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RPC Initialization



I have three LMs: an XL, a 3620, and a MacIvory.  I want any machine
to be able to send data to, or run functions remotely on, any other
specified machine.

This appears to be a job for RPC.  Based on previous discussions,
someone suggested I open a connection using
  (setq *LM05-link* (rpc:open-tcp-agent "LM05"))
and then use 
  (execute-my-remote-function args more-args :transport-agent *LM05-link*)
to invoke the RPC, after having gone through the mess of defining    
the remote-module and the remote-entry.

The current problem is that I get the following error message:
Error: LM25 does not support RPC service.

The following specials have been rebound; use :Show Standard Value Warnings for details:
  *PRINT-LEVEL*

NET:FIND-PATHS-TO-SERVICE-ON-HOST
   Arg 0 (NETI:SERVICE): :RPC
   Arg 1 (NET:HOST): #<FS:LISPM-HOST LM25 22005606115>
   Arg 2 (NETI:ONLY-NEED-BEST): NIL
   Arg 3 (NETI:MUST-HAVE-ONE): T
s-A:           Use protocol RPC-LITTLE-ENDER on medium TCP, or RPC on TCP.
etc.

when I try to open the tcp agent.  If I do a s-A, things seem
to work O.K., but it apparently is using a different protocol than
TCP (not that I understand nor care).

Q: How can I get the program to init the RPC behavior without breaking
out into an error message?  For instance, is there a function that I can
call directly that sets up a "RPC-LITTLE-ENDER" protocol for me?
Or is there some magic file that I have to edit to let one Symbolics know
that another Symbolics has RPC capability?  Or should I use
(setq *LM25-link* (rpc:open-chaos-agent "LM25"))?

Q: I assume that I can simply call rpc:open-tcp-agent once at the beginning
of the month, and then have that connection remain valid as long as 
both machines are running.  Obviously, if I boot the sending machine,
the connection dies.  What happens if I boot the receiving machine--
is the connection established from the sending machine still valid?
What happens if I power-down the MacIvory, and then turn it on again
(same world)--are connections sent from the Mac still valid?  How about
connections being received into the Mac?

Q: If I use a chaos protocol, can I send strings containing Kanji
and carriage-returns from one Symbolics to another?  On p.64 of the #13 Networks
manual, it says that strings should only use the 95 nice printable ASCII characters.
I couldn't get variable-length "opaque-byte" Kanji strings to work.

Thanks.
  John Myers          myers@atr-la.atr.co.jp