Re: [fw-wiz] Tranparent bridge

From: Paul Robertson (proberts_at_patriot.net)
Date: 09/25/03

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    To: Tony Rall <trall@almaden.ibm.com>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2003 12:57:52 -0400 (EDT)

    On Tue, 23 Sep 2003, Tony Rall wrote:

    > Sorry for the digression, but aren't all bridges supposed to be
    > transparent?

    Nope, you can build a non-transparent bridge if you want. It helps the
    drivers in the cars see where... nahhh...

    A non-transparent bridge will modify the MAC address of the
    packets as it bridges them between networks, a transparent bridge will
    forward all the layer 2 traffic unaltered. The right combination of proxy
    arp and forwarding might technically make a non-transparent bridge (if
    you did all the broadcast/multicast stuff too.) The main advantage would
    be in having smaller ARP tables at each node.

    These days, I think the transparent is mostly in there to distinguish it
    from source route bridging. In SRB, the route is added by the device into
    the token-ring frame (well, you can do the explorer thing, but I've never
    seen a network set up that way.)

    Generally SRB was used to take SNA over an intermediate network between
    two token ring LANs.

    Paul
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Paul D. Robertson "My statements in this message are personal opinions
    proberts@patriot.net which may have no basis whatsoever in fact."
    probertson@trusecure.com Director of Risk Assessment TruSecure Corporation

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