mike@BRL.ARPA (Mike Muuss) (07/31/85)
Has anybody implemented SUN's ND protocol for 4.2BSD, so that I could use (say) a VAX or a Gould as the disk server for a SUN-2/50, or is this a hopeless cause? -Mike
dcmartin@sun.uucp (David C. Martin) (08/02/85)
In article <335@brl-tgr.ARPA> mike@BRL.ARPA (Mike Muuss) writes: >Has anybody implemented SUN's ND protocol for 4.2BSD, so that >I could use (say) a VAX or a Gould as the disk server for a >SUN-2/50, or is this a hopeless cause? > -Mike Mt. Xinu in Berkeley is supporting Sun's Network File System on the VAX. You should contact them to determine the availability of a product to fit you particular need (i.e. I don't understand, do you want *just* ND?). -- David C. Martin - Sun Microsystems / UC Berkeley uucp: ..!ucbvax!sun!dcmartin usps: 2280 California St #8 arpa: dcmartin@Berkeley Mountain View, CA 94040 at&t: 415/960-7458 (O) - 415/967-0506 (H)
elman@sdcsvax.UUCP (Jeff Elman) (08/06/85)
> Has anybody implemented SUN's ND protocol for 4.2BSD, so that > I could use (say) a VAX or a Gould as the disk server for a > SUN-2/50, or is this a hopeless cause? > -Mike Yes, we have a VAX implementation of the ND protocol. The code runs on a VAX 11/750 (4.2BSD) and allows the VAX to diskserve SUN-2/50's. At present we have 2 SUN's using the VAX for booting, paging, and fileserving. (The same code also makes it possible for the VAX to be a client off a SUN!) Details from me (elman@nprdc, ucbvax!sdcsvax!sdamos!elman) or the author, Dave Pare (mr-frog@ucsd, ucbvax!sdcsvax!sdamos!mr-frog). Jeff Elman Phonetics Laboratory, C-008 University of California, San Diego (619) 452-2536
jbn@wdl1.UUCP (08/09/85)
Mt. Xinu is talking about supporting NFS on the VAX. But they aren't
shipping product yet.
Actually, the idea of a big machine as a NFS back end is probably a
bad one; NFS is compute-intensive. We have ten diskless stations on a
SUN file server, and seem to be running out of cycles on the file server
long before becoming I/O bound there.
What really seems to be needed is a port of NFS to an intelligent
disk controller. The file server doesn't need to run UNIX; it doesn't
even need to run user programs. The ideal would be a card like the SUN
2/50 card but with an SMD interface, no display interface, CPU(s), RAM, ROM,
no paging, and an Ethernet controller, with NFS in ROM. You would have one
of these for each disk spindle, and each would have enough power to run
NFS for one disk spindle without becoming compute bound. This might make
NFS work.
John Nagle