Transfer files over an Ethernet patch cable

That wasn't that long ago was it..?

/looks longingly out the window, and catch my aging face in the reflection

Basically beat me to writing this, but I wouldn’t have made it so eloquent of an explanation.

"It's possible to just connect two computers together with Ethernet" - on the front page of hackernews. Incredible. Ethernet over USB4 interdomain protocol at least had some novelty, but this...

Back in the day you needed a modified cable for this with RX/TX swapped on one end but nowadays probably all nic chips have auto-detect so you can take a normal patch cable and do it.

If you're used to a "normal" network with a router, it's a revelation that you can go direct.

Oh, I had no idea you could perform such a "broadcast" ping on link-local addresses. Now, that is a nice trick that will save me some typing between computers.

mDNS / Avahi is also great if the machine advertises itself: just use machinename.local after plugging it.

Though the interface needs to be configured for link-local addresses. In my experience, NetworkManager now periodically resets the link if it can't get a DHCP server to respond. I understand the rationale, but it used to be simpler to plug into a headless machine and be confident that you could just ssh in.

I would assume so as well, I'm not sure if all host operating systems act the same though. But you could probably just wait a couple of seconds and the interfaces would have assigned themselves link-local addresses.

I have plugged two ZX Spectrums together and done LOAD "" on one and SAVE "THING" on the other to transfer data.

If you get away from BASIC commands and copy the tape routines up into RAM you can mess with the timing values, and with care you can get it from an average of 1800bps up to around IIRC 12000bps before things really fall apart. Probably with better interfacing you'd get even faster.

With more conservative values, this is how "speedloaders" worked. In the late 80s or early 90s one publisher released games on CD where it would load in the loader at normal rate then ramp up to some unholy speed that CD had the bandwidth and stability for but tape did not.

Gigabit Ethernet doesn't need to detect anything because it sends and receive over the 4 pairs simultaneously using echo cancellation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medium-dependent_interface#Aut... is what allowed the switchover to happen automatically, and it got folded into the 1000BASE-T standard. So yes, crossover cables are no longer required because the two Ethernet adapters at either end can negotiate between them to have one of them "flip" the meaning of its Receive (RX) and Transmit (TX) pins.

The way I learned this, is that patch cables use stranded wires, but ethernet cables use solid wires.

IIRC crossovers are pre-2000, yes. "Fast Ethernet" or 100Base-T adapters usually could talk over straight link.

edit: as for length, it depends. you won't get a gigabit over 150m of crap cat3, but you will get a link, even if it's 10 half-duplex.

That's exactly what a patch cable is. /facepalm

As the article says,

> Removable storage is quite slow unless you are willing to spend a lot of money.

An SSD good enough to copy tens of GB quickly is not cheap.

I remember playing over a 9-pin RS232 null cable - but I guess that is telling about my age :D

Not Warcraft though - some ancient DOS game.

For anyone today who's got copper wire stretched between any buildings, you are in danger and your configuration is quite unwise.

For every standalone building that has a ground, that building also has an electrical potential. This potential is not necessarily the same between two neighboring buildings. When you stretch a copper line between them, you are tempting fate, electrically, not to mention the dangers of lightning strikes and the elements attacking that connection.

It is generally recognized that fiber optics are not only very efficient and durable, but also impervious to electrical troubles of the type that may plague inter-building connections. Simply grab switches or routers that support at least one fiber-optic connection, and link up!

Back in my college days, 169.254.x.y addresses were the bane of my existence, because my job was getting students' computers set up with the brand-new Ethernet connection in their dorm room. This usually required a tech to come out to their room and configure Windows 95 properly, with IP and DHCP instead of Novell Netware and IPX (I don't remember why Netware/IPX was the default on so many Windows 95 installs, but that was definitely what I found most often when I went to look at someone's computer that "wasn't connecting to the Internet".)

Occasionally we had someone who knew what they were doing and had their Windows 95 settings set up correctly, and then all we had to do was activate their room's Ethernet port and add their MAC address to the DHCP server's list of authorized MACs. But most often I or one of the other techs had to head down to the person's dorm room and set up their computer's network settings correctly before it would work. Once the 169.254 address was replaced by 192.168, my job was finally done. But there were times when that took some doing.

And if you prefer ipv6 you can as well just ping -6 ff02::1%eth0 (or eno1 or whatever your devices name in the particular subnet is) and receive all fe80 addresses of other hosts in the subnet.

Also, why is he talking about "ethernet"? Its the IP layer, not the ethernet layer...

If one of the devices support DRD (OTG), but unless one of them is an ARM device, chances are slim.