milne@ICS.UCI.EDU (Alastair Milne) (06/13/89)
We have been having a bit of a problem with PC-NFS which we can't seem to
clear up locally. I wondered if anybody else has seen this, and (ideally)
has a solution.
The startup sequence for PC-NFS starts with NET START RDR.
On PC's with the i286 or i386, NET START RDR usually winds up reporting:
Cannot send broadcast packet: Unknown error
NFS028W : Unable to find a YP server for domain uci-ics.
net: Unable to get hostname by ip addr (128.195.1.53)
(the ip addr reported is always correct for the host reporting it)
Now, the net nevertheless seems to run correctly (i.e. the operations we
try succeed); according to NFSCONF, the PC host picks up everything it's
supposed to by YP and RARP (host name, IP number, subnet mask, etc.). I
can't immediately see a consequence of the conditions reported; and it
seems clear that YP is in fact succeeding in using the domain name
we specify.
The very odd thing is that this has almost never been seen to happen on
8088 and 8086 machines. The suggestion is that the CPU is outrunning
something in the net support -- but when you consider that the majority of
hosts on the net are Sun 3's and 4's, and Sequent Balances, how a 16MHz
(or even a 12MHz) PC could outrun the net is not clear.
The ethernet card we use is the WD8003E. Has anybody heard of this card's
having problems when used with a relatively high-speed CPU? The drivers
are set up as:
DEVICE=NFS\PCNFS.SYS
DEVICE=NFS\SOCKDRV.SYS
DEVICE=NFS\WD8003E.SYS /i3
(before we put the /i3 on WD8003E.SYS, we were enormously frustrated in
trying to discover why the net refused to come up. The /i3 was the
answer for almost every PC on the net.)
If there is general interest, I'll summarise anything I get for the net.
However, mention of the WD8003E has got no response in the past. I have
the impression it's not a terribly popular card.
Thanks,
Alastair Milne,
ETC,
UC Irvinegeertj@nlgvax.UUCP (Geert Jan de Groot) (06/25/89)
In article <8906121909.aa13452@ICS.UCI.EDU> milne@ICS.UCI.EDU (Alastair Milne) writes: > On PC's with the i286 or i386, NET START RDR usually winds up reporting: > > Cannot send broadcast packet: Unknown error > NFS028W : Unable to find a YP server for domain uci-ics. > net: Unable to get hostname by ip addr (128.195.1.53) > > (the ip addr reported is always correct for the host reporting it) > > Now, the net nevertheless seems to run correctly (i.e. the operations we > try succeed); according to NFSCONF, the PC host picks up everything it's > supposed to by YP and RARP (host name, IP number, subnet mask, etc.). We have had the same trouble, and found a solution (at least, one that works for us). This is what I did: - The problem seemed to become less frequent when I explicitly set the netmask by hand: NET YPDOMAIN <domain> NET SUBNET 255.255.255.0 NET START RDR - The problem did not go away. Then, while looking with etherfind(1), we found the reason: PC-NFS kinda hooks onto the system it receives a REVARP response from. That is, it expects it to be a YP server, with rpc.pcnfsd installed and a lot more. As an experiment, try to switch off all rarpd's on all machines except the YP master server (which hopefully has rpc.pcnfsd installed), then boot your PC a few times. The problem should disappear by then. - To fix the problem, enter the PC's ethernet address only on the machines which run on the same YP domain as the PC. Also, install rpc.pcnfsd on all those machines. We have rarpd running only on our fileservers, and all fileservers have pcnfsd installed. When a new fileserver comes in (which happens frequently in the last months :-), the PC users are the first to discover the new machines because they start getting the messages described above. Switching off rarpd until pcnfsd is installed fixes that. > [it] seems clear that YP is in fact succeeding in using the domain name > we specify. Usually, a race condition starts between the fileservers. If a server with pcnfsd wins, all is OK, if not, error. This was OK until SUN4 servers came in, which always won because they were much faster than SUN3's. > The ethernet card we use is the WD8003E. Has anybody heard of this card's > having problems when used with a relatively high-speed CPU? We use them in 30 AT clones, and they work fine for us. > (before we put the /i3 on WD8003E.SYS, we were enormously frustrated in > trying to discover why the net refused to come up. The /i3 was the > answer for almost every PC on the net.) INT3 is used by the second serial I/O channel, if available. For AT's, we use INT5, since nobody has a second parallell printer. I believe INT5 is used for the harddisk on a XT, which explains your problems. I hope this is of some help to anybody. I would like to receive a message if it cleared your problems with PC-NFS. BTW, does anybody know if PCNFS version 3.1 is out already? I was told to expect it in june or july. Good luck, Geert Jan --8<--nip-nip--------------------------------------------------------------- Geert Jan de Groot, Email: geertj@nlgvax.pcg.philips.nl Philips Research Laboratories, ..!mcvax!nlgvax!geertj Project Centre Geldrop, Ham: PE1HZG Building XP, Room 4, Willem Alexanderlaan 7B, "MS-DOS is just a bootstrap" - me 5664 AN Geldrop, The Netherlands. phone: +31 40 892204 [Standard disclaimers apply]
angelini@irisa.irisa.fr (Pierre Antoine Angelini) (06/26/89)
In article <260@nlgvax.UUCP>, geertj@nlgvax.UUCP (Geert Jan de Groot) writes: > In article <8906121909.aa13452@ICS.UCI.EDU> milne@ICS.UCI.EDU (Alastair Milne) writes: > > On PC's with the i286 or i386, NET START RDR usually winds up reporting: > > > > Cannot send broadcast packet: Unknown error > > NFS028W : Unable to find a YP server for domain uci-ics. > > net: Unable to get hostname by ip addr (128.195.1.53) > > > > (the ip addr reported is always correct for the host reporting it) > > We, at IRISA, had to face the same problem (on an XT) on our network. For there is only two PC on that network (mainly composed of Sun stations), I used a local /nfs/hosts file to solve the problem. Anyway , I'am also waiting for the 3.1 release of PCNFS which is supposed to fix that bug. Concerning the release date, I heard from a SUN representative in France that they were late and expected to deliver it in France by late August, beginning of September . There has been the same problem between version 2.0 and 3.0.
lyle@sjuvax.UUCP (Wayne J. Lyle) (06/26/89)
In article <260@nlgvax.UUCP> geertj@nlgvax.UUCP (Geert Jan de Groot) writes: >>>In article <8906121909.aa13452@ICS.UCI.EDU> milne@ICS.UCI.EDU (Alastair Milne) writes: >>>> On PC's with the i286 or i386, NET START RDR usually winds up reporting: >>>> >>>> Cannot send broadcast packet: Unknown error >>>> NFS028W : Unable to find a YP server for domain uci-ics. >>>> net: Unable to get hostname by ip addr (128.195.1.53) >>>> We had this problem, but it is fixed in version 3.01 which I just got on friday. It cleans up alot of the problems with 3.0 including the redirector problem. -- ===================================================================== Wayne J. Lyle St. Joseph's University Academic Computing Philadelphia, Pa 19131 lyle@sjuvax.UUCP, lyle@sju.edu.CSNET