IPX

Summary: Contributed by Jeremy T. Finke

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This document deals with getting Mandrake 6.x working with Netware Tree and Bindery services. The version numbers were current at the writing of this document. Note that since everybody's environment is different some things may or may not apply to your situation. The author of this document does not take responsibility for any damages that may happen to your system while following these instructions.

Here is what software you will need to download:

From ftp.calderasystems.com

• /pub/netware/RPMS/nwclient-4.1.6-4_i386.rpm
• /pub/netware/rh51/SYSV-rh51-nwclient.tar.gz
• /pub/opensource/nkfs/nkfs-4.2.1.tgz

ipxutils-2.2.0.12-8mdk.rpm

This can be found in the 6.0 directories (not 6.1, we are actually downgrading).

The first thing that you need to do, is get IPX working on the NIC interface that you want to use to communicate to the Novell servers. This can be complicated depending on what topology that you are running on your network. I am running Token Ring (not by choice ;), so it was somewhat difficult. You need to go into 'linuxconf -> networking -> ipx interface'.

You can try the auto-configure if you want. I did not have good luck with it. To configure it manually you need to select 'Enable IPX networking'. Then you need to select the tab that represents the NIC that you are using.
Here is where you need to ask your ~NetWare administrator for some information. You need to know what your frame type is and what your network number.
Put this information in the dialog box. My information was 802.2 and 98765. 'Select:' is the primary interface. I also had to put my network number as the Internal Network Number. This does not make sense and I get an error every time I reboot, but it was the only way that I could get everything working. At this point save and activate your changes with 'linuxconf'. I would suggest that you reboot at this point, just to make sure that the changes took place.

Now you are ready to install the client software. GNU/Linux comes with some Netware client software but we are not going to use that. We are installing Caldera's client. I uninstalled the ncpfs package. This is because one of its files ('/usr/bin/nwpasswd') conflicts with Caldera's client. You can just rename this file if you want. Note, that if you uninstall ncpfs 'printtool' will complain to you that you do not have it installed every time that you run 'printtool'.

If you are running Mandrake 6.1 you need to uninstall 'ipxutils-2.2.0.16a-2mdk.i586.rpm'. Then you need to install 'ipxutils-2.2.0.12-8mdk.rpm'. This is the version that comes with Mandrake 6.0. For some reason before I did this, I could attach to the tree, but I could not see any drives. Once I downgraded to this version everything started working properly. I think that is a bug with the new rpm.

Now we need to install the client itself. All you need to do is install the 'nwclient-4.1.6-4_i386.rpm' via your favorite rpm manager ('kpackage' for me). Note, if you have not renamed or removed '/usr/bin/nwpasswd' you will get conflicts.

Now we need to install nkfs. This allows your Linux box to interpret Novell file systems. Just unzip and untar the 'nkfs-4.2.1.tgz' to your favorite place. Enter the nkfs-4.2.1 directory. Now type

make

make install

Next we need to install the scripts that work with a SYS V GNU/Linux system. What you need to do is unzip the 'SYSV-rh51-nwclient.tar.gz' file to you favorite location. Then you need to go to the root of your file system and untar that file. For example:

cd /<br> tar xvf /src/SYSV-rh51-nwclient.tar

At this point you either need to reboot or manually start the service up. You can start this up by running this command:

/etc/rc.d/init.d/nwclient start

You need to use the nwlogin command to login to your network. If you type

nwlogin -h

nwlogin -t tree -u me

section index

Related Resources:

IPX HOWTO

Revision / Modified: Dec. 12, 1999
Author: Jeremy T. Finke

Legal: This page is covered by the GNU Free Documentation License. Standard disclaimers of warranty apply. Copyright LSTB and Mandrakesoft.