Subject: (IPng 7213) PF_INET6, AF_INET6 values.

From: [email-masked] (Peter R. Tattam)
Date: Sat, 20 Feb 1999 14:07:34 +1100

Last time I looked at the API standard, the values for these were not 
explicitly set.

While you may say it doesn't matter and that the source for the relevant 
machine platform should specify the value,  what happens in the case where 
binaries are built with specific values for that machine implementation.

With IPv4 this has not been an issue as the values of PF_INET & AF_INET appear 
to be the same from platform to platform (I have never noticed anything other 
than the value 2) but in the IPv6 development I have seen, because there are 
many other PF_ values after PF_INET, the value of PF_INET6 can be somewhat 
arbitrary.

This is important for API that provide a binary level of compatibility such as 
Winsock 1.1, winsock 2.0, and also would be important for precompiled binaries 
that are distributed for a given platform.

I myself have discovered that the values I used for my stack based on the 
FreeBSD settings turn out to be different to the ones used in the Winsock 2 
spec.  Winsock 1.1 is undefined as it is a frozen protocol (although 
everyone is using it).

same issue also applies to sockaddr structure for IPv6.

What's the correct way to deal with the issue?

Peter

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From: Craig Metz <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 19 Feb 1999 22:52:39 -0500

In message <[email-masked]>, you write:
>than the value 2)

  Linux.

									-Craig