Subject: atalkd fails to communicate with existing router

From: Tom Lane <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 05 Feb 2001 19:29:03 -0500

Hi folks,

  I'm sure this has come up before, but I couldn't find anything about
it after some digging in the archives.  I'm trying to bring up netatalk
on LinuxPPC 2000-Q4 (kernel 2.2.18, netatalk-1.4b2+asun2.1.3-7 RPM).
It's running on a Powerbook G3 (Pismo) which is connected via an Apple
AirPort card to a local Ethernet LAN (the AirPort base station is
running AirPort 1.2 if that matters).  Also attached to the LAN is a
Netopia 435 ISDN router, which has both LAN and PhoneNet ports; the
Netopia acts as a seeding router for the AppleTalk network.  Or it's
supposed to, anyway.  This all works great when I boot MacOS on the
Powerbook, but atalkd does not seem to manage to communicate with the
Netopia.  Here are the relevant /var/log/messages entries:

Feb  5 18:57:41 g3 kernel: NET4: AppleTalk 0.18 for Linux NET4.0 
Feb  5 18:57:41 g3 atalkd[652]: restart (1.4b2+asun2.1.3)
Feb  5 18:57:42 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:57:48 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:08 g3 last message repeated 4 times
Feb  5 18:58:11 g3 atalkd[652]: config for no router
Feb  5 18:58:12 g3 atalkd[652]: ready 0/0/0
Feb  5 18:58:12 g3 atalk: atalkd startup succeeded
Feb  5 18:58:18 g3 atalkd[652]: rtmp_packet router has become available
Feb  5 18:58:18 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:21 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:26 g3 atalk: afpd startup succeeded
Feb  5 18:58:28 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:31 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:36 g3 afpd[794]: Can't register g3:AFPServer@*
Feb  5 18:58:36 g3 afpd[794]: ASIP started on 192.168.168.12:548(0) (1.4b2+asun2.1.3) 
[ yes, 192.168.168.12 is the IP address assigned to the Powerbook ]
Feb  5 18:58:38 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:41 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:48 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:58:51 g3 atalkd[652]: config for no router
Feb  5 18:58:58 g3 atalkd[652]: rtmp_packet router has become available
Feb  5 18:58:58 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:59:28 g3 last message repeated 6 times
Feb  5 18:59:31 g3 atalkd[652]: config for no router
Feb  5 18:59:38 g3 atalkd[652]: rtmp_packet router has become available
Feb  5 18:59:38 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 18:59:51 g3 last message repeated 3 times
Feb  5 18:59:58 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 19:00:08 g3 last message repeated 2 times
Feb  5 19:00:11 g3 atalkd[652]: config for no router
Feb  5 19:00:18 g3 atalkd[652]: rtmp_packet router has become available
Feb  5 19:00:18 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
Feb  5 19:00:48 g3 last message repeated 6 times
Feb  5 19:00:51 g3 atalkd[652]: config for no router
Feb  5 19:00:58 g3 atalkd[652]: rtmp_packet router has become available
Feb  5 19:00:58 g3 atalkd[652]: zip_getnetinfo for airport
... etc etc in an endless loop ...

It looks to me like atalkd may be hearing the RTMP packets that the
Netopia broadcasts (what else would cause it to repeat the configuration
cycle like that?) but it doesn't manage to acquire the correct network
numbers.  The actual configuration of the Appletalk network, as shown by
CheckNet when the Powerbook is booted into MacOS, is:

CheckNET	6:55 PM	2/5/01	Device List	Number of entries = 8

Name			Type			Zone		Net	Node	Skt	Enum
192.168.168.2		IPGATEWAY		AppleTalk	36332	149	72	1
AccelaWriter 8100	LaserWriter		AppleTalk	36332	130	128	0
G3			ARA - Personal Server	AppleTalk	257	132	2	0
G3			Workstation		AppleTalk	257	132	4	0
G3			Multi-User Client	AppleTalk	257	132	48	0
G3			EPSON IJ Notification	AppleTalk	257	132	250	0
G3			  Power Macintosh	AppleTalk	257	132	252	0
Netopia 455-U #26358	Netopia Router		AppleTalk	257	150	100	1

but atalkd doesn't see these network numbers; what it selects and writes
into atalkd.conf is

airport -phase 2 -net 0-65534 -addr 65280.15

None of the basic lookup/troubleshooting tools seem to work; for example
getzones just sits for about ten seconds and says
	atp_rresp: Connection timed out
And, as you can see from the log messages, registering NBP names
doesn't work, nor does looking them up.

BTW, regular TCP across the airport card works fine.  I can even 'ping'
the Netopia from the Powerbook.  It's just Appletalk over IP that's
busted.

It's probably some stupid configuration error on my part, but I'm stuck.
Any ideas?

			regards, tom lane

---

From: Tom Lane <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 06 Feb 2001 01:27:58 -0500

> ... etc etc in an endless loop ...

Further experimentation shows that atalkd works fine if I use a
hardwired connection to the LAN and configure atalkd to the eth0
interface.  It just doesn't like the airport card.  I suspect a
compatibility problem with the airport driver (which is v0.9.3
of Ben Herrenschmidt's Airport WaveLAN/IEEE driver).

The above-quoted symptoms seem to indicate a problem in sending
broadcast Appletalk packets.  Looking at the airport module source code,
I note a history of endianness bugs; I wonder if there is one more that
affects only appletalk packets and not IP packets?

			regards, tom lane