Actually, Phil,  the problem  is both DEC's  and Joiner's,  with a
little help  from the  local system administrator  to boot.   DEC made
things difficult  for the world  by not  requiring a VAXCluster  to be
symetrical.   These things  aren't  like  Multi-Porcessor VM  systems,
they're acutally  several independent, Uni-Processor VMS  systems that
share  some  hardware.   Each  can  have its  own  SYS$UAF  file  (the
equivalent of the CP  directory), and not all users on  node X need to
be allowed on node  Y. In fact, there's no requirement  that user Q on
cluster node  X be the same  user as Q on  node Y. So that's  a strike
against DEC, albeit one that gives their customers better control over
their systems.
 
    Joiner couldn't simply assume  that messages directed to Q@CLUSTER
should be sent to any Q logged into any cluster node.  They decided to
handle  the problem  by allowing  the  system administrator  to set  a
cluster up as either a single system, sending out messages and mail as
<user>@<clustername>, or as several systems, each sending out meesages
and mail  as <user>@<clusternodename>.  Either way,  mail and messages
will be  accepted for  <user>@<clusternodename>.  Clusters set  up the
first  way will  also  accept mail  to  <user>@<clustername>, but  not
messages.  So that's a strike against Joiner.
 
    Some system administrators apper  to have configured their systems
in such  a way  as to be  unreachable, or difficult  to deal  with, so
that's one on them.
 
Ross Patterson
Rutgers University