🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Oct29.201303.16217@brtph560.bnr.ca> rmcash@eos.ncsu.edu (Rob Cash) writes:
>I have a question for you concerning establishing stream socket connections
>without using a reserved port from the /etc/services file.  Basically, the
>question is: how can the client determine the server's port, if the server's
>port was assigned automatically by the operating system because s_port was 0?

You need some common communication mechanism to bootstrap things.  If the
server's system runs a port mapper, the server could register his port with
the port mapper and the client could contact it.  You then rely on the fact
that the port mapper has a well-known port.

It's analogous to the real world telephone system: some services have
well-known phone numbers (e.g. 911 for emergencies), but to find other
phone numbers you have to call Directory Assistance (at the well-known
number 411).
-- 
Barry Margolin
System Manager, Thinking Machines Corp.

barmar@think.com          {uunet,harvard}!think!barmar