RPC on Symbolics

[eyvind%hrp.no@Warbucks.AI.SRI.COM (Eyvind Ness)]

   Date: Thu, 8 Aug 1991 17:57-0400
   From: CStacy@STONY-BROOK.SCRC.Symbolics.COM (Christopher Stacy)

       Date: Thu, 8 Aug 1991 15:41 EDT
       From: eyvind%hrp.no@Warbucks.AI.SRI.COM (Eyvind Ness)
       In-Reply-To: Mathew Jones's message of Thu, 8 Aug 91 10:27:44 PDT

       - Thanks, but I think you misunderstand. There is a SYSTEM called RPC
       on my Symbolics too. Unfortunately, it does not contain any of the
       interesting stuff (REGISTERRPC, CALLRPC, XDR conversion etc. etc.) -
       only some Genera-specific *garbage* is present in the current RPC
       package.

   Eyvind,

   Genera has a complete RPC/XDR programming substrate, integrated with the
   Lisp environment.  It is compliant with RFC#1057 and RFC#1014, and it
   works over both the usual network transports (like TCP, UDP, and serial)
   and also over the embedding communications interface on the MacIvory.
   It is also even used by Genera itself on the UX and MacIvory systems.
   Symbolics RPC is documented in "The Remote Procedure Call Facility"
   section in the Document Examiner (in the "Networks" book),
   and also in the User's Guide for each of the embedded systems.

I have read it all - no success in trying it out over the network,
though. I can't find the Symbolics portmapper process either.

   Under Genera, you don't have to deal with the kinds of details that you
   are complaining are "missing."  For example, you don't need to use
   "callRPC" to invoke your remote procedures, because you don't deal with
   them like they are some special, different kind of functions.
   Rather, they are just Lisp functions, and you just invoke them like any
   other Lisp function.  The fact that they might be implemented on a remote
   machine is transparent to you.

I really HATE this part. Why does Symbolics have to invent something
special here? I WANT to use callrpc and registerrpc! That is what I am
familiar with, and it would make life much easier if I could port the
Explorer code directly to Symbolics without having to learn yet
another way of doing RPCs (less direct and sillier way in this case, I
think).  Also, *normal* Unix libraries (-lc) provide a uniform set of
functions to deal with RPC which you can find on the Explorer, but not
on Symbolics.

Thanks for showing interest in the problem, Chris.

Eyvind.