The zmodem/kermit issue

When Kerberized telnetd was installed on the Athena dialups, users of zmodem complained that uploads of files to Athena, using rz from the sipb locker, were failing. A workaround was given - type "rlogin athena" at the pasta prompt instead of just "athena". Then zmodem uploads worked again.

Requiring this workaround for zmodem means load on OLC. Encouraging people to use kermit should mean we support it better than we do now.

Here's a chronology of related email:

July 26, 1994
Bruce calls for a meeting of various people, including CSS, to discuss the issue.
July 28, 1994
Meeting date is set. Oliver Thomas will represent CSS Athena/micro consultants.
August 1, 1994
Minutes are sent out to the is-minutes@MIT.EDU mailing list detailing the decision to try to support kermit better and not pursue zmodem support. Oliver submitted clarifications to the action items.
August 2, 1994
Ted verifies that windowing kermit works fine.
August 8, 1994
Oliver calls for reexamination of not supporting zmodem, citing Ted suggests trying an alpha version of the Mac client that purports to be better.
Mid-August, 1994
With the term about to begin, everybody got busy doing other things. Since a workaround existed for zmodem uploads, the issue went low on everybody's priority list, so the conversation stalled.
August 27, 1994
Bruce pointed out that Columbia had released a beta version of the Mac client, including many bug fixes.
October 28, 1994
Carla asks the PPT to consider fixing things so that zmodem will work again.
November 14, 1994
Bruce creates a summary of options for the PPT evaluate.
November 16, 1994
(from the PPT minutes) CSS Position: "zmodem IS a supported product, and we should make it work right!"
December 3, 1994
Bruce shares some findings showing that flow control characters are being interpreted at the dialup end, and not being passed to the client.
December 14, 1994
Bruce asks for help on comp.protocols.kerberos, comp.sys.ultrix and comp.sys.aix. No help is offered except for some stabs in the dark from epeisach, none of which work when Bruce tries them.
December 29, 1994
Bruce finds a "zmodem options" dialog box on zterm with a checkbox for "escape ctl chars". When this box is checked, transfers work fine. Burce sends mail about it.
Bruce R. Lewis / <brlewis@mit.edu>
$Date: 94/12/31 14:40:16 $