I'm slowly piecing together a vintage homelab. Right now I have a 486 dual booting MS-DOS and OS/2 Warp 3, and a PIII running OS/2 Warp 4.

Any recommendations on good ways to get these two talking to each other, while expanding it to others in the future? Netware? Samba? Whatever IBM calls all those weird things OS/2 comes with?

I'm aware of RetroNAS and intend to look at it - although the only dedicated server I have to throw it on is FreeBSD and it looks like it's built around Debian packages for ease of installation.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: 2o fOr beeRS bbS>>20ForBeers.com:1337 (21:2/150)

I'm slowly piecing together a vintage homelab. Right now I have a 486 dual booting MS-DOS and OS/2 Warp 3, and a PIII running OS/2 Warp 4.

Any recommendations on good ways to get these two talking to each other, while expanding it to others in the future? Netware? Samba? Whatever IBM calls all those weird things OS/2 comes with?

Hmmm you want peer networking or a centralised server? Theoretically even MS-SOD ought to have SMB available. But the simplest is probably NFS. I
don't have any experience with OS/Who thoug but SMB still seems the most likely to me.

Spec


*** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
--- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
* Origin: A camel is a horse designed by a committee. (21:3/101)

Hello deepthaw!

21 Nov 23 11:46, you wrote to all:

Any recommendations on good ways to get these two talking to each
other, while expanding it to others in the future? Netware? Samba? Whatever IBM calls all those weird things OS/2 comes with?

I remember back when I used OS/2 that it had a great TCP stack. I shared files just by setting up a local FTP server in one machine and accesing it from the other :)
But I know you can setup netbios and connect to windows networks.

I'm aware of RetroNAS and intend to look at it - although the only dedicated server I have to throw it on is FreeBSD and it looks like
it's built around Debian packages for ease of installation.

NO idea about the above :)

Regards
Orphan


--- GoldED+/W64-MSVC 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Digital Asylum BBS - bbs.digitalasylum.com.ar:2323 (21:2/119)

Hello Orphan,

25 Nov 23 10:54, you wrote to deepthaw:

Hello deepthaw!

21 Nov 23 11:46, you wrote to all:

Any recommendations on good ways to get these two talking to each
other, while expanding it to others in the future? Netware?
Samba? Whatever IBM calls all those weird things OS/2 comes with?

I remember back when I used OS/2 that it had a great TCP stack. I
shared files just by setting up a local FTP server in one machine and accesing it from the other :) But I know you can setup netbios and
connect to windows networks.

yeah i'm using ftp and as it works well i was lazy to configure nfs or samba :)

Regards,
--
dp

telnet://bbs.roonsbbs.hu:1212 <<=-

... Uptime: 5d 13h 21m 11s
--- GoldED/2 1.1.4.7+EMX
* Origin: Roon's BBS - Budapest, HUNGARY (21:4/148)

Hello Roon!

26 Nov 23 00:48, you wrote to me:

yeah i'm using ftp and as it works well i was lazy to configure nfs or samba :)

Regards,
--
dp

Yeah if you don't have to share too much using FTP is probably the easiest. Installing protocols for networking using the IBM TCP stack (don't remember exactly its name on OS/2) is a pain in the ass.

Regards
Orphan


--- GoldED+/W64-MSVC 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Digital Asylum BBS - bbs.digitalasylum.com.ar:2323 (21:2/119)

deepthaw wrote to All <=-

I'm slowly piecing together a vintage homelab. Right now I have a 486
dual booting MS-DOS and OS/2 Warp 3, and a PIII running OS/2 Warp 4.

Any recommendations on good ways to get these two talking to each
other, while expanding it to others in the future? Netware? Samba? Whatever IBM calls all those weird things OS/2 comes with?

MS Lan Manager was the only "real" way to get OS/2 and DOS talking.
Pain in the butt. If you want to go real retro, setting up a Netware
3.11 server would definitely have all of the protocols, at a horrendous
cost of complication.

If memory serves, there was some way to connect DOS via Samba, but it's
been years since I'd even thought about that.

When I ran the two, I used Lantastic and created a DOS VDM in OS/2 to
talk to the DOS network using the DOS Lantastic stack and it worked
amazingly well. Any DOS peer-to-peer network should work similarly -
personal netware, maybe?


... Do you have access to your previous configuration?
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
* Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)

Hello poindexter!

26 Nov 23 21:22, you wrote to deepthaw:

When I ran the two, I used Lantastic and created a DOS VDM in OS/2 to
talk to the DOS network using the DOS Lantastic stack and it worked
amazingly well. Any DOS peer-to-peer network should work similarly -
personal netware, maybe?

I remember I used Lantastic for a while and it worked amazingly well.. in DOS.

Regards,
Orphan


--- GoldED+/W64-MSVC 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Digital Asylum BBS - bbs.digitalasylum.com.ar:2323 (21:2/119)

If memory serves, there was some way to connect DOS via Samba, but it's been years since I'd even thought about that.

I was under the impression the LanMan was the SMB client for DOS? No real
idea what else it did.

amazingly well. Any DOS peer-to-peer network should work similarly - personal netware, maybe?

Is Personal Netware, Netware Lite by another name? Or something else..
nwlite was the first network I had..

Spec


*** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
--- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
* Origin: A camel is a horse designed by a committee. (21:3/101)

Orphan wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

I remember I used Lantastic for a while and it worked amazingly well..
in DOS.

Yeah, being able to do screen redirection, drive redirection, shared
drives and shared printers in DOS was pretty cool. If memory serves, the dedicated LANTastic cards only did 5 mbps, which was sufficient back
then. It let me run the BBS headless and run a console in a DOS window
is OS/2, which I thought was Pretty Damn Cool.



... Remember, the enemy's gate is "down"...
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
* Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)

Hello poindexter!

28 Nov 23 06:25, you wrote to me:

Yeah, being able to do screen redirection, drive redirection, shared drives and shared printers in DOS was pretty cool. If memory serves,
the dedicated LANTastic cards only did 5 mbps, which was sufficient
back then. It let me run the BBS headless and run a console in a DOS window is OS/2, which I thought was Pretty Damn Cool.

Yes I actually enjoyed it a lot. I don't remember the speed (specifications) but I do remember that it was plenty enough for what I did. For BBS in OS/2 its amazing.

Regards,
Orphan


--- GoldED+/W64-MSVC 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Digital Asylum BBS - bbs.digitalasylum.com.ar:2323 (21:2/119)

Yeah, being able to do screen redirection, drive redirection, shared drives and shared printers in DOS was pretty cool. If memory serves, the dedicated LANTastic cards only did 5 mbps, which was sufficient back
then. It let me run the BBS headless and run a console in a DOS window
is OS/2, which I thought was Pretty Damn Cool.

Inneresting... I was given a copy of NWlite with the first 3c503 cards I received. At the time I was able to just bung them in, run the install
software off its floppy and it all worked like a dream. At least remote
drives and print sharing did. Had to use Artisoft's "The Network Eye" for screen redirection.

A few people tried to sling me a copy of LanTastic further down the track. I don't know if these were dud copies, or what, but they steadfastly refused to install at any time. It always appeared to be missing drivers... but being
pre internet if it didn't work out of the box, then it was pretty tricky
trying to get anything else required. And I don't think I ever saw what a complete driver load for an installed system looked like.

Out of interest, what kind of card only did 5mbps? Never saw anything like that.

Spec


*** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
--- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
* Origin: A camel is a horse designed by a committee. (21:3/101)

Orphan wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

Yes I actually enjoyed it a lot. I don't remember the speed (specifications) but I do remember that it was plenty enough for what I did. For BBS in OS/2 its amazing.

The cards were some sort of proprietary protocol that ran over coax with terminators, like ethernet. Where Ethernet was 10mbps, LANtastic was
something like 2 mbps, which was sufficient for DOS networking, printer
sharing and so on.

Fast forward 30 years and I've got gigabit networking in my house...



... What else have you hidden from me?
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
* Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)

Spectre wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

Out of interest, what kind of card only did 5mbps? Never saw anything
like that.

They were proprietary, not Ethernet. I'm pretty sure ARCnet was 5 mbps,
which ended up performing as well if not better than Ethernet since it
didn't have issues with collisions. ARCnet was a token-passing algorithm
like Token Ring.



... How did you find this place?
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
* Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)

They were proprietary, not Ethernet. I'm pretty sure ARCnet was 5 mbps, which ended up performing as well if not better than Ethernet since it didn't have issues with collisions. ARCnet was a token-passing algorithm like Token Ring.

Hehe, horses for courses... Ethernet without significant load ought to be faster than Token Ring. Of course as soon as you load it up, and CD and resolution were a bit more ordinary.. Only ever saw the odd ARCnet card.. and by the TokenRing cards were popping up, thin ethernet was already in use.. There's also meant to be an 8Mbp TokenRing too If'n I recall right..

I can only guess it must've been a pretty early version of LanTastic, I've
only got memories of the oddbod using it was NE1/2000's

Spec


*** THE READER V4.50 [freeware]
--- SuperBBS v1.17-3 (Eval)
* Origin: A camel is a horse designed by a committee. (21:3/101)

Hello poindexter!

01 Dec 23 08:03, you wrote to me:

The cards were some sort of proprietary protocol that ran over coax
with terminators, like ethernet. Where Ethernet was 10mbps, LANtastic
was something like 2 mbps, which was sufficient for DOS networking, printer sharing and so on.

Yes I remember that. I did not have numbers in my head of how fast it was, but comparing to nowadays its amazing how things have changed.

Fast forward 30 years and I've got gigabit networking in my house...

Yeah me too.. which is amazing

Regards
Orphan


--- GoldED+/W64-MSVC 1.1.5-b20180707
* Origin: Digital Asylum BBS - bbs.digitalasylum.com.ar:2323 (21:2/119)

On 01 Dec 2023 at 08:05a, poindexter FORTRAN pondered and said...

They were proprietary, not Ethernet. I'm pretty sure ARCnet was 5 mbps, which ended up performing as well if not better than Ethernet since it didn't have issues with collisions. ARCnet was a token-passing algorithm like Token Ring.

I believe ARCnet was 2.5 Mbps, but it was token-based and I will
absolutely buy that it beat early Ethernet.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: Agency BBS | Dunedin, New Zealand | agency.bbs.nz (21:1/101)

On 05 Dec 2023 at 06:20a, Spectre pondered and said...

They were proprietary, not Ethernet. I'm pretty sure ARCnet was 5 mbp which ended up performing as well if not better than Ethernet since i didn't have issues with collisions. ARCnet was a token-passing algori like Token Ring.

Hehe, horses for courses... Ethernet without significant load ought to be faster than Token Ring. Of course as soon as you load it up, and CD and resolution were a bit more ordinary.. Only ever saw the odd ARCnet
card.. and by the TokenRing cards were popping up, thin ethernet was already in use.. There's also meant to be an 8Mbp TokenRing too If'n I recall right..

Depends on the TokenRing. TR was at 16 Mbps when Ethernet
was still capped at 10 Mbps, and of course, it would scale
better as the number of stations on the network increased.
(Linear versus quadratic.) By the time of Fast (100 Mbps)
switched Ethernet, though, TokenRing was obsolete. But aside
from the frame format, ethernet today bears little resemblance
to the original Ethernet developed at PARC (which was actually
3 Mbps....).

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: Agency BBS | Dunedin, New Zealand | agency.bbs.nz (21:1/101)

Spectre wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

Hehe, horses for courses... Ethernet without significant load ought to
be faster than Token Ring. Of course as soon as you load it up, and CD
and resolution were a bit more ordinary..

A different world... at one company we had 20-30 users on shared
ethernet hubs, then used a 5 port switch as a collapsed backbone - that
way you could share files/printers in your group and not be affected by
traffic elsewhere.

We had to do a lot of balancing to make it work, but it was worlds
better than the coax ethernet it replaced.

Only ever saw the odd ARCnet
card.. and by the TokenRing cards were popping up, thin ethernet was already in use.. There's also meant to be an 8Mbp TokenRing too If'n I recall right..

Any time you needed a small workgroup back in the early '90s, people
recommended ARCnet - maybe because it was robust and (mostly)
trouble-free. You'd need to set a card ID on jumpers, so it needed some
documentation to prevent duplicate IDs when you added more systems, but
you could set up a star topology with a passive hub over coax easily.


... Abandon normal instruments
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
* Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)

tenser wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

I believe ARCnet was 2.5 Mbps, but it was token-based and I will absolutely buy that it beat early Ethernet.

Back then, the clod who managed our company's networks put all of the IT desktops into the same segment as the servers. We'd get horrible
performance during the day, then make the servers unavailable when we
played Quake after hours.

I don't use the term "clod" lightly. He insisted on Cat 5 jacks and
premise cabling, then terminated them on 66 blocks and cross-connected
every jack using 2 pair cross-connect cable to a set up 66 blocks that connected via AMP cable to the switch. The 66 blocks were only CAT3, the cross-connect cables were *lucky* if they supported CAT3.



... Adding on
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
* Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)

On 05 Dec 2023 at 06:28a, poindexter FORTRAN pondered and said...

tenser wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

I believe ARCnet was 2.5 Mbps, but it was token-based and I will absolutely buy that it beat early Ethernet.

Back then, the clod who managed our company's networks put all of the IT desktops into the same segment as the servers. We'd get horrible performance during the day, then make the servers unavailable when we played Quake after hours.

I don't use the term "clod" lightly. He insisted on Cat 5 jacks and premise cabling, then terminated them on 66 blocks and cross-connected every jack using 2 pair cross-connect cable to a set up 66 blocks that connected via AMP cable to the switch. The 66 blocks were only CAT3, the cross-connect cables were *lucky* if they supported CAT3.

LOL. "Unclear on the concept" right there.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
* Origin: Agency BBS | Dunedin, New Zealand | agency.bbs.nz (21:1/101)

On 05 Dec 23 13:08:24 tenser wrote...

On 01 Dec 2023 at 08:05a, poindexter FORTRAN pondered and said...

They were proprietary, not Ethernet. I'm pretty sure ARCnet was
5 mbps, which ended up performing as well if not better than
Ethernet since it didn't have issues with collisions. ARCnet was
a token-passing algorithm like Token Ring.

I believe ARCnet was 2.5 Mbps, but it was token-based and I will
absolutely buy that it beat early Ethernet.

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64) * Origin: Agency BBS | Dunedin,
New Zealand | agency.bbs.nz (21:1/101)

To which Bf2K+ replies...

The first two Netware networks that I ever set up wer on ARCnet systems.
They worked very well but I don't remember ethernet being available at
that time... of course these days I don't remember much of anything :)


--- RATSoft/FIDO v09.14.95 [JetMail 1.01]
* Origin: STar Fleet HQ - Real Atari! bbs.sfhqbbs.org:5983 (21:3/171.0)

I don't use the term "clod" lightly. He insisted on Cat 5 jacks and
premise cabling, then terminated them on 66 blocks and cross-connected every jack using 2 pair cross-connect cable to a set up 66 blocks that connected via AMP cable to the switch. The 66 blocks were only CAT3, th cross-connect cables were *lucky* if they supported CAT3.

My only comment - what the hell was with this "clod"? Running CAT5 but cross-connecting to 66-blocks? I know for sure there were CAT5 patch
panels back in the day. SMH! I am sorry that you had to endure that.
Thank goodness for today and the knowledge we have. I hope nobody in
their right mind would do that again.
--Matt

--- RATSoft/FIDO v09.14.95 [JetMail 1.01]
* Origin: STar Fleet HQ - Real Atari! bbs.sfhqbbs.org:5983 (21:3/171.0)

To which Bf2K+ replies...

The first two Netware networks that I ever set up wer on ARCnet systems They worked very well but I don't remember ethernet being available at
that time... of course these days I don't remember much of anything :)

Say it ain't so BF2K+!! You, forgetting things? LOL!
I am right there with you. I think CRS is catching up to me as well.
--Matt

--- RATSoft/FIDO v09.14.95 [JetMail 1.01]
* Origin: STar Fleet HQ - Real Atari! bbs.sfhqbbs.org:5983 (21:3/171.0)

On 08 Dec 23 07:31:00 Mhansel739 wrote...

To which Bf2K+ replies...

The first two Netware networks that I ever set up wer on ARCnet sys They worked very well but I don't remember ethernet being available that time... of course these days I don't remember much of anything

Say it ain't so BF2K+!! You, forgetting things? LOL!
I am right there with you. I think CRS is catching up to me as well. --Matt

To which Bf2K+ replies...

Yep... there seems to be no avoiding it.

--- RATSoft/FIDO v09.14.95 [JetMail 1.01]
* Origin: STar Fleet HQ - Real Atari! bbs.sfhqbbs.org:5983 (21:3/171.0)

Say it ain't so BF2K+!! You, forgetting things? LOL! I am right there
with you. I think CRS is catching up to me as well. --Matt

I can remember what I did today... but I won't remember it tomorrow.
:)


--- D'Bridge 4
* Origin: (21:1/148)

Wait, I did something yesterday? I barely remember making my coffee this morning. And you know what, I think I am ok with that. But I can't
remember.
There are some aspects of getting older that I think I am alright
embracing. Loss of memory is NOT one of them. Moving a little slower - I
can work with that, as long as I am still moving.
--Matt

--- RATSoft/FIDO v09.14.95 [JetMail 1.01]
* Origin: STar Fleet HQ - Real Atari! bbs.sfhqbbs.org:5983 (21:3/171.0)

Mhansel739 wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

My only comment - what the hell was with this "clod"? Running CAT5 but cross-connecting to 66-blocks? I know for sure there were CAT5 patch panels back in the day. SMH! I am sorry that you had to endure that.
Thank goodness for today and the knowledge we have. I hope nobody in
their right mind would do that again.
--Matt

Yeah, this was way back when, and he did things the only way he knew, apparently.

I took over cabling for the newer buildings and I did it all with Krone
parts, which made for a nice unified station field - 4 drop, they could
be all ethernet, all voice or some mix of the two. Apparently, Krone had
lower losses and could be repunched more than 110 could at the time. I
needed to buy new blades for my punch tool, but I loved the connectors.

They kind of came and went in the early '90s, unfortunately. Don't see
them now.



... Do the words need changing?
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
* Origin: realitycheckBBS.org -- information is power. (21:4/122)