tgoodman@bbn.com (Todd Goodman) (01/09/90)
Hi everyone, I'm hoping that a lot of you have ideas or pointers for what I'm trying to set up. What I'm trying to do is set up a network comprised of a 386 machine running ESIX/V 3.2 Rev. C running mainly as a database server and five 286 machines running DOS which will access the database on the 386 and display records from the DB. I decided to go with a Unix O/S on the 386 because it will need to be doing a couple of other things besides being just a file server. These other applications running on the 386 that will not be very processor or disk intensive compared to the DB server processes. The 286 machines running DOS is mainly a cost consideration. If this setup won't work then I'll have to devise something else. My questions are: 1. I was thinking of setting up the 286 machines as diskless workstations and booting across the ethernet. I have heard that 3COM (I think) makes an ethernet controller that will allow this. Is it possible to use ESIX NFS and PC-NFS in this manner to boot MS-DOS clients? Can anyone suggest a good NFS implementation for the 286 machines? 2. Given that the clients are up and running with mounted partitions from the server, I was planning to use a DB server on the 386 to grab requested records from the DB and put them in files for the clients to scarf off the mounted partitions. Is this a really gross idea? Would I be better of canning the NFS and just using TCP to get the records? 3. Does anyone know what kind of a hardware configuration I'd need for the 386 to run as an NFS server for five clients? Ten clients? I'm thinking of a 33Mhz 386 with cache (if it'll work with the ethernet board), an ESDI disk (or two), 8M of 32 bit memory, and 16-bit VGA display. Is this hopelessly underpowered? Should that be 16M of memory? Am I way out in left field on this one? 4. Would I be better off getting an MS-DOS X server and just running the 286 machines on the 386 where they could do the DB accesses themselves? All the X servers I've seen are pretty slow, which would be unacceptable for this application. Are there good X servers for MS-DOS that people would recommend? 5. If I go with the 286 machines running X servers then what would my recommended 386 config be? Different from that proposed in number three above? How about the 286 hardware configurations? 6. Can anyone recommend a good DB for an ESIX system? I'm kind of partial to INGRES at this point, but certainly am open to suggestions. I haven't looked into INGRES for ESIX yet so that may not even be an option. The DB will need to be able to handle binary data. I realize that that many answers depend on the answers to the other questions, but I'm just trying to get an idea right now from people who have used a similar setup or who have some insight into possible problems. I'd very much appreciate even negative input (e.g., "You'll never get that kind of setup to work."). As usual, I'll post a summary of any responses I receive. Please tell me if you DO NOT want your name or email address in the summary. Thank you very much, Todd Goodman (617) 873-3866 (8:30am - 6:00pm EST) (617) 489-5502 (All other times) +=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+ | Todd Goodman, BBN Communications, Inc. tgoodman@bbn.com | | Disclaimer: I never speak for anyone but myself. uunet!bbn!tgoodman | +=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= "Right theory, wrong universe." =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=+