TokenTalk NB Card: Incompatible with IBM ECF



Does Apple's Token Ring card and MacDFT participate in what customers call IBM
ECF (Enhanced Connectivity Facility)?

None of the software that Apple provides for the TokenTalk NB card supports
ECF. ECF was one of the intermediate steps that IBM took towards SAA (Systems
Application Architecture), and is no longer in the mainstream of architectures
promoted by IBM except as a building block of SAA.

MacDFT uses our own proprietary API for communication with a host, and MacAPPC
is fully compliant with IBM's LU 6.2 protocol specification (including the APPC
verb set). Thus, Apple does not support the limited verb set specified by ECF
(which is rarely used anyway).


Published Date: Feb 18, 2012