mcc@wlv.imsd.contel.com (Merton Campbell Crockett) (04/08/91)
Again, I'm at the electronic water fountain looking for information to help clarify my thoughts. This time the subject is Novell NetWare. We have a small Novell NetWare LAN for our offices used by system engineers to prepare drawings and parts lists for systems and by pricing personnel to derive system costs. Originally it was based on AST Premium 286 workstat- ions running MS-DOS 3.3 with 3COM 3C503 Ethernet cards (IRQ 5) using thin wire ethernet. Because AutoCAD was heavily used, it was impossible to have NetWare software installed simultaneously. Additional printers were acquired for each of the workstations that ran AutoCAD. Effectively, the LAN became nothing more than an expensive "sneakernet". Workstations that weren't used for AutoCAD used the LAN to, primarily, share printer resources. The LAN was upgraded two weeks ago. The server and the system engineering systems were upgraded to AST Premium 486/25 workstations with 4 Mbytes of memory running MS-DOS 4.01 with Tiara Ethernet cards (IRQ 2). The Novell NetWare 386 version 3.10 was installed on the systems by the vendor perform- ing the upgrade. The system engineer who had been, more or less, maintaining the LAN left the week our new workstations were installed. The network was basically opera- tional at the time of his departure except we were unable to enter any com- mands on the server's console--always returned ??? and an error message of command not found or something similar. On Friday, the server failed. I happened to be in the cubicle where it was installed to get a document that I had printed and noticed that it was going through its boot sequence. The AUTOEXEC.BAT file had not been configured to run SERVER automatically, so I entered SERVER and was greeted by an error stating that volume SYS failed to mount because of a FAT mismatch. It took a while to locate the NetWare documentation set--the key manuals had been placed in the box with the manuals destined for an East Coast office. The manual suggests that VREPAIR be run to correct the problem. Unfortunately, VREPAIR if it is present on the server is probably on the SYS volume which is not accessible from MS-DOS and the NetWare distribution disks--original or backup--can't be found. Is there any way of starting SERVER to force it to mount either the primary or mirror SYS volume so we can find out what the damage is and recover from this error? The second part of my inquiry involves upgrading to version 3.11 of NetWare- -our upgrade kit arrived last week. This seems to be a good time for the upgrade considering that our LAN is currently unusable. Could we use the upgrade procedure to recover the files on our server? Version 3.11 also seems to provide a TCP/IP which was not present in earlier versions. Those of us that needed Internet and DDN access had been using MS-Kermit or other communications programs to access Unix and VMS systems through our COM ports to provide this accesss. Reading the new documenta- tion suggests that one of our systems could be defined as a router and pro- vide direct access to our in-house ethernet backbone. Is there an SMTP product available that can use Novell's new NetWare prod- uct? I didn't find any mention of SMTP in the documentation. As our IP address space is limited, it would be desirable to have an IP address as- signed only to the router and then have it act as a mail exchanger between SMTP and whatever mail services that are provided by Novell. There also appears to be a capability to encapsulate IPX frames in TCP/IP packets. Has anyone used this capability to tunnel through a TCP/IP net- work? It would seem to be an ideal solution for integrating our East Coast office into our local LAN. It would allow us to use two 56 Kb X.25 circuits that currently exist between the East and West coasts with Internet and DDN connections as backup instead of telephone circuits which were originally planned to be used. (The X.25 circuits are connected directly to corporate LANs on the East and West coasts and support TCP/IP and DECnet communication links.) A secondary reason for these questions is that I have been asked by another engineering group to take a look at a system they are upgrading for a DoD customer which includes an existing LAN supported by Novell's NetWare and LAN WorkPlace for DOS. Thanks for any information that you can provide. Merton Campbell Crockett
martino@logitek.co.uk (Martin O'Nions) (04/08/91)
mcc@wlv.imsd.contel.com (Merton Campbell Crockett) writes: >The AUTOEXEC.BAT file had not been configured to run SERVER automatically, >so I entered SERVER and was greeted by an error stating that volume SYS >failed to mount because of a FAT mismatch. It took a while to locate the >NetWare documentation set--the key manuals had been placed in the box with >the manuals destined for an East Coast office. The manual suggests that >VREPAIR be run to correct the problem. Unfortunately, VREPAIR if it is >present on the server is probably on the SYS volume which is not accessible >from MS-DOS and the NetWare distribution disks--original or backup--can't be >found. >Is there any way of starting SERVER to force it to mount either the primary >or mirror SYS volume so we can find out what the damage is and recover from >this error? If you boot DOS from the hard drive, try LOAD C:VREPAIR - I always put the key utilities on the DOS boot device, and know a few people who do the same. If VREPAIR is not available on your boot disk, run server, insert the disk SYSTEM-1, and type LOAD A:VREPAIR (also applicable for floppy-boot systems). This should cure it (famous last words). When you refer to the mirror SYS volume, is it a mirrored disk configuration, or are you referring to the mirroring of key info. on the drive? If the former, it should automatically remirror, but if not, try booting from floppy, and mirroring drive 0 to drive 1 (if the primary has the problem). If the latter, thats what vrepair uses anyway. Hope it helps (mail me if you need more info) Martin -- DISCLAIMER: All My Own Work (Unless stated otherwise) -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Martin O'Nions Logitek Group Support martino@logitek.co.uk -------------------------------------------------------------------------- O'er the rugged mountain's brow / Clara threw the twins she nursed And remarked, "I wonder now / Which will reach the bottom first?" (Harry Graham - Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes)
keith@ca.excelan.com (Keith Brown) (04/11/91)
The News Manager) Nntp-Posting-Host: ca Reply-To: keith@ca.excelan.com (Keith Brown) Organization: Novell, Inc. San Jose, California References: <1991Apr7.185014.25384@wlbr.imsd.contel.com> Date: Mon, 8 Apr 1991 20:49:45 GMT In article <1991Apr7.185014.25384@wlbr.imsd.contel.com> mcc@wlv.imsd.contel.com (Merton Campbell Crockett) writes: >The AUTOEXEC.BAT file had not been configured to run SERVER automatically, >so I entered SERVER and was greeted by an error stating that volume SYS >failed to mount because of a FAT mismatch. >The manual suggests that >VREPAIR be run to correct the problem. Unfortunately, VREPAIR if it is >present on the server is probably on the SYS volume which is not accessible >from MS-DOS and the NetWare distribution disks--original or backup--can't be >found. VREPAIR.NLM should always, always, always be kept out on a NetWare v3.X servers DOS partition. Everybody.... go look now. If it isn't there, put it there! If done properly, the first stage of the OS install should have been to copy the contents of the SYSTEM-{1,2,3} diskettes from the NetWare 3.X distribution onto the servers DOS partition. Alas, these diskettes do contain many files that you probably will never use (such as LAN drivers for boards that you don't have) and some installers are a little over zealous with the DEL command when trying to purge these unnecessary files. If you don't have a VREPAIR.NLM sitting out on your servers DOS partition my guess would be that your installer stripped the startup files down to the bone (SERVER.EXE, STARTUP.NCF and ISADISK.DSK). Note that with the advent of NetWare v3.11, VREPAIR may require the supporting name space repair modules such as V_NFS.NLM and V_MAC.NLM which should also live out on the DOS partition. Be aware that in order for the server to be able to load modules that are out on the DOS partition you must *not* have removed DOS from the lower 640K of memory in the server (with either the "remove DOS" or "secure console" server commands). Currently, the NetWare OS uses DOS to access DOS file systems. > >The second part of my inquiry involves upgrading to version 3.11 of NetWare- >-our upgrade kit arrived last week. This seems to be a good time for the >upgrade considering that our LAN is currently unusable. Could we use the >upgrade procedure to recover the files on our server? Absolutely, but get your SYS: volume repaired first! If you've lost your old pre-3.11 distribution then it should be possible to: 1) Load all the files from the SYSTEM-{1,2,3} diskettes to your servers DOS partition. 2) Fire up the new SERVER.EXE with the "-ns" flag. 3) Load the ISADISK.DSK and VREPAIR.NLM modules from the DOS partition (the new ones you just copied in off of the 3.11 distribution). 4) Put VREPAIR to work on your SYS: volume following the instructions. You should run VREPAIR several times until it reports no errors on the volume. Unfortunately VREPAIR is somewhat temperamental about informing you that it has been unsuccessfull repairing a volume after a single pass. It nearly always gets the job done in the end though. Stick with it! 5) Have a crack at mounting SYS. It should work. 6) Carry on with the upgrade instructions in the 3.11 manual set. If you have your server configured with one large SYS: volume you may consider reconfiguring it somewhere down the line. As of NetWare v3.11 there are some good reasons to put users and their data on separate volume(s), keeping SYS: aside for the OS and possibly other application executables. I can discuss these somewhere more appropriate, like comp.sys.novell, if there is enough interest. >Version 3.11 also seems to provide a TCP/IP which was not present in earlier >versions. >Reading the new documenta- >tion suggests that one of our systems could be defined as a router and pro- >vide direct access to our in-house ethernet backbone. That's what its for. Currently the IP module can route between Ethernet, Token Ring and Arcnet topologies. This routing capability has proved very complimentary to our (Novell) solution for TCP/IP client connectivity. The LAN WorkPlace for DOS, which you mention, can be installed on existing Token Ring and Arcnet NetWare LANs and the server can be used to route the IP traffic out onto an Ethernet backbone where all your "traditional" IP hosts are liable to be found. Other DOS TCPIPs may work also, provided they come in a version that supports the underlying media. >Is there an SMTP product available that can use Novell's new NetWare prod- >uct? I didn't find any mention of SMTP in the documentation. Thats because SMTP support is not in the base operating system. I can't say anymore on this subject, otherwise my corporate punishment neckband will start tightening. >There also appears to be a capability to encapsulate IPX frames in TCP/IP >packets. Has anyone used this capability to tunnel through a TCP/IP net- >work? It would seem to be an ideal solution for integrating our East Coast >office into our local LAN. Sounds like we could have built this capability into the operating system for you personally. You have exactly the setup and need that the IP tunneling capability is designed to address. Given a 3.11 server at your East and West coast offices, and an IP tunnel set up between them, the folks in either office will be able to login to each others servers, use each others printers, use each others SNA gateways and generally see all of the IPX resources on the remote LAN as though they were on the local LAN. By setting things up carefully, such that workstations get everything but real working data from the local LAN, even the performance degradation over the "slow" link may be barely perceivable to the average homosapien. For example, a workstations drive Z: should always be mapped to a local servers PUBLIC directory, applications should always be loaded from the drives of local servers, applications should be configured to keep their temporary files and housekeeping information on local servers etc, etc.... Keith - Keith Brown Phone: (408) 473 8308 Novell San Jose Development Centre Fax: (408) 433 0775 2180 Fortune Dr, San Jose, California 95131 Net: keith@novell.COM
jkt@seneca.Sed.Novell.COM. (Jack Thomasson) (04/12/91)
>>>>> On Mon, 8 Apr 1991 20:49:45 GMT, keith@ca.excelan.com (Keith Brown) said:
Keith> Thats because SMTP support is not in the base operating system.
Keith> I can't say anymore on this subject, otherwise my corporate
Keith> punishment neckband will start tightening.
we can't say anything... but if you read the 1 apr 91 edition of
PC WEEK, somewhere around page 12, first article on the page:
"Novell Polishing NLMs for E-Mail Integration on NetWare", you may get
an idea of what we can't talk about.
--
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Jack Thomasson :{)} jkt@Sed.Novell.COM
Novell, Inc. / MS C-25-1 / 122 East 1700 South / Provo, UT 84606
Phone: (801)429-7604 FAX: (801)429-5511
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