Installing NetWare Requester for OS/2 v1.3 on IBM OS/2 v1.3
Here I'm installing version 1.3 of the NetWare Requester for OS/2 on IBM OS/2 v1.3.
This same client also works on IBM OS/2 1.2 and should also work on the Microsoft versions of 1.2 and 1.3. I don't have access to any of these versions of OS/2 to try though. I didn't even have access to this version of OS/2 until it arrived on my doorstep a few hours ago. So this is pretty much my first experience with 16bit OS/2 and I don't really know what I'm doing.
Contents
Tools
Things you'll need to follow along:
- A VM (or PC) with a clean install of OS/2 v1.3 (v1.2 ought to be similar/the same)
- a NIC that is compatible with the NetWare OS/2 Requester
- A copy of the NetWare OS/2 requester on floppy disk. You can get the files from the OS/2 Netware Clients page and copy them into disk images or onto real floppy disks..
- A NetWare 3.11, 3.12 or 3.2 server.
Creating the VM and installing is out of scope for this document as nothing special is required aside from maybe patching the install disk to be compatbile with fast CPUs. I'm using IBM OS/2 Refresh Level 1.30.2 which works just fine without patching.
Note that the OS/2 Utilites that come with NetWare 4.11 (and possibly earlier 4.x releases) are not compatible with this version of OS/2 or the OS/2 client. If you don't have any NetWare 3.x servers you'll need to do some extra work. More information at the bottom of the page.
Installing
We're starting off with a fresh clean install of IBM OS/2 1.3 Standard Edition. No built in networking. No built-in everything really - doesn't even have solitare! Pretty bare-bones.
For installation, I've copied the contents of REQUESTR.V13 into a floppy disk image. Note that despite the file extension (V13) this is just regular zip archive. 7zip will open it fine. Note that the floppy disks (or disk images) must have the correct volume labels! These are:
| Archive | Volume Label |
|---|---|
| REQUESTR.V13 | REQUESTER |
| OS2UTIL1.V13 | OS2UTIL-1 |
| OS2UTIL2.V13 | OS2UTIL-2 |
| OS2UTIL3.V13 | OS2UTIL-3 |
The OS2UTIL disks are the OS/2 utilities that live on the server (in SYS:LOGIN, SYS:PUBLIC, etc). The files are all dated 1991 so they may or may not be newer than what comes with NetWare 3.11 (my copy of 3.11 seems to have a handful of OS/2 utilities dated 1992). If you're running something newer than NetWare 3.11 you can certainly ignore this stuff.
To install, insert the REQUESTER disk, open an OS/2 Window, switch to A: drive and run INSTALL:
And we get a graphical install program! I was half expecting a console app.
Its even got a logo
Click the Specify directories button.
The defaults all look fine. Click OK.
Then click the Edit CONFIG.SYS button.
And we get this!
There is no driver in here for the AMD PCNet card VirtualBox is emulating (the PC Net driver at the top of the list is actually for some IBM Card). I don't see any way of supplying your own driver here so just pick NE2000 and we'll go edit CONFIG.SYS later to replace it with a different one.
Check any other boxes you'd like.
And save the results to C:\CONFIG.SYS
Then click the Copy program files button.
Then click the Start button to start copying!
Copying files...
Files copied!
Now you can click the exit button to exit.
We'll have to reboot the machine of course.
Back at our console window. Time to deal with the network driver!
This driver seems to work with VirtualBox under OS/2 v1.3. To make things easier I've copied it into a disk image you can just mount in a VM: os2pcntnw.ima.
Switch over to C drive and CD into the netware folder. Mount the floppy disk image.
Then just run copy A:*. One file should be copied - PCNTNW.OS2:
Next run E C:\CONFIG.SYS
And we get this nice graphical text editor.
Scroll down until you get to the NetWare section and find the line DEVICE=C:\NETWARE\NE2000.SYS.
Comment it out with a REM
Then add a new line under it: DEVICE=C:\NETWARE\PCNTNW.OS2
Save the file...
Click the Type button.
And just choose Plain Text.
Exit the editor and the OS/2 window then go shutdown and reboot the system.
Network starting up just before we get to Presentation Manager.
And we're back in OS/2!
Next up there is a patch - NSD004.EXE - available from the OS/2 clients page. Its a self-extracting executable which you should be able to extract using 7zip. Copy the contents onto a floppy disk/into a disk image. The volume label for the disk image/floppy disk must be NSD004.
Mount the NSD004 disk image you created and open an OS/2 window. Change to drive A: and run NSDINSTL.EXE
Click Specify directories
Defaults look good. Hit OK.
Then click Copy program files
Then click Start
Files are copied...
Done! Click OK.
Then Exit
We've got to reboot. Hit OK then shutdown and reboot.
All done! NetWare OS/2 Requester version 1.3 is installed and patched.
Logging In
To login: open an OS/2 Window, switch to L drive, change into the OS/2 directory and run the login command:
And login normally!
The login script runs, drives are mapped.
And we can see the network!
That was all done with my NetWare 3.2 server. I've shutdown my NetWare 3.2 server and restart OS/2. Lets see how it likes NetWare 4.11...
Not surprising. The NetWare 4.11 version of the OS/2 login command doesn't work under OS/2 2.0 either.
Version 2.0 of the OS/2 Requester came with its own copy of login.exe. Does version 1.3?
No. So the v1.3 requester can't login to NetWare 4.11 on its own.
More Screenshots
I've started my NetWare 3.2 server back up and restarted OS/2. Lets see if I can at least use the NetWare 3.2 login command to attach to a NetWare 4.11 server...
That works fine.
And thats all there is to this client! No graphical tools - just the standard command line stuff. It runs login scripts and maps directories so thats better than the NT 3.50 client at least!
If you're using a NetWare 4.11 server (and maybe earlier 4.x versions) you'll probably want to put the contents of those OS2UTIL disks somewhere for use by OS/2 1.3 as the NetWare 4.11 versions of the OS/2 utilites are incompatible with the v1.3 requester. One possible solution which I've not tested yet:
- Take server backups (or at least backups of the OS2 directories)
- Copy LOGIN.EXE and its dependencies to C:\NETWARE when you install the client
- Alter SERVINST.CMD on OS2UTIL-1 and change the install paths on lines 34-36:
- \\%SERVER%\SYS\LOGIN\OS2 becomes \\%SERVER%\SYS\LOGIN\OS2_13
- \\%SERVER%\SYS\SYSTEM\OS2 becomes \\%SERVER%\SYS\SYSTEM\OS2_13
- \\%SERVER%\SYS\PUBLIC\OS2 becomes \\%SERVER%\SYS\PUBLIC\OS2_13
- Alter login scripts to detect pre-2.0 requesters and map drives to the OS2_13 directories instead of the OS2 directories
Disclaimer & Comments
I'm not a netware expert, don't have any of those fancy novell certifications and have never administred a netware network; I've just played with it at home occasionally since 2004 or so. Email me if you've got any suggestsions or corrections for this page or any extra information you think is worth including here. My address is david at this websites domain name (without the www bit of course).