RFC 2097 (rfc2097) - Page 3 of 13

The PPP NetBIOS Frames Control Protocol (NBFCP)

RFC 2097                         NBFCP                      January 1997


   MAY       This word, or the adjective "optional", means that this
             item is one of an allowed set of alternatives.  An
             implementation which does not include this option MUST be
             prepared to interoperate with another implementation which
             does include the option.

1.2.  Terminology

   This document frequently uses the following terms:

   peer      The other end of the point-to-point link.

   silently discard
            This means the implementation discards the packet without
            further processing.  The implementation SHOULD provide the
            capability of logging the error, including the contents of
            the silently discarded packet, and SHOULD record the event
            in a statistics counter.

   end-system
            A user's machine.  It only sends packets to servers and
            other end-systems.  It doesn't pass any packets through
            itself.

   router    Allows packets to pass through, usually from one ethernet
             segment to another.  Sometimes these are called
             "intermediate-systems".

   bridge    Allows packets to pass through with the data field
             unmodified.  Usually from one ethernet segment to another
             or from one ethernet segment to a token-ring segment.

   gateway   Allows packets to be sent from one network protocol to
             the same or different network protocol.  For example,
             NetBIOS packets from an NBF network to a TCP/IP network
             which has implemented RFC 1001 and RFC 1002.

   local access only server A server which does not pass any packets
             through itself to other servers.

2.  A PPP Network Control Protocol for NBF

   The NBF Control Protocol (NBFCP) is responsible for configuring,
   enabling, and disabling the NBF protocol modules on both ends of the
   point-to-point link.  NBFCP uses the same packet exchange mechanism
   as the Link Control Protocol.  NBFCP packets MUST NOT be exchanged
   until PPP has reached the Network-Layer Protocol phase.  NBFCP
   packets received before this phase is reached should be silently



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