C.Chaundy@its.unimelb.edu.au (05/06/91)
We are having difficulty in booting diskless Novell clients across a cisco AGS+ router (running 8.2-3 code). The clients are all on one Ethernet interface and the Novell server is on another. This is the problem analysis as it was reported to me: Novell keeps track of all the Ethernet addresses of its workstations by giving them a connection number when they first connect to the server and then it remembers this number until you shutdown the server. The problem with the cisco showed up when we were using remote boot eproms in our ethernet cards (Micom NI5210's). Novell would begin to boot the machine (by downloading a psuedo-boot-disk), but when it came to loading the true network driver, the machine would hang. What was happening was that the Server was giving the machine a new Connection number at this time and then the psuedo-boot-disk would lose track of where the machine was. This was also causing the server to lock the psuedo-boot-disk file while the "lost" connection was still trying to "read" it thus not allowing it to be modified in any way. Is this analysis correct and how can the situation be rectified? Thanks in advance, Chris Chaundy Technical Manager, Networks, Information Technology Services, The University of Melbourne Internet: C.Chaundy@its.unimelb.EDU.AU (DTE 505233430003) Phone: +61 3 344 7045 Cables Unimelb Fax: +61 3 347 4803 Telex AA35185 Post: Parkville, Victoria 3052 Australia
ralls@cisco.com (05/08/91)
Hi Chris, From your message, this sounds like a purely Novell problem, so I'm not sure how much help I can be. ( This is not the case please let me know.) There are some novell problems caused by the clients net number becomming corrupted. With a bad source address in the packet, the server can no longer contact the client. We have coded a work-around to this novell problem in the next release of cisco software (8.2(4)). You might consider upgrading to this version if that turns out to be a problem for you. Sorry not to be more helpful, -vicki