Comments on File Access Protocol

A file access protocol (FAP) of the sort proposed by John Day in RFC 520 is a good idea. The following corr~ents suggest improvements (mostly additions) to the protocol described in RFC 520. 1. (Philosophical comment) rrhe intent of both F'I'P and FAP is to make it po ssible for-a user to remotely access f iles. In effect, FTP provides means for a user to have (parts o f) file activity bf the sort typically initiated at the command language level "slaved" acros s the ne t wo rk to the site where the file resides.-I n a similar way the in tent of FAP is to provide a mechanism whi.c h allows activi t y o f the sort typically initiated by programs at the operating system or monitor level t o be '" slaved II acros s the ne t wo z k to the s ite where the file reside s. The OPEN, CLOS t SETP , etc. commands of FAP c an be viewe d as a t t e mp t s to d e f i n e "generic" file system monitor calls. The sugg e st i o n s made below are further att empts to ma k e fe a t u r e s t y p i c a l l y avai l able to lo c al use rs a l s o ava i lab l e to r e mo t e u s e r s v i a PAP.