  DECnet network address usage? 
 The Question is:
 
How can I get a third party or other software to find if a Decnet node number
 is already in use?  This is a utility like ping that searches the network to
 see if the decnet node id is already in use.  I do not know the name of this
 utility, we used to hav
e it running on a DOS machine but the machine was not Y2K compatable.  I know
 this utility is available, Cisco has this on there Boundary routers.
 
 The Answer is:
 
  This is not a particular issue with DECnet-Plus, of course, thus
  the use of DECnet Phase IV will be assumed.
 
  While you can determine known nodes via NCP commands -- most
  commonly, commands such as:
 
    $ RUN SYS$SYSTEM:NCP
 
    TELL masternodedatabasenode SHOW NODE name
 
    or
 
    TELL masternodedatabasenode SHOW NODE area.node
 
  If you wish to monitor the configuration of your local DECnet Phase IV
  Ethernet network, you can use the CONFIGURATOR module.  For details,
  see the NCP SET MODULE CONFIGURATOR documentation.
 
  If you wish to monitor nodes that are currently reachable within a
  DECnet Phase IV network, you can use the DCL command SHOW NETWORK.
 
  If you wish lower-level access to this information, you can use the
  DECnet Phase IV NICE protocol to directly query the configuration
  of the DECnet network management layer.
 
  A simple reachability probe (eg: SET HOST) will only tell you if the
  node is both reachable and is currently participating in a DECnet
  network.  If the node happens to be down, unreachable, or not running
  DECnet when you probe, then you will likely later encounter the
  IVADDR invalid media address if you then (re)use that node's DECnet
  address -- in this case, the IVADDR error indicates that a duplicate
  DECnet node address has been detected.
 
  The OpenVMS Wizard STRONGLY encourages the use of a central NCP
  database, either for a particular area or for a particular DECnet
  network.
 
