Legacy Document

Inside Macintosh: Networking /

Chapter 1 - Introduction to AppleTalk / Deciding Which AppleTalk Protocol to Use

Directly Accessing a Driver for a Network Type

The .ENET, the .TOKN, or the .FDDI driver is normally called by the AppleTalk Manager through the AppleTalk connection file for the link type (EtherTalk, TokenTalk, or FDDITalk) when the user has selected one of these network types from the Network control panel. You can write your own protocol stack or application that uses one of these drivers directly rather than through AppleTalk.

The interface at this level allows you to open the driver and send data to it directly for transmission over the network. However, to receive data from the network, you need to provide a protocol handler written in assembly language.

For Phase 1 Ethernet packets, that is, the original version of Ethernet packets, you can read data directly from an Ethernet driver using the default protocol handler that Apple provides or your own protocol handler.

For IEEE 802.2 packets, you must use the interface to the Link-Access Protocol (LAP) Manager to attach your protocol handler to read data from an Ethernet, token ring,
or FDDI driver. Token ring and FDDI support only 802.2 packets.

The chapter "Ethernet, Token Ring, and Fiber Distributed Data Interface" in this
book describes how to use the interface for Phase 1 Ethernet packets. The chapter "Link-Access Protocol (LAP) Manager" in this book describes how to use the interface for IEEE 802.2 packets.