What you have been describing, and what no one else
seems to have
twigged to,
is what we called a TIP ("terminal interface processor") or EtherTIP
(because
it sat directly on the 3Mbit/10Mbit Ethernet, unlike the ARPANET TIPs
that sat
on a 56Kbit leased line). There were dozens of these scattered across
Rich,
That is quite interesting. I suspected that such devices probably have been
around for a long time in some form or another but I had never heard the
term EtherTIP. As Jonathan pointed out the Lantronix devices have the same
capability by putting them into modem emulation mode and then using the
ADTD(IP ADDRESS:PORT) command. I am not sure how capable the telnet client
is but I would guess it may have been as good as the Cisco boxes. If I do
roll my own Pi solution I at least now know how to properly refer to it :D.
Thanks.
-Ali