about the old have you got Prince Albert in a can joke, with the punchline "well let him out he can't breathe."
I imagine that actual rails were not part of the original build.
In fact the rails were part of the original build; the engineering schema provided calculations in carriage of the weight of the subway trains which would run on them; live and dead loads are carefully calculated by advanced capacity planning in constructions of both public and private infrastructure projects. The PHY abstraction, if you will. Subsequently those construction decisions were subject to a costs inquiry into equitable waste; train tracks starting nowhere and finishing nowhere which have no trains on them, as the more cynical newspaper reports of the day reportedly recorded. I have seen a copy of the essential parts of the decision in a not too old LSUC annual practice update. It was a case in point of its day and the actual ultimate use of the track infrastructure vindicated the city planners actions, if not the actual disbursements involved. I can't remember the case Title or docket number tho - it may still be used as a case in point, otherwise the LSUC wouldn't publish the facts in a modern update record. I'll have to paraphrase how the courts reacted to the city's expert witness on the costing; a records clerk. It was along the lines of - if the city presumes that a common layperson, labouring in the bowels and recesses of city administration is an expert, they are very much mistaken. It was only the passage of time and the subsequent rise in urban population density of the post war industrial economy, which then deemed those earlier costs and any overruns to be economically viable. Inevitably, it is one thing to be an expert in filing systems; it is quite another thing altogether to be able to analyze the contents of the file and provide expert testimony purporting to validate a financial abstraction prepared for the courts, This was an activity which the clerk was not qualified to do. Social media is a tricky thing. If you look on the web you will find on the city website a detailed history of construction, which omits any references to the City's legal finagling before and after the facts. My data source was from an old CD from a deprecated LSUC annual report. I did a keyword search for something related and stumbled on the case brief. I thought the Justices words were a priceless comment on the phenomenon of "expert bias" in testimony. It was pretty clear the "mirror" documents examined in the court did not support the clerks so called expert testimony in his analysis of the financial accounts.
I suspect that two world wars and the depressions delayed use of the route for the tracks. In the end, the part over Rosedale Valley did not get used.
Fun fact: apparently the first Toronto Subway was 100% funded by the TTC fare boxes.
Personally I'd like the see both the farebox and automotive gas emissions go the way of the dodo in favour of a carbon emission balancing scheme. In order to do that, the entire foundation of hydrocarbon resource extraction industry has to be re-imagined and that economic "jolt" factor has many corporations working very hard to ensure they don't loose profitability for their shareholders. FYI - if you are a Toronto urban LRT fan Flyda is an interesting design concept and is now open source. It runs on rails, and while the project does not address actual power and process control systems, with modern advancements, as the author notes, the future implications of the original design are flexible in going forward with a combined surface and elevated rapid transit system. Advances in autonomous vehicles could remove rails in residential areas. The cars, either self directed or automated, could link together into chains for longer inter uban movement and even longer intra urban destinations, in appropriate social distancing, should those provisions have to stay in force. Why build a subway underground and parallel to the don valley when essentially the same style of capacity planning which provided for the viaduct, could elevate this very flexible modular transit system over the don roadway. Not to mention cable raceways for power distribution, optical data and even combining water purification in an attached aqueduct to handle upstream surface runoff. Modern material science makes it possible that our infrastructure constructions could mimic the carbon sink capabilities of our remaining and ultimately diminishing urban green-space, effectively if not quite as efficiently as our similarly at risk boreal forests. https://faculty.washington.edu/jbs/itrans/flyda.htm Post to this mailing list talk@gtalug.org
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On 2020-05-27 09:20 PM, Russell Reiter wrote:
Funny thing, I have been working with telecom, computers and networks for decades, but have never, not once, seen FDDI implemented anywhere.
I don't necessarily think that's a funny thing, you don't typically get the pedigree of every network your data traverses, unless you actually search for it.
I have worked hands on with a variety of systems and networks. I have worked on telcom, cell networks, office LANs, cell networks, Rogers networks, in central offices, factories warehouses and more. I have seen a lot.
Toronto is a pretty late adopter of LRT tech, so in that sense, others have done our structural groundwork for us. I rode my first articulated urban LRT vehicle in Europe in 1967. The pilot LRT project for Toronto didn't materialize til 2001. Sure we had a couple of bendy buses but surface LRT was not on the Toronto transit radar at all; not for all those decades.
LRT used to be called "streetcars". Toronto has had them for well over a century.
Wasn't that Air Canada system linked to the US carriers through SABRE Inc's frame relay system which allowed consumers to be able to access a computerized booking system using DTMF tones.
They connected to Sabre and eventually moved to it. However, I had no experience with it. The system at Front St. was based on a UNIVAC system and I worked on the communications front end, which ran on Collins computers.
On 5/28/20 7:02 AM, James Knott via talk wrote: [snip]
Toronto is a pretty late adopter of LRT tech, so in that sense, others have done our structural groundwork for us. I rode my first articulated urban LRT vehicle in Europe in 1967. The pilot LRT project for Toronto didn't materialize til 2001. Sure we had a couple of bendy buses but surface LRT was not on the Toronto transit radar at all; not for all those decades.
LRT used to be called "streetcars". Toronto has had them for well over a century. There is also GO transit that started around 1967 but I guess that would best be described as HRT.
-- Alvin Starr || land: (647)478-6285 Netvel Inc. || Cell: (416)806-0133 alvin@netvel.net ||
On 2020-05-28 07:45 AM, Alvin Starr via talk wrote:
LRT used to be called "streetcars". Toronto has had them for well over a century. There is also GO transit that started around 1967 but I guess that would best be described as HRT.
There used to be something called "interurban" railways. There were a few in the Toronto area. These typically had a single, self propelled car and were lighter than regular railroads. The Halton County Radial Railway, was created on a segment of the line going to Guelph. Interurbans were often called radial railways, as they were like spokes around a hub. I recall my mother talking about one that used to go to Richmond Hill. GO Transit started in 1967, but would be closer to regular trains.
On Thu, May 28, 2020, 7:02 AM James Knott via talk, <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 2020-05-27 09:20 PM, Russell Reiter wrote:
Funny thing, I have been working with telecom, computers and networks for decades, but have never, not once, seen FDDI implemented
anywhere.
I don't necessarily think that's a funny thing, you don't typically get the pedigree of every network your data traverses, unless you actually search for it.
I have worked hands on with a variety of systems and networks. I have worked on telcom, cell networks, office LANs, cell networks, Rogers networks, in central offices, factories warehouses and more. I have seen a lot.
Toronto is a pretty late adopter of LRT tech, so in that sense, others have done our structural groundwork for us. I rode my first articulated urban LRT vehicle in Europe in 1967. The pilot LRT project for Toronto didn't materialize til 2001. Sure we had a couple of bendy buses but surface LRT was not on the Toronto transit radar at all; not for all those decades.
LRT used to be called "streetcars". Toronto has had them for well over a century.
Streetcars in Toronto use narrow gauge rails and trucks on the city streets in order to provide for and blend two lanes of vehicular traffic each way. Speed and reliability is limited by those environmental factors. LRT's use dedicated surface access and Toronto's first dedicated LRT was planned and enacted a few short years ago. The one I experienced in the sixties used bollards at to prevent motorized vehicular access to areas where pedestrians board and dedicated right of way in other places. Sort of like our current pilot project but with more human safety factored in.
Wasn't that Air Canada system linked to the US carriers through SABRE Inc's frame relay system which allowed consumers to be able to access a computerized booking system using DTMF tones.
They connected to Sabre and eventually moved to it. However, I had no experience with it. The system at Front St. was based on a UNIVAC system and I worked on the communications front end, which ran on Collins computers.
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On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 09:27:09AM -0400, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
Streetcars in Toronto use narrow gauge rails and trucks on the city streets in order to provide for and blend two lanes of vehicular traffic each way. Speed and reliability is limited by those environmental factors.
Toronto streetcars run TTC gauge which is 60mm wider than standard gauge. It sure isn't narrow.
LRT's use dedicated surface access and Toronto's first dedicated LRT was planned and enacted a few short years ago.
Well they are working on it. Those are standard gauge, so slightly narrower than the streetcars and subways. -- Len Sorensen
On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 4:53 PM Lennart Sorensen < lsorense@csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:
On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 09:27:09AM -0400, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
Streetcars in Toronto use narrow gauge rails and trucks on the city streets in order to provide for and blend two lanes of vehicular traffic each way. Speed and reliability is limited by those environmental factors.
Toronto streetcars run TTC gauge which is 60mm wider than standard gauge. It sure isn't narrow.
Your right it is labeled as broad gauge. TTC gauge rails @ 4'10 1/2in are narrower than legacy broad gauge rails @ 5'6in, which were eventually replaced with standard gauge @ 4'8 1/2 in. Apparently TTC gauge was implemented to allow the set of wheels on one side of a horse drawn wagon to ride in one track to stay reasonably centred in the roadway without the other side slipping into the track on that side.
LRT's use dedicated surface access and Toronto's first dedicated LRT was
planned and enacted a few short years ago.
Well they are working on it. Those are standard gauge, so slightly narrower than the streetcars and subways.
Those cars would be able to connect with the existing higher speed rail corridors. Everything seems to have a pantograph now, so it looks like the tech is heading that way. I did hear that they are going to have to raise the height of the Dufferin bridge going over the tracks to the CNE grounds. They're doing this in order to make way for the overhead wiring, but I'm not sure when that is going to start. Probably on the very back burner now, all things considered.
-- Len Sorensen
-- Russell
On 2020-05-28 6:32 p.m., Russell Reiter via talk wrote: On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 4:53 PM Lennart Sorensen <lsorense@csclub.uwaterloo.ca<mailto:lsorense@csclub.uwaterloo.ca>> wrote: On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 09:27:09AM -0400, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
Streetcars in Toronto use narrow gauge rails and trucks on the city streets in order to provide for and blend two lanes of vehicular traffic each way. Speed and reliability is limited by those environmental factors.
Toronto streetcars run TTC gauge which is 60mm wider than standard gauge. It sure isn't narrow. Your right it is labeled as broad gauge. TTC gauge rails @ 4'10 1/2in are narrower than legacy broad gauge rails @ 5'6in, which were eventually replaced with standard gauge @ 4'8 1/2 in. Apparently TTC gauge was implemented to allow the set of wheels on one side of a horse drawn wagon to ride in one track to stay reasonably centred in the roadway without the other side slipping into the track on that side. At the time, there was also a real concern that future "street railway" operators would allow normal freight cars and switch engines onto the trolley-car lines, and they declared that they would adopt a gauge that prevented that misuse.
LRT's use dedicated surface access and Toronto's first dedicated LRT was planned and enacted a few short years ago.
Well they are working on it. Those are standard gauge, so slightly narrower than the streetcars and subways. Those cars would be able to connect with the existing higher speed rail corridors. Everything seems to have a pantograph now, so it looks like the tech is heading that way. I did hear that they are going to have to raise the height of the Dufferin bridge going over the tracks to the CNE grounds. They're doing this in order to make way for the overhead wiring, but I'm not sure when that is going to start. Probably on the very back burner now, all things considered. I suspect that this may deliberately funded, like road repair, to inject money into the economy. --dave -- Len Sorensen -- Russell --- Post to this mailing list talk@gtalug.org<mailto:talk@gtalug.org> Unsubscribe from this mailing list https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk -- David Collier-Brown, | Always do right. This will gratify System Programmer and Author | some people and astonish the rest dave.collier-brown@indexexchange.com<mailto:dave.collier-brown@indexexchange.com> | -- Mark Twain CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE AND DISCLAIMER : This telecommunication, including any and all attachments, contains confidential information intended only for the person(s) to whom it is addressed. Any dissemination, distribution, copying or disclosure is strictly prohibited and is not a waiver of confidentiality. If you have received this telecommunication in error, please notify the sender immediately by return electronic mail and delete the message from your inbox and deleted items folders. This telecommunication does not constitute an express or implied agreement to conduct transactions by electronic means, nor does it constitute a contract offer, a contract amendment or an acceptance of a contract offer. Contract terms contained in this telecommunication are subject to legal review and the completion of formal documentation and are not binding until same is confirmed in writing and has been signed by an authorized signatory.
On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 07:02:19AM -0400, James Knott via talk wrote:
LRT used to be called "streetcars". Toronto has had them for well over a century.
And Toronto was one of the very few cities that never got rid of them. Sometimes being slow at jumping on trends can turn out to be a good thing. -- Len Sorensen
On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 07:02:19AM -0400, James Knott via talk wrote:
LRT used to be called "streetcars". Toronto has had them for well over a century.
Not sure of the historical use of the word streetcar although I've used it all my life. Most of the world refers to them as Tram's, ostensibly because of the pole which connects them to motive power. Although, if you remember
On Thu, May 28, 2020 at 4:50 PM Lennart Sorensen via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote: the Red Rocket era cars, you also probably remember watching them hook together with train couplings when one broke down. The push connection was commonplace. The pull connection always drew a crowd, just to watch the backup manouver. That was a show.
And Toronto was one of the very few cities that never got rid of them. Sometimes being slow at jumping on trends can turn out to be a good thing.
Not sure that Toronto was one of the few that never got rid of Streetcars. It did stand up to some very intense opposition to their retention from industry lobbyists however, City Council kept them in service as being essential to the core needs of residents of Toronto. I believe all of the Canadian cities over 1M residents, have an internal rail transit system. Although some are newer than others. I worked for a demolition company in Calgary and I remember when the city had to saw up and remove thousands of cubic feet of concrete, (I'm pretty sure it was a quarter mile stretch of the blue line expansion) because the MPA values of the pours were well below spec and would never cure hard enough to support live loading for any extended length of time. There are over four hundred cities in the world which currently run inter urban transit on rails. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tram_systems_by_gauge_and_electrificat... In Toronto a lot of people back in the 60's right through to the 80's dismissed Trams as a nostalgic Heritage aspect of planning. I actually rode the last Trolly Bus up Bay St while I was coming home from downtown in the early am. There was a photographer on it and he took a picture of the driver to record this historic moment for the union news. This was the face of automotive pressure to use buses on surface routes and push people into subways. However, one of greatest under reported reasons for retaining Streetcars, was the automobile traffic calming measures, which the regularized movement at posted street speeds and regular stops to pick up passengers provided. The flow control tokens in the people moving stream, so to speak. This UN report introduces the reader to three Urban Planning terms City Proper, Urban agglomeration and Metropolitan Area. An aerial map of Toronto is the used as the visual graphic for helping to define the terms. https://www.un.org/en/events/citiesday/assets/pdf/the_worlds_cities_in_2018_...
-- Len Sorensen --- Post to this mailing list talk@gtalug.org Unsubscribe from this mailing list https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
-- Russell
On 2020-05-29 09:57 AM, Russell Reiter wrote:
Although, if you remember the Red Rocket era cars, you also probably remember watching them hook together with train couplings when one broke down. The push connection was commonplace. The pull connection always drew a crowd, just to watch the backup manouver. That was a show.
While all streetcars have a means of emergency removal, at one time they were often coupled together to handle the passenger load. You could see those couplers on many of the PCC cars. These couplers were capable of passing the control signals, so that both cars could provide traction. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidents%27_Conference_Committee_(Toronto_st...
On Fri, May 29, 2020 at 10:26 AM James Knott via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 2020-05-29 09:57 AM, Russell Reiter wrote:
Although, if you remember the Red Rocket era cars, you also probably remember watching them hook together with train couplings when one broke down. The push connection was commonplace. The pull connection always drew a crowd, just to watch the backup manouver. That was a show.
While all streetcars have a means of emergency removal, at one time they were often coupled together to handle the passenger load. You could see those couplers on many of the PCC cars. These couplers were capable of passing the control signals, so that both cars could provide traction.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidents%27_Conference_Committee_(Toronto_st...
I remember riding on a coupled pair once or twice. Unfortunately as traffic increased and prolonged traffic jams became more commonplace, along with the fact that they couldn't access the short turn loops without being uncoupled, the coupling practice died out. On the CLRV's corrosion in the joining conduits also became an interface problem.
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On 2020-05-27 04:26 PM, Russell Reiter wrote:
I can't say for sure whether token ring on optical networks has left the IoT entirely.
There have been a lot of technology that's come and gone over the years.
Fiber and associated hardware is still very expensive.
Not really.
In some process and control systems redundancy and fail-over take necessary priority
Yep, and there are ways to do that with Ethernet and IP. I mentioned the 432 fibre strands on the Finch LRT. That's split into 2 redundant networks.
On 2020-05-27 04:26 PM, Russell Reiter wrote:
I can't say for sure whether token ring on optical networks has left the IoT entirely.
There have been a lot of technology that's come and gone over the years.
Fiber and associated hardware is still very expensive.
Not really. Generally speaking fiber is still more expensive than copper wiring but
On 5/28/20 6:57 AM, James Knott via talk wrote: the difference is not nearly as bad as it once was. The biggest thing is the price of CAT-5,6,7... is way down the price curve due to volume and the fact that most of us can afford the hardware to terminate copper cable. The cost of fiber termination is still way up there.
In some process and control systems redundancy and fail-over take necessary priority
Yep, and there are ways to do that with Ethernet and IP. I mentioned the 432 fibre strands on the Finch LRT. That's split into 2 redundant networks.
Redundant networks over the same cable(bundle) is not really redundant. Ethernet is not a real-time protocol. There are a number of ways to cover that shortcoming but Ethernet networks will never have deterministic throughput. For most things this is OK but if you need microsecond level timing then your looking at some other protocol. Throwing out real-time response and using CSMA/CD half duplex operation made the initial Ethernet hardware much cheaper than its competitors. With that market share the incremental changes to the hardware have made the original Ethernet unrecognizable. As for IP. It is best described as resilient and not redundant. The protocols on top of IP make for a very robust network that will generally route around failures. But they are even further from deterministic. -- Alvin Starr || land: (647)478-6285 Netvel Inc. || Cell: (416)806-0133 alvin@netvel.net ||
On 2020-05-28 08:30 AM, Alvin Starr via talk wrote:
Generally speaking fiber is still more expensive than copper wiring but the difference is not nearly as bad as it once was. The biggest thing is the price of CAT-5,6,7... is way down the price curve due to volume and the fact that most of us can afford the hardware to terminate copper cable. The cost of fiber termination is still way up there.
The cost of fibre patch cords isn't that far from copper: https://www.fs.com/c/fiber-optic-cables-209?gclid=Cj0KCQjwwr32BRD4ARIsAAJNf_... SFP modules will set you back less than $10. Compare that to the cost of a Cisco switch or router and you'll find the difference is trivial. There's also the advantages such as immunity from electrical interference, shock hazard, no longer limited to 100M (in fact, it's possible to cross the Atlantic, without repeaters). Unbelievable bandwidth (theoretical maximum 2.5 petabit, IIRC), less volume (important with larger cables) and more.
Redundant networks over the same cable(bundle) is not really redundant.
Who said anything about being in the same bundle?
Ethernet is not a real-time protocol. There are a number of ways to cover that shortcoming but Ethernet networks will never have deterministic throughput. For most things this is OK but if you need microsecond level timing then your looking at some other protocol.
Token ring was deterministic, in that there was a maximum time, before a device could transmit. This compared with half duplex Ethernet (coax or hub), where there's a random factor. However, that difference doesn't exist with switches, where you can assign priority, scheduling and more. The limiting factor with Ethernet is something called "funneling", where packets from multiple sources are all heading to the same port, which will cause a backup. VLAN tags can be used to provide priority, as well as ToS in IP. So, it all boils down to proper engineering of the network.
Throwing out real-time response and using CSMA/CD half duplex operation made the initial Ethernet hardware much cheaper than its competitors.
When's the last time you saw half duplex Ethernet? Also, most of that gear ran at 10 Mb, with a small amount capable of 100 Mb. However, switches killed half duplex. Of course, 100 Mb was left in the dust years ago, with 100 Gb, or more, now used in many applications. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terabit_Ethernet
As for IP. It is best described as resilient and not redundant. The protocols on top of IP make for a very robust network that will generally route around failures. But they are even further from deterministic.
IP and Ethernet are best effort. Then again, so was token ring. They all rely on some end to end protocol, such as TCP to provide protection against data loss. You'd have to go back to X.25 (yes, I've worked with that too) to get such protection on a per hop basis. As I mentioned, almost my entire career, going back to 1972 has been in telecom, computers and networks, so I do have some idea about what I'm talking about.
On 5/28/20 9:10 AM, James Knott via talk wrote:
On 2020-05-28 08:30 AM, Alvin Starr via talk wrote:
Generally speaking fiber is still more expensive than copper wiring but the difference is not nearly as bad as it once was. The biggest thing is the price of CAT-5,6,7... is way down the price curve due to volume and the fact that most of us can afford the hardware to terminate copper cable. The cost of fiber termination is still way up there.
The cost of fibre patch cords isn't that far from copper: https://www.fs.com/c/fiber-optic-cables-209?gclid=Cj0KCQjwwr32BRD4ARIsAAJNf_...
SFP modules will set you back less than $10. Compare that to the cost of a Cisco switch or router and you'll find the difference is trivial.
There's also the advantages such as immunity from electrical interference, shock hazard, no longer limited to 100M (in fact, it's possible to cross the Atlantic, without repeaters). Unbelievable bandwidth (theoretical maximum 2.5 petabit, IIRC), less volume (important with larger cables) and more. Absolutely. There are some real advantages to fiber and I did not say that fiber did not have its advantages just that it is still a little more expensive
FS.com is a good source of inexpensive patch cables and networking products. But still a 1M OM3 cable is ~$5 and a 1M CAT5e is ~$2.5. Not a huge difference but if you need a thousand of them it starts to add up. I am sure a Cisco SFP is more than $10 from Cisco If your doing the cabling then the cost of the termination and testing equipment can become a stumbling block.\ There is also the cable prep and cleaning that is needed with optical fiber which is not part of the CATx than CATx.
Redundant networks over the same cable(bundle) is not really redundant.
Who said anything about being in the same bundle?
True. That was my bad. I made an assumption from your comment about the cable being along the LRT right of way. But that being said all cable along a single right of way is in essence a single point of failure( think back hoe ). Multiple fiber bundles does not make that problem go away.
Ethernet is not a real-time protocol. There are a number of ways to cover that shortcoming but Ethernet networks will never have deterministic throughput. For most things this is OK but if you need microsecond level timing then your looking at some other protocol.
Token ring was deterministic, in that there was a maximum time, before a device could transmit. This compared with half duplex Ethernet (coax or hub), where there's a random factor. However, that difference doesn't exist with switches, where you can assign priority, scheduling and more. The limiting factor with Ethernet is something called "funneling", where packets from multiple sources are all heading to the same port, which will cause a backup. VLAN tags can be used to provide priority, as well as ToS in IP. So, it all boils down to proper engineering of the network.
Still Ethernet is not real-time. There are a lot of things that can be done to make it more amenable to human scale real-time but hard real-time operation is just not part of the mix. Once you hit a switch it gets worse. There may be some switches out there with deterministic queuing but I don't know of them.
Throwing out real-time response and using CSMA/CD half duplex operation made the initial Ethernet hardware much cheaper than its competitors.
When's the last time you saw half duplex Ethernet? Also, most of that gear ran at 10 Mb, with a small amount capable of 100 Mb. However, switches killed half duplex. Of course, 100 Mb was left in the dust years ago, with 100 Gb, or more, now used in many applications. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terabit_Ethernet Yesterday. I still have some thinnet hardware in my junk pile.
The design choices early on have effects on the uptake of a technology. Cheap Ethernet cards made for more people using the technology and more people using the technology leads to more companies developing hardware to extend the technology. Rinse and repeat. The openness or propritaryness of the protocols may have also played into those cost calculations. I remember a time when it looked like ATM might take take a chunk out of the Ethernet installed base but the cards never came down in price enough to make it happen. I did have a friend who made a lot of money by selling his ATM card startup to Cisco. Losing a manufacturer may have help in the demise of cheap ATM cards.
As for IP. It is best described as resilient and not redundant. The protocols on top of IP make for a very robust network that will generally route around failures. But they are even further from deterministic.
IP and Ethernet are best effort. Then again, so was token ring. They all rely on some end to end protocol, such as TCP to provide protection against data loss. You'd have to go back to X.25 (yes, I've worked with that too) to get such protection on a per hop basis.
As I mentioned, almost my entire career, going back to 1972 has been in telecom, computers and networks, so I do have some idea about what I'm talking about.
I was there also and around the same time along with dealing with aircraft avionics where there are some hard real-time and redundancy requirements. I also know a little about this. I did not suggest that you did not know what you were talking about I was just pointing out some subtler points. -- Alvin Starr || land: (647)478-6285 Netvel Inc. || Cell: (416)806-0133 alvin@netvel.net ||
On 2020-05-28 11:33 AM, Alvin Starr via talk wrote:
If your doing the cabling then the cost of the termination and testing equipment can become a stumbling block.\ There is also the cable prep and cleaning that is needed with optical fiber which is not part of the CATx
When running fibre, patch cords are normally used. I've run in some that were 35M. So, it's just a matter of run and plug in, though cleaning is always a good idea. The outside plant guys at Rogers and Bell would be splicing though. You see them hiding in their trucks or tents when they do that. Try this consideration, cost/bandwidth. Fibre is much cheaper than copper at the higher bit rates. Of course at some point you are past the point where copper is even usable. For example I mentioned 100 Mb and higher.
I made an assumption from your comment about the cable being along the LRT right of way. But that being said all cable along a single right of way is in essence a single point of failure( think back hoe ). Multiple fiber bundles does not make that problem go away.
On the LRT, the conduits are buried in the concrete, so the backhoe guy would really have to be determined to cut the fibre. ;-)
Still Ethernet is not real-time. There are a lot of things that can be done to make it more amenable to human scale real-time but hard real-time operation is just not part of the mix. Once you hit a switch it gets worse. There may be some switches out there with deterministic queuing but I don't know of them.
And neither is token ring. When you configure a managed switch, at least the better ones, you can choose from different queing methods, such as round robin, priority ports, how much data can pass in each cycle and more. All you have with token ring is the maximum wait time. Well, you can do better than that with a managed switch. Also, what do you mean by "worst"? If you have a single switch that connects all the devices, then you can say that as soon as a frame comes in on port X, it gets handled ahead of any other. Or you could put it into higher priorty queues etc. You can't get much more deterministic than that.
I still have some thinnet hardware in my junk pile.
And I have a 10 Mb hub. But how long has it been since it was last used? As for "cheapness", a lot of that depends on the target market. The stuff you might buy at Sayal or Canada Computers is not likely to find it's way into a data centre or telecom office (I've worked in both). ATM was designed for telecom carriers and not really suitable for LAN use. With the cells being so small, there was a lot of overhead bandwidth and also the difference in cell size, depending on where you were in the world. Avionics is a whole different area. The Collins computers I mentioned were designed for use on Navy ships and were built a whole lot different from other systems I worked on. One example would be they were water cooled. They were also military spec. Since you were in avionics, you probably are quite familiar with Collins.
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 11:41:15AM -0400, Russell Reiter wrote:
Sorry that was just a reference to the fact that FDDI is deployed in the past. You'd have to figure that if the effort was made to use a dedicated fiber network in a complex, business or government, they'd still be using it wouldn't they?
FDDI was 100 Mbit, so at this point having ripped it out and replaced it with gigabit or faster ethernet is quite likely.
The reference also said it's losing ground, but as with all things tech, optical connections are becoming commonplace in IoT and old stuff becomes new again.
The paranoid me wonders if my computer speakers are a microphone also. :-0
They can be used that way in some cases. And many modern audio chips have pin routing configuration so you could remap the speaker jack as a microphone jack. Probably wouldn't work well, but I would not say it couldn't be done. -- Len Sorensen
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 11:51 AM Lennart Sorensen < lsorense@csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 11:41:15AM -0400, Russell Reiter wrote:
Sorry that was just a reference to the fact that FDDI is deployed in the past. You'd have to figure that if the effort was made to use a dedicated fiber network in a complex, business or government, they'd still be using it wouldn't they?
FDDI was 100 Mbit, so at this point having ripped it out and replaced it with gigabit or faster ethernet is quite likely.
The reference also said it's losing ground, but as with all things tech, optical connections are becoming commonplace in IoT and old stuff becomes new again.
The paranoid me wonders if my computer speakers are a microphone also. :-0
They can be used that way in some cases. And many modern audio chips have pin routing configuration so you could remap the speaker jack as a microphone jack. Probably wouldn't work well, but I would not say it couldn't be done.
Actually a couple of years ago I bought the ASUS PRIME-A mb you recommended, not necessarily because of M.2 NVME but also because the external audio connections have impedance sensing; each audio channel is on its own tracing on the MB and the speakers had an optical connection. I also had a weird experience when I used a line adapter to plug a guitar into the line in and play out the speakers. After I defined the loopback device for pulse audio I'm not sure what it was but, when I adjusted the potentiometers on the guitar for base, treble and volume, I seemed to be able to tune in an audio broadcast channel and got that signal out the speakers. I know it was a broadcast, I heard it clearly, it was a one sided conversation, but in a language I don't know. So my thought was to get an audio breakout to usb via the Thunderspy port, but that would defeat the purpose of using the Realtek codec features of the board. What I really need is a good quality junction between the guitar phono I/O and the computers stereo line-in. It's a simple mono to stereo 1/4 - 1/8 in hardware adapter, which doesn't seem to exist. At least as a direct connection. You can plug an adapter into the guitar that will take the line input but the friction fit is very poor and crackles, although it seemed to make for a pretty good antenna at the time. --
Len Sorensen
-- Russell
On Wed, 27 May 2020 at 12:39, Russell Reiter via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
when I adjusted the potentiometers on the guitar for base, treble and volume, I seemed to be able to tune in an audio broadcast channel and got that signal out the speakers.
There are many instances of poorly shielded equipment picking up AM radio broadcasts, since all you need is a diode, inductor, capacitor and antenna to receive it (A.K.A crystal radio). Just wiring can create inductance and capacitance and a makeshift rectifier is pretty simple to inadvertently create as well. A long cable can form an antenna. -- Scott
On 2020-05-27 12:39 p.m., Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
I also had a weird experience when I used a line adapter to plug a guitar into the line in and play out the speakers. After I defined the loopback device for pulse audio I'm not sure what it was but, when I adjusted the potentiometers on the guitar for base, treble and volume, I seemed to be able to tune in an audio broadcast channel and got that signal out the speakers. I know it was a broadcast, I heard it clearly, it was a one sided conversation, but in a language I don't know.
The guitar has big coils: the circuit has high impedances, and in the case of a connection to a regular audio line input, it's not optimally terminated. And bingo, an impromptu radio receiver. We used to hear a HAM radio operator key up transmission through our subwoofer. You could see his antenna rising up over the houses a block over.
So my thought was to get an audio breakout to usb via the Thunderspy port, but that would defeat the purpose of using the Realtek codec features of the board. What I really need is a good quality junction between the guitar phono I/O and the computers stereo line-in.
Guitar in to a mic preamp is not as exciting but is fairly clean. From there you can go to line level with impunity. Linux, Linux, Linux. There. :-) Cheers, Mike
On 2020-05-27 12:39 p.m., Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
I also had a weird experience when I used a line adapter to plug a guitar into the line in and play out the speakers. After I defined the loopback device for pulse audio I'm not sure what it was but, when I adjusted the potentiometers on the guitar for base, treble and volume, I seemed to be able to tune in an audio broadcast channel and got that signal out the speakers. I know it was a broadcast, I heard it clearly, it was a one sided conversation, but in a language I don't know.
The guitar has big coils: the circuit has high impedances, and in the case of a connection to a regular audio line input, it's not optimally terminated. And bingo, an impromptu radio receiver. We used to hear a HAM radio operator key up transmission through our subwoofer. You could see his antenna rising up over the houses a block over.
Thanks for that explanation. You read about weird edge case RF stuff like
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 12:56 PM El Fontanero via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote: that but unless you actually experience it for yourself, it can be hard to sort out the source of the issue.
So my thought was to get an audio breakout to usb via the Thunderspy port, but that would defeat the purpose of using the Realtek codec features of the board. What I really need is a good quality junction between the guitar phono I/O and the computers stereo line-in.
Guitar in to a mic preamp is not as exciting but is fairly clean. From there you can go to line level with impunity.
I had a look around for non usb direct input hw. The ones with the 3.5mm output are a couple of hundred bucks. The direct phono jack adapter and cable I used with 3.5mm connections at both ends cost about ten all total. The sound is clean enough, but the mechanical connection causes a lot of static. The fittings don't match to high enough tolerances and the cord jiggles the connection too much when I play it. Reminds me of when I was ten and built a crystal radio. I was disappointed that I could only tune in one station, 1050 CHUM AM, the closest one to my house. Looks like I accidentally anachronistically recreated CFRB (Canada's First Rogers Battery) using a two thousand dollar Linux solid state home computer system, a forty dollar electric guitar and cheap ebay audio fittings and cables, although I'm pretty sure that wasn't CFRB I was tuning in. https://torontoist.com/2012/12/toronto-invents-the-batteryless-radio/
Linux, Linux, Linux. There. :-)
Cheers, Mike
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-- Russell
On 2020-05-27 05:42 PM, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
Reminds me of when I was ten and built a crystal radio. I was disappointed that I could only tune in one station, 1050 CHUM AM, the closest one to my house.
I had the same problem, except I got CFRB instead of CHUM. I lived roughly the same distance from both. I would have preferred CHUM. ;-)
On Wed, May 27, 2020 at 6:12 PM James Knott via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 2020-05-27 05:42 PM, Russell Reiter via talk wrote:
Reminds me of when I was ten and built a crystal radio. I was disappointed that I could only tune in one station, 1050 CHUM AM, the closest one to my house.
I had the same problem, except I got CFRB instead of CHUM. I lived roughly the same distance from both. I would have preferred CHUM. ;-)
Same basic tech but different experiential outcomes based on topography. I got my set by sending in cereal boxtops. A couple of years later a classmate of mine had a kit where the tuner actually worked for multiple stations. But his dad was an electrical engineer and helped him out with his kit, the parts for which, were definitely not from R. J. Kellogg's Battle Creek loyalty rewards centre like mine and maybe yours was.
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-- Russell
On 2020-05-27 06:50 PM, Russell Reiter wrote:
I had the same problem, except I got CFRB instead of CHUM. I lived roughly the same distance from both. I would have preferred CHUM. ;-)
Same basic tech but different experiential outcomes based on topography. I got my set by sending in cereal boxtops. A couple of years later a classmate of mine had a kit where the tuner actually worked for multiple stations. But his dad was an electrical engineer and helped him out with his kit, the parts for which, were definitely not from R. J. Kellogg's Battle Creek loyalty rewards centre like mine and maybe yours was.
No, my grandfather gave me a kit (I think it was called Erectronic) which was 15 different projects, the first of which was a crystal set. He originally gave it to an uncle, who showed little interest in it. The projects were assembled on a peg board, over which paper templates were laid and the various parts, mounted on plastic platforms, plugged into the holes and were connected with jumpers. The kit came with a 1U4 vacuum tube, IIRC and used a 1/2 volt and a 90V batteries. It could also be used to build a morse code transmitter and a voice transmitter, both of which interfered with local AM radios. ;-) I would have been around 10 or 11 when he gave me that kit.
participants (9)
-
Alvin Starr -
D. Hugh Redelmeier -
Dave Collier-Brown -
David Mason -
El Fontanero -
James Knott -
lsorense＠csclub.uwaterloo.ca -
Russell Reiter -
Scott Allen