dlpi(7P)




NAME

     dlpi - Data Link Provider Interface


SYNOPSIS

     #include <sys/dlpi.h>


DESCRIPTION

     SunOS STREAMS-based device drivers wishing  to  support  the
     STREAMS   TCP/IP and other STREAMS-based networking protocol
     suite implementations support Version 2  of  the  Data  Link
     Provider  Interface  ("DLPI").  DLPI  V2 enables a data link
     service user to access and use any of a variety of  conform-
     ing data link service providers without special knowledge of
     the provider's  protocol.  Specifically,  the  interface  is
     intended  to  support  Ethernet, X.25 LAPB, SDLC, ISDN LAPD,
     CSMA/CD, FDDI, token ring,  token  bus,  Bisync,  and  other
     datalink-level protocols.

     The interface specifies access to the data link service pro-
     vider  in  the form of  M_PROTO and  M_PCPROTO type  STREAMS
     messages and does not define a specific protocol implementa-
     tion.  The  interface  defines  the  syntax and semantics of
     primitives exchanged between the data link user and the data
     link  provider  to  attach  a physical device with physical-
     level address to a stream, bind a datalink-level address  to
     the stream, get implementation-specific information from the
     data link provider, exchange data with a peer data link user
     in one of three communication modes (connection, connection-
     less, acknowledged connectionless), enable/disable multicast
     group and promiscuous mode reception of datalink frames, get
     and set the physical address associated with a  stream,  and
     several other operations.

     For details on this  interface  refer  to  the  <sys/dlpi.h>
     header.  For  free access to the STREAMS  DLPI Specification
     visit      The       Open       Group       website       at
     www.opengroup.org/pubs/catalog/c811.htm.


FILES

     Files in or under /dev.


SEE ALSO

     le(7D), hme(7D), ge(7D), qfe(7D), gld(7D)


NOTES

     Streams drivers for network interface cards (NIC) must  meet
     the following driver name constraints:

        o  Length - Name cannot exceed 16 characters. Names  con-
           taining three to eight characters are preferred.

        o   Legal Characters - Legal characters are: alphanumeric
           (a-z,  A-Z,  0-9), and the underscore ('_'). Addition-
           ally, the first and/or last character of a name cannot
           be a digit.


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