In the message dated: Tue, 07 May 2013 09:52:23 -0600,
The pithy ruminations from Yves Dorfsman on
<Re: [lopsa-discuss] nc vs telnet> were:
=> On 2013-05-07 09:44, Derek Balling wrote:
=> >
=> > On May 7, 2013, at 11:40 AM, Yves Dorfsman <[email protected]> wrote:
=> >> 1) how many servers do you know of will accept a telnet connection (as in
a network terminal)? Hence, telnet is obsolete.
=> >
=> > For the purpose of "telnet to port 80", I don't care about the network
terminal tcp/23 port.
The above two statements seem to deliberately conflate telnetd and the
telnet client. The example that spawned this thread ("telnet example.com
http") centers around the client and it's ability to connect to arbitrary
TCP/IP ports.
=>
=> Look at it the other way around: Since there is another tool that can do the
=> same + some more, why would you keep both of them?
=>
Are you proposing emacs as the replacement for every tool? :)
My point of view is that you keep both tools because, in fact, they do
different things and do them with different strengths and weaknesses.
Telnet as a server has a bad reputation, which is why distributions (and
individuals) may use a different tool instead...such as "nc"...which can
be run as a completely insecure server...oh, wait, that's why we don't
like telnetd.
In some environments, a tool that "can do port scanning", as nc
describes itself, wouldn't be installed on arbitrary machines. Without
a alternative, such as telnet (yes, it could also be abused as a port
scanner), it's difficult to do some basic troubleshooting.
In many cases, I'd rather install and use a tool (telnet) with a limited
and well-defined scope than install a 'network Swiss-army knife' tool
with many functions. A tool with a man page that lists common uses as:
o simple TCP proxies
o shell-script based HTTP clients and servers
o network daemon testing
o a SOCKS or HTTP ProxyCommand for ssh(1)
o and much, much more
is not always 'better' than the traditional Unix model of having small
programs that each do one thing well. See:
http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/
[Arguments about whether telnet should even have the ability to connect
to arbitrary ports will be entertained in Room 23, down the hall.]
Sure, I've used (and will continue to use) nc, but that doesn't mean you can
have my telnet until you pry it away from my cold, dead, keyboard.
Mark
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