NWLink is installed from the Protocols tab in the Network Properties dialog box. See Figure 9-4. NWLink is very easy to install and requires no configuration at the time of installation. NWLink NetBIOS also appears as an installed protocol when NWLink is installed on a computer.

NWLink NetBIOS enables Windows NT computers to use Novell NetBIOS to communicate with Novell servers and other Windows NT machines using NWLink. The NWLink NetBIOS item cannot be removed separately from NWLink, or configured in any way. Microsoft’s NWLink NetBIOS includes some features not available in Novell’s IPX/SPX NetBIOS. Consequently, these features are not used when a Windows NT machine communicates with a NetWare server.

1. Go to the Network Properties dialog box by right-clicking Network Neighborhood and selecting Properties, or by double-clicking the Network icon in Control Panel.
2. Select the Protocols tab and click the Add button.
3. Select NWLink IPX/SPX Compatible Transport and click OK.
4. Enter the path to the Windows NT Workstation 4.0 source files, if necessary, and click OK.

NetWare has a number of different frame types that can be used with Ethernet, and while Windows NT can automatically detect which one is in use, it may be necessary at times to force a certain frame type to be used. The following four frame types can be selected in addition to Auto Detect:

When Auto Detect is selected, Windows NT listens for each frame type in the order listed above. If none of these is detected, Windows NT uses the Ethernet 802.2 frame type by default.

In the NWLink IPX/SPX Properties dialog box, you can’t see which frame type was detected and used when Auto Detect is selected. To see this information, you must use the IPXROUTE CONFIG command, which tells you what frame type is being used, and to which network adapters each frame type is bound. The IPXROUTE command has other functions as well, such as displaying the Service Advertising Protocol (SAP) table and viewing IPX statistics. You can see the available options by entering IPXROUTE /? at the command line.

The frame type and network number can be changed from the NWLink IPX/SPX Properties dialog box. However, if you need to use multiple frame types, you must use a Registry editing tool to accomplish this with Windows NT Workstation. Configuring Windows NT Server to use multiple frame types can be done with the NWLink IPX/SPX Properties dialog box, shown in Figure 9-5. Do not attempt to configure the IPX frame type by changing the Registry unless it is absolutely necessary—your computer can crash if this Registry key is incorrectly altered. Information regarding this Registry key and its values can be obtained in the Windows NT Registry Entries Help file, in the Windows NT Workstation 4.0 Resource Kit, Microsoft TechNet, or other third-party books with Registry entry documentation.

It is possible to use more than one frame type at once, and doing so is a rather common practice. However, just as the use of multiple protocols diminishes network performance, using two or more frame types also causes network performance degradation.

The IPX network number is used to identify the physical network segment attached to the computer so that IPX traffic can be routed. Each physical network segment in an IPX environment must have one or more unique network numbers. Windows NT Workstation automatically detects the IPX network number in use on the attached segment if the frame type is set to Auto Detect, or 0 (zero) is entered as the network number.

1. Select the Protocols tab in the Network Properties dialog box.
2. Select NWLink IPX/SPX Compatible Transport and click the Properties button.
3. In the Frame Type field, pull down the drop-down list and select the frame type you wish to use.
4. In the Network Number field, enter the network number you wish to use, or enter the number zero, for Windows NT to automatically detect the network number. If the Frame Type is set to Auto Detect, the Network Number field will be grayed out.

Listed below are some scenarios to help in determining the best way to configure the frame type to be used by Windows NT on your network:

Q & A

CSNW is installed from the Services tab in the Network Properties dialog box. It does not require any configuration at the time of installation, but will prompt each user, the first time he or she logs on, for the preferred server or preferred tree and context.

You will notice that once CSNW is installed, selecting the Client Service for NetWare item on the Network Services tab causes the Configure button to become disabled. Instead, a CSNW icon is added to the Control Panel, as illustrated in Figure 9-6. Double-clicking this icon brings up the CSNW configuration dialog box.

1. Select the Services tab in the Network Properties dialog box.
2. Click the Add button and select Client Service for NetWare in the Select Network Service dialog box.
3. Click OK and enter the path to the Windows NT Workstation 4.0 source files, if necessary, and click OK to finish.
4. Restart the computer for the new network changes to take effect.

1. After you have installed CSNW, the Select NetWare Logon dialog box, Figure 9-7, appears when you log on to the computer. This dialog can also be invoked after the first logon by double-clicking the CSNW icon that is added to the Control Panel. The Overview button on this dialog box brings up the CSNW Help file, which contains lots of good information.
2. If you want to use a bindery logon to a specific server, select the Preferred Server radio button, and choose in the Select Preferred Server field the server to which you wish to log on at startup.
3. If you are logging in to an NDS tree, select the Default Tree and Context radio button and complete the Default Tree and Context fields accordingly.
4. Check the Run Login Script checkbox if you want the NetWare logon script to execute at the time of authentication.

After NWLink and CSNW are installed, Windows NT has two redirectors enabled, the Microsoft Network and the NetWare Network. By default, the NetWare Network is placed first in the network access order for both network and print providers. This order can easily be changed via the Network Access Order dialog box, which is reached by clicking the Network Access Order button that is added to the Network Services tab after CSNW is installed. See Figure 9-8.

For best performance, the network that you use most should be at the top of the access order. For instance, if the file server you access most is a NetWare server, but your network printing is done through a Windows NT Server, NetWare or Compatible Network should be at the top of the Network Providers list, and LanMan Print Services should be the first Print Provider.

1. Select the Services tab on the Network dialog box and click the Network Access Order button.
2. Select the network provider that you want to be first in the access order and click the Move Up button until it is at the top of the list.
3. Select the print provider that you want to be first in the access order and click the Move Up button until it is at the top of the list.

Once NWLink and CSNW are installed and configured, you can connect to NetWare resources with Windows NT Explorer or from the command line. This gives both users and administrators the same flexibility they have connecting to Windows NT Servers. Users can browse their way to resources, and administrators can use the command line to attach resources in logon scripts and batch files.

With NT Workstation, Microsoft offers a reasonable NetWare client for attaching to NetWare file and print servers. This client supports both bindery and NDS modes, which makes it suitable for almost any environment.

Installing the client is easy and straightforward—just click a few places and you’re done. The installation setup is even smart enough to know that you need to have the NWLINK protocol installed to connect to the NetWare server. It installs the NWLINK protocol while you are installing Client Services for NetWare (CSNW), if the protocol is not present. What could be easier?

We get calls from clients saying that after installing CSNW, they can attach to some of the NetWare servers and not others. What is the problem? The most frequent problem is the frame type that NT is using.

Novell servers come in general categories. 3.x operating systems and 4.x operating systems. Generally speaking, the NetWare 3.x servers use a frame type designated as 802.3, and the 4.x servers use a frame type designated as 802.2. As a side note, 802.2 is an IEEE standard known as Logical Link Control (LLC.) You might be familiar with the Microsoft implementation, Data Link Control (DLC). The 802.2 protocol is also known as Source Routing.

When you install CSNW, by default NT attempts to auto-detect which type of frame type is being used. This is really cool, because you don’t have to know what the frame type is. Unfortunately, it only auto-configures for one frame type or the other. And, if it detects both frame types (802.3 and 802.2) on the network, it has a bias to auto-configure to support the 802.2 frame type.

One of our clients was a NetWare 3.x shop, migrating from NetWare 3.x to both NetWare 4.x and NT. The client had both frame types on the wire. NT auto-detected the 802.2 frame and configured to support that frame type. Thus the client could not attach to their 3.x NetWare servers.

The solution is to configure CSNW for both frame types manually.

Mapping network drives and browsing files on a NetWare server with Windows NT Explorer are practically the same as mapping drives and browsing files on a Windows NT Server. The most significant difference is that NetWare servers appear under the NetWare Compatible Network in the Network Neighborhood, while Windows NT Servers appear under the Microsoft Windows Network.

1. Double-click the Network Neighborhood. If the server you wish to connect to is present, go to step 4.
2. Double-click Entire Network, and then double-click NetWare or Compatible Network. If the server you are connecting to is present, go to step 4.
3. Double-click the NDS tree that contains the server you are connecting to. Continue browsing through the organizational units until you see the server.
4. Double-click the server and then right-click a folder and select Map Network Drive to connect a network drive to the folder, or just double-click the folder to browse its contents.

Connecting to NetWare print queues is just like connecting to shared printers on Windows NT computers. Three print queue configuration options are available in the CSNW dialog box, which is started with the CSNW icon in the Control Panel. If you want to eject a page at the end of each print job, check the Add Form Feed option; choose Notify When Printed to receive notification that your document has been printed; and select Print Banner for a banner page to be printed before each print job.

1. Double-click the Network Neighborhood. If the server you want to connect to is present, go to step 4.
2. Double-click Entire Network, and then double-click NetWare or Compatible Network. If the server you are connecting to is present, go to step 4.
3. Double-click the NDS tree that contains the server you are connecting to. Continue browsing through the organizational units until you see the server.
4. Double-click the server. The contents of the server contain printer icons for each available print queue on the server.
5. Double-click the print queue that you wish to use. Continue setting up the printer by specifying make and model to install the appropriate drivers, and by naming the printer.

How you map network drives and connect to print queues on NetWare servers with the command line varies, depending on whether the server is using bindery services or NDS. Listed below are examples of how to use command line utilities to make drive and printer connections with either bindery or NDS servers.

Q & A