[ale] Problem connecting to ZDNet

[Fulton Green]

On Sun, Oct 29, 2000 at 06:20:14PM -0700, Chris Ricker wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Fulton Green wrote:
> 
> > In a nutshell, I can't seem to bring up ZDNet's website in my Linux browser,
> > but I can do so from Window$ 98. It appears to be a telnet-level problem.
> > 
> > Here's the scoop AFAIK:
> > 
> > - I'm DSL-connected through a Telocity gateway box from my box's 3com 10baseT
> >   Ethernet PCMCIA card (3c589).
> > - I have a dual-boot notebook, with Win98 on one partition and Red Hat 7.0
> >   running a locally-compiled 2.4.0-test9 kernel.
> > - If you're still reading after that statement, you're obviously the
> >   adventurous sort. :)
> > - I am able to connect to www.zdnet.com from Win98's IE.
> > - I am unable to do a "lynx www.zdnet.com" from Linux, however.
> > - Performing a "telnet www.zdnet.com http" under Linux yields
> >   "Connection refused", so that rules out browser-specific issues.
> > - Performing a "ping www.zdnet.com" from Linux, however, does yield remote
> >   responses.
> > 
> > So with all this in mind, what would be the best way to analyse betweeen the
> > two OSes just what kind of TCP/IP packets I'm sending?
> 
> The problem is probably that you enabled ECN; for me, running
> 2.4.0-test10-pre6-reiser, I can reach zdnet if I disable ECN, but not if I
> enable it.
> 
> ZDNet (and much of the rest of the 'net) is broken and doesn't handle ECN
> correctly.  Email them and gripe; the problem is most likely misconfigured /
> non-upgraded Cisco routers on their end, though the chances of them doing
> anything about it are slim.

Way to go! I disabled ECN, recompiled, and now it works like a charm.

For the uninitiated, ECN stands for "explicit congestion notification". It's
a TCP option under the Networking Options section of the 2.4 kernel build
configuration utility.

For the barely-initiated (which includes myself): what exactly does ECN do,
anyway?
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