Installing NetWare OS/2 Client 2.01 on IBM OS/2 2.0
A quick overview of installing what is possibly the last officially supported NetWare client release for IBM OS/2 2.0.
Contents
Tools
Things you'll need to follow along:
- A VM with:
- IBM OS/2 2.0
- Bridged networking (IPX won't get through NAT)
- A NIC with Netware OS/2 drivers (I'm using PCnet-PCI II)
- A copy of version 2.01 of the OS/2 NetWare client (available from the OS/2 Netware Clients page).
Creating the VM and installing OS/2 2.0 are out of scope for this document as nothing special is required beyond perhaps rebooting if it crashes on startup (a problem with fast CPUs I think - if this gets annoying the latest fixpack fixes it).
To make things easier I've placed the contents of the three client zip files plus the OS/2 PCnet driver into four disk images:
WSOS2_1.IMA | WSOS2_2.IMA | WSDRV_1.IMA | pcnet.IMA
Installing
We're starting off with a fresh install of OS/2. Doesn't matter if any fixpacks are installed or not for this.
Mount the WSOS2_1 disk in the VM and run A:\INSTALL.EXE
The NetWare installer. This looks exactly the same as the installer for the final version of the client. It confused me a lot the first time - I thought it had opened a text editor, not an install program.
Choose the Requester on workstation option from the Installation menu.
The default directory should be fine. Click OK.
Default option (Edit CONFIG.SYS and Copy All Files) is the one we want. Click OK.
Driver selection time. This screen is a bit odd. Click the drop-down arrow...
And it asks you for a disk. Mount the pcnet disk image (or WSDRV_1 if you're not using a PCNet card) and click OK.
And the drop-down list opens with all the drivers available on the disk. PCNTNW.OS2 is the driver for the PCNet card.
Continue...
Choose if you want DOS and Windows sessions to have network access and if so what sort of access. Private: All DOS and Windows sessions have separate logins to NetWare from each other and from OS/2. Global: All DOS, Windows and OS/2 sessions share a single NetWare login.
I'm going with on and global:
You don't need any of this stuff for basic file services. SPX support may be handy so I'm going to install it (don't see any reason why not).
Asking where to save CONFIG.SYS changes to. The default is fine.
Here its asking if you want to install all possbile LAN drivers or just the one you chose. Installing only one seems a sensible option.
Make sure the driver disk (either pcnet or WSDRV_1 - which ever you used before) is in the drive then hit OK.
Network drivers have been copied, now you're about to install the client itself. Click OK.
And insert the WSOS2_1 disk.
Copying files... (progress is in the status bar of the main window in the background)
Insert disk WSOS2_2 and click ok...
More file copying...
Done! You can now exit the install utility (double click on the icon in the top left of the window)
And we've got to reboot next.
Right click on the desktop, shutdown...
OK.
Shutting down...
Time to reboot!
Network driver starting up...
And we're back! With a new Novell icon on the desktop! (if you can't see it, it might be on top of the Windows Programs icon in the top left)
More Screenshots
To login, go into the Command Prompts folder and open a new OS/2 Window
Then switch to L: drive, change into the OS2 folder and run login
Enter username and password...
Logged in! Kind of weird that OS/2 doesn't get a graphical login screen. You can close the terminal now.
Network drives are mounted...
Files on the netware server.
There is a network folder on the desktop...
And in it a NetWare folder...
Containing one server! I actually have two on the network. The other one, VNW411 (NetWare 4.11), isn't showing for some reason. It has in the past beore I setup VNW32 (NetWare 3.2) - I guess this client just prefers NetWare 3.x? Which is fine as this client seems to struggle a bit with 4.11 anyway.
Settings window has a network status tab.
Volumes on server VNW32.
Volume has a Network Status tab too.
Stuff on the SYS volume, browsed directly Network Neighbourhood-style without a mapped drive.
Seems OS/2 supports UNC paths.
That Novell folder on the desktop. NetWare TSA is some app for backing up the server t
NetWare TSA. This is for backing up the workstation to the server IIRC.
Install is just the install program. Useful if you need to make config changes.
Network Printer: for network printing. I don't have any printers setup with OS/2 or netware so I guess this does nothing for me.
Last but not least: NetWare Tools. This is pretty similar to apps from around this era that were provided for Windows 3.1 and MacOS. I've found sometimes if you're not already logged in from the console this may not show any servers or mapped drives. Possbily a bug or possibly just a result of how my network is setup (this in a VM, two instances of netware in VMS on a different computer, software ethernet bridges, etc)
Double-clicking on a mapped drive gives you this. Double clicking on an unmapped drive is the same dialog but with less filled in.
Drives menu
The tools menu. The disk drives window is already open.
Printer ports
Printers menu
Double click a parallel port to setup network printing.
Servers showing my lone NetWare 3.2 server that I'm currently logged into.
Servers menu
Attach. Kind of like a login screen but doesn't run login scripts like the console login does.
Change password
Double-click a server to logout.
Directory Tree: this client is NDS compatbile but for some reason it can't see my tree at the moment.
The Tree menu.
Change tree
Change context
Login: The closest to a GUI login for OS/2. Only supports NDS (NetWare 4.0+) and doesn't run login scripts. So the console login is still the best option.
User List - select server
User list for server VNW32
Users menu
Send message
And this is what its like to receive a message on OS/2! It takes over your entire screen!
Print queues - if I had any.
And thats the client for OS/2 2.0. Not much different from the clients for OS/2 2.1x, 3.0 and 4.0 really. OS/2 2.0 is pretty neat though given it pre-dates Windows 3.1. You can certainly see where a lot of Windows 95 features came from!
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).